Everyone of us has set goals for our personal life as well as for our business life. As we begin the New Year, many of us will set some goals. They may include losing some weight, exercising more, quitting smoking, being active in our community, or spending more quality time with our family. In their business life, people will set goals to be more organized, earn more money, grow a business, complete a training course, get that promotion, or join a professional association.
These are certainly all worthy goals. However just like last year or the previous year, most of these goals will not be achieved. Why? Usually because they were not set properly to begin with, or the person setting the goal was really not committed to achieving it.
Your attitude is critical – To achieve anything worthwhile in life you must have a positive mental attitude no matter what other successful attributes we possess. A positive mental attitude is the energy that when combined with our other skills and attributes, allows us to reach our goals. Success is achieved and maintained by people who work hard with a positive mental attitude. We believe work actually becomes fun when we set and achieve specific goals. All successful people have a definite purpose combined with a positive attitude. They constantly ask, “Where am I going? What do I really want? What are my goals?” When this happens, we know your work becomes more enjoyable and rewarding instead of an unpleasant means of paying your bills. You become self-motivated and enthusiastic. And that enthusiasm turns into achievement!
The importance of self-management – Good self-managers enjoy their work because they accomplish more and they give themselves more credit. You can increase your performance by improving your self-management abilities. Setting personal and business goals are tools that will help you improve your self-management
Be Positive - State what you want to do. If you want to avoid or stop doing something, state your goal in terms of what you want to do instead.
Set a Deadline - A deadline provides you with the needed time frame for achieving your goal. It gives you something to aim for.
Be Specific - You’ll want to measure your progress as you work toward your goal. The more specific your goal, the easier it is to measure your progress. Always quantify your goal.
Be Realistic - Goals should be realistic and yet cause you to “stretch” to reach it. Setting unrealistically high goals will cause you or your people to feel badly for attaining only 90%, or worse, they may not even try to make it. Better to set smaller goals, meet them, and then set a higher goal.
Write Your Goals Down - You must be able to write your goal down. Your goal statement must answer as many of the following questions as possible.
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