Setting Your Goals For 2011

What is success?

It is the deliberate accomplishment of worthy goals over a specified time frame.  Success, therefore, begins with goals and goals define success.

Successful people are driven by goals and they take massive and corrective action to achieve it.

Goal setting compels them to go further and faster in life.  It helps them to focus and channel all their resources in the right direction.

Goal setting is the key to managing life and the logical fulfilling approach to dynamic living.

How To Set And Achieve Your Goals

Use My HSR Personal Plan at the end of this Love Note to help you craft your personal plan.

Step 1:  Define My S.M.A.R.T. Goals

Goal setting begins with the choice of worthy goals. Goals that will challenge you to stretch, give you excitement, and bring out the best in yourself.

The following are qualities of meaningful goals:

Specific. A goal that is well defined is already half achieved. It must be specific. Eg. Do not, for example, say you wish to make a lot of money. State, specifically, how much.

It should be in a written format. There is an Oriental proverb which says that “The palest ink is more enduring than the strongest memory!’

Measurable. Your goals must be expressed in terms of results that can be measured. It will help you monitor your progress and adjust accordingly.

Achievable. Douglas Edwards, a pioneer in sales training commented, “If you don’t believe you can achieve the goal, you won’t pay the full price for it.” Goal setting will become a meaningless exercise if you cannot give it your full commitment.

Easy To Recall. Achievement of your goals depends on the intensity of desire to turn it into a reality and your desire depends on how easy it is to recall your goals. You must be able to remember it at all times even if you do not refer to the written plan.

Time-based. It is not a goal if you do not have a time frame for its achievement. The time frame must be within the foreseeable future.

Step 2:  Develop Sub-Goals

The Chinese have a saying, “The journey of a thousand miles begin with a single step.” And, if we may add, and then one more step… and then one more step… until you achieve your goal.

By developing sub-goals, it will also help you monitor your progress and ensure you are moving in the right direction.

Step 3:  Determine Compelling Purpose

To achieve success, you must have compelling reasons to do it. If you do not know the ‘Why’s you wish to achieve your goals, you will never find out the ‘How’s.

Your purpose will drive your performance and pursuits.

Your compelling purpose must be vital, passionate, and sustainable. These qualities will cause you to jump out of bed every morning to work hard and smart to achieve your goals.

Step 4:  Prepare Myself

Barriers. To succeed, you need to know why you may fail. You need to know what will prevent you from achieving your goals and take every possible action to overcome them.

Your barriers may be related to people, things, yourself, situation, or even something intangible like a bad experience in the past. Eg. bad habits, procrastination, fear of failure etc.

Price. Success comes with a price. You must make sacrifices, discipline yourself, and persevere through the long, narrow, and winding path towards success.

When you persist, the price will become an enjoyable part of a satisfying and fulfilled life. In the future, you will look back and experience the joy of relentless pursuit or the pain of endless regret. 

Take actions now, eg. Give up eating unhealthy food, stop negative activities, end toxic relationships etc.

Step 5:  Craft Strategies

You need to constantly ask yourself, “How can I achieve my goals?” Explore all options by answering questions that begin with why, what, where, who, when, and how.

You have to study the resources that you have; for example, your time, money, and energy, and decide how best to deploy them to achieve your goals.

Decide what you have to do every single day to achieve your goals. In addition, determine how you can leverage on systems, technologies, tools, and other resources to achieve more and better results. 

You should not only take the right actions but also take these actions correctly. Help your team mates to duplicate and improve on your success to achieve even better results.

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). You need to set appropriate KPIs, eg. number of prospects, listings, buyers, viewings, negotiations, Advisors, and other factors that will help you chart your progress, take corrective actions, and help you improve yourself.

You must take every action to learn and improve your attitude, knowledge, and competence. You need to make time time to role play, practice your skills, and obtain 360^o feedback from different and appropriate parties.

Step 6:  Motivate Myself

A lot of goals live and die shortly after they have been set.

For goals to be achieved, it must be driven by a growing desire and this desire must be kept alive and burning.  Goals must become a vital, integral, and desired part of your life.

Goals must be constantly visualised using all five senses. The clearer you see, hear, smell, taste, and feel how joyful and rewarding it is to achieve your goals, the faster it will be achieved.

Use aids; including pictures, photographs, and words placed in strategic locations, to remind you of your goals. You can also record what it means to achieve your goals and play it back to yourself so as to stay motivated. 

Request positive people to help you stay motivated in achieving your goals. Avoid ‘energy vampires’ who will suck your energy, distract you, and keep you away from achieving your goals.

Adopt successful people as your mentors. Like they say, “You cannot fly with eagles if you mix with turkeys.”  Interact with these top producers, learn from them, and model after their positive actions. 

Communicate your goals daily through SMSes, emails, and telephone calls to people who will be able to give you positive encouragements, feedback, and other value-additions.

Surround yourself with a team of goals-driven professionals. You can synergise with and leverage on them to achieve better results.

You should also reward yourself when you reach your goal.

Success breeds success. It will spur you to do more for your life.

Step 7:  Take Actions

After you have planned for the actions to reach your goals, you must act.

You must master the courage; commit yourself totally; remove all fears, uncertainties, and doubts; and plan, strategise, and take massive actions to turn your goals into a reality.

In My HSR, we call this process,  ‘Go4It!’

You must take the first step and then be prepared to take the next better step. Do not be sidetracked until you have completed your action plan.

James Russel Lowell, a famous poet once wrote, ‘All the beautiful sentiments in the world weigh less than one single lovely action.’

Remember, if you keep doing the same thing, you will always get the same results. Therefore, you must apply constant and never ending improvements (CANI).

Successful people always do things ordinary people do not do and do not do things ordinary people do.

In the words of Paul Myer,

 

‘Whatever you vividly imagine,

ardently desire, sincerely

believe, and enthusiastically

act upon must inevitably come to pass.’

 

Please get hold of ‘My HSR Personal Plan’ pocket-sized card, complete your plan, and carry it everywhere you go.

Continue to review and improve on it daily.

To help you plan and achieve your goals, please attend the HSR Million Dollar Challenge Bootcamps and our Goal Setting Workshops.

We will conduct powerful exercises to ensure that your goals are embedded in every cell, every tissue, and every part of your body, soul, and mind. We will also show you how to achieve your goals effectively.

Please make goal setting an integral part of your life.