Setting Goals for 2011

Every year, I take some personal time to assess, adjust, write new goals for the New Year and make a plan for achieving those goals. I’d like to share part of this process with you – and encourage you to use it for yourself to create a powerful, prosperous and joyful 2011. I hope you will find this peek into my process helpful.

In this eighth post in the series, I’m moving into the second step of my process –

Goal Setting for 2011

There are three steps to this process:

1. Reviewing my Goals for 2010
2. Setting 1 Year Goals for 2011
3. Breaking those goals down into 3-4 month increments

Reviewing My Goals from 2010

When looking back at my goals from the previous year I want to do 3 things:

1. Celebrate my successes – Woo Hoo!
2. Look at what worked and didn’t work – particularly around the goals I didn’t accomplish
3. Apply those lessons to the coming year

Looking at my goals from last year was very confronting as for the most part, I didn’t complete them.  Yes, I’m admitting it publicly.  I’m a coach – and I’m not perfect.

Whew – there, I said it.  But that’s part of the point of this blog.  It’s not about – look at me, see what a guru I am – don’t you want to be like me?  It’s more about – here’s my process.  I’m human just like you.  And I’m a work in progress.  And that means – if I can do it, so can you!  And hopefully, there are things I can contributed to your process to make you more successful.

So, in looking back at last year and looking specifically at what worked and didn’t work, I’ve seen some things that I want to share with you.

Set Goals With Specific Deadlines

In writing my goals last year, I just wrote the goals – I didn’t give each goal a specific deadline.  I was writing what I wanted to accomplish at some point during the year.  What didn’t work was being specific about when I would be accomplishing it.  Lacking a specific time frame, I didn’t know when I was supposed to start working on them and they just kept getting pushed by more urgent things.

So, this year, I will not only write specific Deadlines for the accomplishment of each goal, but also set a start date for each project.

Keep Goals in the Forefront of Your Awareness

I wrote those goals and then set them aside.  I didn’t post them anywhere and I didn’t refer to them.  Yes, I knew they were my goals for the year.  But they weren’t in the forefront of my awareness – and so it was really easy to postpone beginning those projects.

In addition, because I’m not currently working with a coach and no longer have a business partner – there were no other voices holding me accountable to those commitments.

So, this year, I’ll do a few things differently:

• Send my goals to my accountability partner, and ask for her support in achieving them.
• Post my goals on my bulletin board and read them every morning

Build a Structure for Accomplishing Your Goals

Last year, I moved my business out of my home.  And I somehow never re-established my time management structure with my new circumstances.  It all fell by the wayside and I found myself running my day by the seat of my pants.  That has never worked for me in the past – and there were many ways it didn’t work for me last year.  And I knew it wasn’t working for me.  I intended to spend the summer really setting up those structures.  But then my Dad got sick and everything changed.

Now that I’ve moved across country and I will be having even more demands on my time, I know that re-establishing my foundation is absolutely vital both to my business success, but also to my own happiness and satisfaction in my life.

So, here’s my plan:

1. Write my goals with start and end dates and share those with my accountability partner
2. Break the larger goals down into sub-goals with start and end dates
3. Create PRD’s for 2011 first quarter for each area of my life and make sure my goals are built into those PRD’s
4. Create a Time Map for my current situation and implement that map immediately
5. Re-institute my daily bookends (morning and evening rituals)