WEEKLY FOCUS
Goal Setting
We often talk about motivation…Someone feeling motivated…Someone lacking motivation, yet few people question what motivation really is, or even how to become motivated!
To be motivated or to have motivation, means that you have powerful Goals that you have created for yourself and that give you the desire to succeed (the motivation).
People can sometimes become confused with short term/medium term and longer term Goals. Once when working with a Premiership Linesman, we chatted about Goals. Mention was made of a newly appointed Football League Referee. His Goal was to referee the World Cup Final! Image having the motivation to try to achieve a target that may be at best 20 years ahead!
Part of Goal setting is understanding the small steps that have to be made to achieve the touch points on your journey to success. If we use the referee as an example. His initial Goal may be to finish his first month on the Football League panel with a rating (they are assessed and marked each game), of higher than X. In doing this the SMART technique will have been used.
Specific
Measurable
Achievable
Relevant
Timed
All of these apply to that initial short term Goal…The other great thing about setting short term Goals is the focus that they provide…The “here and now”. A big part of motivation is celebrating success. Giving yourself that well deserved pat on the back…Feeding your own positive self-talk which then provides increased levels of motivation!
A Goal set too distant in the future, provides no focus or reason to celebrate!
Anything worth achieving requires hard work and a degree of stretch. Goals provide that. Part of the process requires short term evaluations to allow you to build on as you gain more experience and learning….Increased self-belief from the short term success.
We don’t wait (or should not do!), until the year end to praise our staff even though the company may have an annual target. We use short term measures & targets…Goals. This then allows regular evaluations to take place, to ensure that you are heading in the right direction. When you use your Satellite Navigation, you don’t use it for the last mile of a 300 mile trip…You use it to take you along the right route from the very start of your journey!
Make sure your Goals reflect that!
I believe that visualization is one of the most powerful means of achieving personal goals.
Harvey Mackay
