What's the best possible outcome?

True story: I was voted most pessimistic in my high school class.

I knew it wasn't an accurate title (after all – my immediate response was "Huh – well at least enough people know my name to think to vote for me")

I'm still not sure why that superlative was even a thing (I also got "First Person to Write a Book" and as far as I know, I'm still in the running for that one) – but a *lot* has changed since then.

Now, one of the most common questions I ask leadership coaching clients going through a negative work experience is: "What's the best possible outcome from this situation?"

Sometimes the answers come easily ("Having an absentee manager means I have more room to try out new things"), sometimes we're digging deep ("Now I know how *not* to motivate my team members"), but inevitably, we're able to realize that there are many possible ways a given scenario can turn out – and some of those ways can actually benefit us.

It's tempting to proactively problem-solve and try to mitigate negative outcomes, but when we have limited information, we can end up spending a lot of energy worrying about something that may not even happen. It puts us in defensive mode, reacting to what's going on.

Thinking about positive outcomes puts us in an active mode – we can think of opportunities, get a clearer vision of what we're moving towards, and get a better sense of our priorities. Instead of being in damage-control mode, we have a bias toward action and creation instead.

What's the best possible outcome from this situation?