A very Happy New Year and I hope it’s a positive and fulfilling year for you and yours.
My LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram feeds are full to the brim of posts on Goal Setting. It’s that time of the year. They are everywhere. This however is not another post on how to set goals. It’s a few of my thoughts on some good things to keep in mind when you feel a case of Goal Setting FOMO coming along.
Focus on YOUR OWN business and personal goals
The first point I would make is to focus on YOUR OWN business and/or personal goals. That’s whats important. Other organisation’s and people’s goals are just that. They are THEIR goals. Some may be good, some less so. Some may be overly ambitious and unrealistic, some less so. Who knows? So don’t compare and despair with your goal setting. Goals come in all shapes and sizes. Not every goal needs to knock your socks off!
What matters is that your goals serve you.
Don’t get me wrong. I’ve nothing at all against goal setting when its done correctly. I’ll spend a lot of this month with businesses and individuals working on their goals and plans for 2021 and beyond. Its a very positive and important process. When goals are worked on correctly, they can result in better focus, provide milestones to measure progress against, keep motivation levels up, stimulate consistent planned action, increase performance and help companies and individuals to move closer to what they want to be.
And that’s the key point. Our goals need to HELP us with all of the above. If our goals are not doing that, then we are missing the point. How many times have we set goals for ourselves and for the first couple of weeks or months it’s all happy days. Then we hit some roadblocks and challenges and all of a sudden instead of our (unrealistic?) goals motivating us to take action, they are demotivating us. We start to feel guilty and frustrated. Sound familiar?
SMART goals that are AMBITIOUS but ACHIEVEABLE, REALISTIC and SUSTAINABLE
A consistent approach I take with companies and individuals is to help them to create SMART goals that are AMBITIOUS but ACHIEVEABLE, REALISTIC and SUSTAINABLE also. I like a stretch goal as much as the next person. Its good to challenge yourself and get yourself out of your comfort zone too. Just so long as the goals continue to have the impact of helping you to get to where you want to be. If that’s not happening, then it’s time to reassess your goals and how you are setting them.
Make sure your goals are serving you!