Welcome to the New Year! I love this time of year – a fresh start and the perfect opportunity to readjust and realign both personally and professionally. And many of you know, it’s also when I choose my new Word of the Year. This word represents a concept or value that I want to deliberately focus on in the coming months. For me, resolutions and long lists of goals often feel intimidating and overwhelming. I find that narrowing my focus to a single, meaningful word feels more manageable and impactful.
In 2024, my Word of the Year was Expansion – with a focus on growing, improving, and stretching myself. And believe me – I was stretched last year. Kansas Tourism experienced incredible growth. As a team, we faced the challenges that come with rapid expansion, including growing pains and moments of exhaustion. Personally, I struggled to schedule time to recharge, often feeling like I was just trying to keep my head above water.
So going into 2025, I found that choosing my Word of the Year wasn’t easy. I had many ideas and concepts swirling in my mind but just could not land on the perfect word. But it finally all came together a few days ago when I was doing one of my least favorite responsibilities – scheduling my car for maintenance. I will admit…I am not a good car owner. I’ll put off oil changes, delay buying new tires as long as I possibly can, and don’t even get me started on needing to change my differential fluid – whatever that is! But when my car’s dashboard keeps flashing and reminding me that required maintenance is due – I know that I can’t just keep ignoring it. Eventually it will catch up with me. As my youngest son once told me (in the pouring rain with a very irritated tone after changing my flat tire caused by worn-out tires), “Just take care of business Mom”. Lesson learned. Paying attention to those blinking alerts and timely addressing maintenance is necessary to keep everything running smoothly.
This led me to my Word of the Year for 2025…Calibrate.
Calibrate is defined as “the deliberate process of fine-tuning and aligning systems, strategies, and actions to ensure precision, effectiveness, and harmony in achieving desired outcomes in a constantly evolving environment.” Wow. Take a moment to read that again. I can’t think of a better word to embrace this year.
With the ongoing growth and changes in the tourism industry, 2025 is my year to focus on being deliberate in refining programs and strategies to assure everything is aligned and operating smoothly. And Calibrate does not mean to stop growth or evolution; it means being intentional and strategic to ensure that growth is effective. It also means prioritizing maintenance – both for operations and for myself – so everything continues to run at peak performance. It is alignment. It is taking care of business.
So here is to 2025 – the year to Calibrate. And to get the differential fluid changed in my car.
I can’t wait to see what 2025 is going to bring.
To The Stars,
