Making It Happen

The holiday season is here.  Organizationally, it is strategic planning time, budgets are being finalized and most of us are buckling down to finish out the year with a bang.  Personally, most are making gift lists and thinking about their New Years resolutions.

Last year for Christmas, my husband got me a book called Living Your Best Year Ever, which is filled with goal-setting activities and personal and professional challenges.  I'd had a tough year, and was honestly wishing it was a pair of earrings instead because that was easier than facing the realities of wanting to change several big things in my life.  But I knew I needed to change things if I wanted things to change, so I dug into the book.

While at first I was overwhelmed with its intensity, the (seemingly simple, yet hard to make habitual) act of writing down my goals and following the plan of daily activities directly tied to my goals was a powerful and enlightening experience. 

“Goal setting is the most important aspect of all improvement and personal development plans.  Confidence is important, determination is vital, certain personality traits contribute to success, but they all come into focus in goal setting.”           -Paul J. Meyer

For the three big goals I had for myself this year, the book had me focused every day on the things I could do to get me to my goals.  Surprisingly, my most difficult goal was met first…by March 6. 

“Living a more balanced life” – well, I’m still working on that, but, with a great support network around me and those I have shared my goals with who keep me accountable, I am markedly closer than I was in January.

We all have big goals for ourselves, and many people succeed in great feats like losing 100 pounds, finding their dream job, or starting their own business.  The one thing these people have in common is that they calibrate their daily lives around these goals.  They figure out what they can do on a daily basis that would get them closest to their goal, measure their progress daily, set weekly goals, and do monthly reviews of what works and what doesn’t.

“To achieve something you have never achieved before you must become someone you have never been.”  -Les Brown

Reaching big goals, personal or professional, whether it is to achieve a new feat in loan growth or to write a novel, is a daily execution of smaller tasks and measurement.  And you can’t do it alone.  If it is organizational, involve your staff in the goal setting and measurement.  Make measuring your progress a team activity.  Put up one of those thermometer pages and draw it in each time you get closer to that goal.  The more people in your organization who you involve in this process, the more successful you will be.

If it is a personal goal, tell someone close to you what your plans are and share your progress with him/her along the way.  You'll always push yourself harder if you know you have someone holding you accountable on a regular basis.  But most important in this process is stopping to assess your progress along the way in order to make improvements and celebrate successes.

Reaching goals requires continued awareness and a lifestyle of commitment to the growth and improvement you want in all areas of life.  It is a journey, and not a destination.  Here's to a great ending to 2013, and an upcoming year of bests.

“Go confidently in the direction of your dreams.  Live the life you’ve imagined.”              -Henry David Thoreau

Amanda

Working Backwards to Move Forward

Have you ever planned a campaign or event and were running around last minute scrambling to complete everything in time? If so, a backwards plan may be exactly what you need. Begin with the end in mind. Backwards planning is a great time management tool. By planning a campaign or event backwards it is easier to guarantee nothing is missed and everything comes together perfectly.

First, define the end result. Then record every step and sequence to receive the result. Finally, create the deadline driven timeline. Use a blank calendar and mark down the number of days until the event or campaign launch. Be sure to exclude the days you aren’t at work, such as weekends and holidays, etc. This will give you and your team an accurate picture of where you are and how much time is left to complete each task.

This same concept works as well for setting personal and career goals. 

Success to you!

Melissa

September already, really?

I honestly can’t believe it’s the first week of September! I mean I saw June 1^st, July 1^st and August 1^st come and go…but boy, September already? Good things come with September: school starts, football starts, apple cider, the leaves will begin to change, and fall is in the air, I could go on and on. 

September also means there are only 3 months following until the end of the year. How is the rest of 2010 going to shape up for you? Personally, professionally take a look at the calendar. Are there goals you set at the beginning of the year that have fallen off your to-do list? Have new goals appeared on your list? With the change of the calendar maybe now is a good time to look at those goals and reprioritize them for the final stretch of the year. Think of what you set out to accomplish in 2010 and how do those goals help with that accomplishment? Let’s get there together!

Here I thought when the kids went back to school things would start to slow down. I was only kidding myself. What that really meant was I could finally dive deeper into work.

Some give up their designs when they have almost reached the goal; while others, on the contrary, obtain a victory by exerting, at the last moment, more vigorous efforts than before.
 -Polybius