30 Days "Take Action" Program - Day 5

Goals - Taking a Bite out of Goals

People often feel overwhelmed by the idea of building their business. They may have a big goal and even real needs but find it difficult to take the steps required because it is just too BIG. Thinking big is a great thing, but when it comes to building a business it's the little things that count. Most of the small steps are in fact critical to developing a successful business.

So the secret to successful goal setting is setting goals that include the little steps as well as the BIG destination. It's like the saying "How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time."

Our BIG Goals need to be pursued in bite size pieces. As we achieve the smaller goals our big goal gets closer to completion. If you have or are going to invest money, time and energy to building your business it's essential that you have goals in place.

Goals allow you to live your life your way through the power of personal planning. Properly-set goals can be incredibly motivating as well, and as you get in the habit of setting and achieving goals the benefits you receive are both professional and personal.

Goals also allow us to achieve more with focus, that is why top level executives, athletes and professionals use them. It's because they work!

Setting Goals

Merriam-Webster defines a goal as "the end toward which effort is directed." Goals may be either short to long term. Long term goals can take three to five years, whereas short term can be daily, weekly, monthly. A medium range goal is yearly.

When we actually set goals regularly like in the case of daily, weekly or monthly, they are fairly simple goals, ie., contact two prospects a day, finish a welcome to team email this week, obtain 5 new team members this month, and these short term goals can build towards, medium and long range goals.

Goal Setting Tips:

• Be Positive: Express your goals positively, make sure a goal is something you want rather than something you want to avoid. Example: 'Write a good marketing email' is a much better goal than 'Don't make any stupid spelling errors in marketing emails'
• Be Precise: You must be able to measure your goals so set dates, times and details so that you can measure achievement.
• Set Priorities: When you have several goals, give each a priority. This helps you to avoid feeling overwhelmed by too many goals, and helps to direct your attention to the most important ones.
• Write goals down: this crystallizes them and gives them more force.
• Be Realistic: Keep the short term goals you are working towards achievable. Make sure you have the ability and skills necessary to reach your goal. Make your goals incremental, so that Daily goals, build to weekly goals, and weekly to monthly, monthly to yearly, building all the way to long term goals.
• Set Controllable Goals: You should take care to set goals over which you have as much control as possible. There is nothing more discouraging than failing to achieve a goal for reasons beyond your control.
• Do It Your Way: All sorts of people (parents, media, society) can set unrealistic goals for you. So when making your plans be sure you are setting goals based on your needs and abilities.
• Raise the Bar: If you are afraid or unsure you may set your goals to low. The aim is to set up goals just to the point where you can just reach them and not beyond your reach. This will ensure that goals are obtainable and yet get you to stretch your limits.

Achieving Goals

Achieving a goal can represent milestones on many levels dependant on the reason behind the goal. So when you have achieved a goal, take the time to enjoy the satisfaction of having done so. Be aware of the journey in fulfilling a goal and learn from each one.

Goals in reviews:

• If you achieved the goal too easily, make your next goals more challenging.
• If the goal took a disheartening length of time to achieve, make the next goals a little easier.
• If you learned something that would lead you to change other goals, do so.
• If while achieving the goal you noticed that you need more skills, then set goals to get the skills.

Failure to meet goals does not matter as long as you learn from it. Goal Setting is a process and both successes and failures teach you things if you are willing to learn.

To discover more about the power of goal setting, Empowerism have Goal Setting plans. Go to Empowerism to find out how Goals can assist you in building your business.

Setting Up Your Goals

STEP 1: Set aside 10 to 15 minutes before you go to bed or as soon as you wake up in the morning to jot a to-do goal list for the next day.

STEP 2: Use any format that is comfortable for you, try writing in your daily planner. Make sure your list is on one page and can be carried with you wherever you go.

STEP 3: Try assigning tasks to hourly slots, even if exact timing isn't crucial.

STEP 4: Fill in preset, mandatory appointments such as business meetings or child-pickup times.

STEP 5: Prioritize tasks in order of urgency, and write those down before less important ones.

STEP 6: Figure out when, during the day, you are most productive and alert. Schedule the more demanding tasks during these times.

STEP 7: Schedule an easy job after a difficult one or a long task after a short one to keep yourself stimulated. This is also a mini reward for you for tackling the harder task.

STEP 8: Indicate time for breaks and time to spend with family and friends. Balance in your life will make you more productive in the long run.

STEP 9: In addition to your daily schedule, keep an ongoing list of projects that you need to accomplish, but haven't penciled into your daily list ' people to email, people to call, things to fix around the house, bills to mail. Update this list at least once a week.

STEP 10: Try keeping a list of long-term goals. For example, you might be planning to be full time marketing within one year, remodel your home or return to school for an advanced degree.