My decade of agile experience has given me the privilege to help companies find new ways to get the most value from their efforts, while allowing their people to feel valuable and valued. I've also found ways to get the most value from my own personal effort and know that I'm valued and valuable in both my work and personal life.
In September, our way of life was about to be disrupted by the largest storm that ever threatened the Continental United States.
The predictions were scary. Irma would make a direct hit on the entire state of Florida.
The Governor announced on local television stations "Evacuate now. We can rebuild your home, but we cannot rebuild your life".
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/hurricane-irma-rick-scott_us_59b00079e4b0dfaafcf453bc
Millions of Floridians, especially those in the low-lying Florida Keys, listened, and left. The storm hit the Mountains of Cuba, slowing it's progress and shifting it's trajectory west. The Ft Lauderdale/Miami area was spared. Key West flooded but recovered quickly. Key Largo had less damage than expected. The rest of the Keys weren't so lucky, especially Cudjoe Key, where the storm made landfall, and Big Pine Key, which was on the northeast "dirty side". Tornadoes caused massive destruction, the storm surge created a 2-5 foot floods in many homes and homes that were standing the day before were broken into pieces in the canals, streets, and ocean.
My husband and I live in Pompano Beach. We weren't completely spared. We lost our seawall, and had flooding in our sunroom, but it could have been worse. We were about to find out how much worse.
See, we happened to be in Virginia when the hurricane came. Like most Floridians, I was more than concerned. The anxiety and stress caused me more than one sleepless night, even though I realized I could do nothing about what was going to happen. Then it dawned on me, my husband and I are uniquely prepared to change what happened after the storm.
Read the Post 2 to see how we responded.