Earn more money, be a better colleague, or live healthier? Throw such goals away immediately. What does “earn more money” mean? Is it 1,000 kuna per month, 10 times that much, or 100 times that much? What does it mean to be a better colleague? Does it mean that you will spend more time with your coworkers at lunch, hang out with them every Friday after work, or help them with every project they have? Your goals should be perfectly clear to a six-year-old child and an eighty-year-old woman.
Can you somehow “measure” your progress? If your goals are financial, you can measure them in some currency. If they are related to weight loss, you can also monitor them on your scale. It’s not bad to have some kind of “measurement unit” that will help us determine our goals – you just need to be a little creative. Want to run your company better in 2020? No problem! How will you “measure” it? Through increased meetings with your key people, greater involvement in the hiring process of new employees, or a monthly insight into your marketing KPIs?
Are your goals even achievable?
Psychology has long discovered that we are most italy whatsapp data motivated by tasks that are difficult enough to “force” us to use all our abilities. We will achieve goals that are too easy immediately, after which our enthusiasm will wane, and we will very quickly find ourselves driving in first gear, without any progress or development. We will very quickly give up on goals that are too difficult, when we see that we have overestimated our own capabilities, and that we have set ourselves too high a bar.
Why do you want to achieve your goals?
What will you gain from achieving them? Is “that something” in line with your values and everything that is important to you in life? Even the most effective goal setting methodology is useless if those goals are not in line with our value system.
How will you check your progress?
Do you know the answer to the question “how to eat an elephant”? Piece by piece, of course. No matter how big a task may seem at first, like a mountain you think you’ll never climb, it’s helpful to remember that even the steepest of hills has a way to reach its peak. Let’s take it step by step. Break your goals down into smaller parts and, of course, set a time limit for each one. Without a time limit, goals remain “floating in the air,” and we essentially never force ourselves to achieve them.
Last but not least: make sure you enter the new year with a “clear head”. Before your mobile phones switch to the 2020 calendar, finish all the tasks that are left “hanging” in the air somewhere. Are they emails that you need to answer, reports that you need to send, or proposals for your clients that you need to write? Dig through your desks, bags and drawers and find all the forgotten to-do lists that you once wrote. See if any tasks are left unfinished.
It may sound banal, but it has a huge impact on our subconscious mind. When we enter the new year unencumbered by the “tails” of the previous one, only then do we have the strength and energy to focus on the most important projects.