Hi, my name is Gene and I am a Goalaholic.
How did this happen you ask? It all goes back to my childhood.
The root of my addiction goes back to my school experience. Going into my 5th grade year, my parents sent me to an alternative school that was based completely around goal setting. As students, we had to set yearly, quarterly, weekly and daily goals. Our grades and rewards were based entirely on our ability to meet our goals. As a result, I left that school with an obsessive attention to goals. It helped me over achieve, but it also drove those around me a little crazy.
I have a friend that recently coined the phrase “Geneapetraphobia,” meaning: the fear of having Gene as a friend because he will constantly ask you and talk about goals.
With this long history of dealing in the world of goals I have a few pointers that I love to pass on to others:
- Discover and align. What is important to you? What do you want out of life? What stories do you want told about you when it is all over? Some people are very uncomfortable with these questions, but they must be answered if you want to set and achieve quality goals.
Don’t know where to start in the discovery process? Use a business coach or talk to your trusted inner circle of friends. Since they know you and care about you, they may be able to point you in the right direction. Once you’ve discovered what’s important to you, you can start to align your short-term goals with where you want to go in life. When you do this, I guarantee the results will be powerful and transformative.
- Record and display. To accomplish your goals you need to have them in your face as much as possible. Write them on your bathroom mirror, put them on your refrigerator, make them the back ground on your computer or find a schedule and goal software that keeps them in front of you. There is nothing more powerful than daily visual goal reminders. At Petra Coach and in my lawn care companies we create “themes” every quarter built around one of our goals for the quarter. We post the theme everywhere with constant measurement updates, so we always know where we stand in regards to our quarterly goal.
- Measure. Find a way to break down your goals into portions that can be measured on the way to your deadline. For instance, if your goal is to lose ten pounds, break it down into three workouts a week for three months. This way you can chart your progress as you meet your mini gym date goals. Some goals are harder to do this with than others, but I have never found a goal that couldn’t be measured in some way. Hint: If you can’t find a way to measure your goal, refocus it. For more on this check out this online software that helps you with the process. https://aligntoday.com/
- Reward. After you break down your goals in a way that allows you to measure progress, reward yourself for staying on schedule.
If I meet my weekly targets before noon on Friday, I reward myself by leaving the office a few hours early. The catch, I have accountability partners. My team members know my personal reward criteria. If I go into my Friday meeting and report I’m not on target, they hold me to staying until 5. Contrarily, if I hit my goals, it’s freedom for the weekend.
What are the best ways you’ve found to set and reach your goals? Let me know in the comment section below.
Photo credit: <a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/weinand/5313296821/”>zen!</a> via <a href=”http://photopin.com”>photopin</a> <a href=”http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/”>cc</a>
