We’re getting down to the wire, and 2016 is about to be over. My New Year, New You series is drawing to a close…now that you’ve managed your to do list and your calendar and gone paperless, you need to set up some goals. A quick note on resolutions vs. goals. To me, the word “goals” conjures up a sense of importance, whereas “resolutions” feels more like “I’m gonna try hard but who knows!” That’s just me. Whatever YOU call them, goals or resolutions, you need a plan to make them happen. Today, I want to write about how to set your goals. This is NOT a post with advice on what goals to set (although I’ll share some ideas to get your wheels turning). This is a post that approaches goal setting as a task, and the best ways to keep track of your goals and accomplishing them. I’m not a psychologist or therapist (I am, however, an expert at telling people what to do). You’ll need to decide what’s important to you. Set-Up a System If you don’t take a few minutes to set-up a place to collect your thoughts and start making a list of possible goals, you’re going to get frustrated and overwhelmed. Creating a system to collect your thoughts and just get them written down can prove to be immensely helpful. Bonus points if you’re able to keep track of all your goals and their progress in that same system. Note, however, that it doesn’t have to be fancy. An Evernote notebook, a Trello board, a project in Todoist…whatever works for you will suffice. For me, I created a Trello board. It started with one column: Ideas. Start Collecting I added a ton of things to my initial list - I first entered anything in my brain that I wanted to accomplish in 2017. From there, I reviewed my “spark” tag in Evernote and made a list of all the things that, over time, was something I had considered. I took a look at my goals from last year - was there anything I didn’t get done but still want to try? I reviewed my business plans and a couple Pinterest boards. Finally, I took a look at things I may already do but want to continue or build upon. Admittedly, this list got long. It was more important to me to get as much on it as I was thinking about and plan (and remove) from there. Make a Plan After I had collected my thoughts, it was time to make a plan. First, my Trello board got some column additions:
For each goal, you’ll need to determine:
Goal #1 - Read three books a month NEEDS - Sometimes, these can seem obvious. Obviously, in order to read books, I’ll need books. Duh. But taking a step now and going a little bit further can allow your action steps to be as complete as possible. I’ll need a library card (to get books), and time to read the books. I’ll also need some way to keep track of what books I want to read and what I have read so far. SUCCESS - Because my goal has a specific target, by this time in 2017, I should have read 36 books. “Read more books” is a resolution, “read three books a month” makes it a goal. ACTION - I already have my library card, so that’s done. To keep things organized, I’ll stick with my Goodreads account; I just added a shelf for books this year. I added “Select books for the month” to the template I created in Todoist. And while I can’t create time, I’ll have to make an effort to set aside time to read. My card in Trello looked like this when I was done: Goal #2 - Redesign and launch website. NEEDS - Again, some of these are obvious. I’ll need some knowledge (i.e. research on some ideas to make my website better). I’ll need new headshots. I’ll need time to design and launch. SUCCESS - Obviously, launching a new website will be the desired, measurable outcome. But because I want to get this done sooner rather than later, this goal is going on my Date Specific column and has a due date of February 01 (and I’m already anxious that I announced this to the world, so hopefully this post keeps me accountable). ACTION - How am I going to get that knowledge? And those headshots? Ordinarily, I would create Todoist tasks, but my friend Megan Hogan is saving me a lot of time. Megan’s holding a “Launch a Website That Doesn’t Suck” workshop in January at 1701 (a co-working space where we’re both members). Talk about killing two birds with one stone. If you’re in the area, you can sign up for this event here. And while I don’t have a list of other tasks juuuuust yet, I’ll create a Todoist label to use when I start capturing tasks. Here’s a sneak peek of this goal’s card in Trello. A little simpler than the book card, but a good start nonetheless (and again, made SO MUCH easier because of Megan’s workshop): To Recap:To accomplish your goals, you first need to decide on some... CREATE A SYSTEM --> CAPTURE IDEAS --> MAKE A PLAN And to get to work on them, you need a plan... NEEDS, SUCCESS, ACTION The two goals I set out here are only two of a long list, so believe me when I say that this approach works for any number of goals you decide to set. Join me back here next week, where I'll be ready to reveal my new work area at home! You can subscribe to my mailing list here. You can also follow me on Twitter or Pinterest. If you’re in need of a virtual operations manager, check out my FAQs or available services, then head over to my consultation page so we can connect.
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