Many business professionals are familiar with writing business goals for the upcoming year. Unfortunately, it’s common to find these well intentioned goals tossed in a file drawer not to be looked at or referred to again. What was intended to serve as a guiding force or roadmap for positive behaviors and change has been forgotten. Does this behavior seem flawed to you?
“Goal setting is all about creating balance,” states Karl Schaphorst, President of Sandler Training. “Goals need to address the whole person, not just the professional person. If attaining a goal means sacrificing in other areas of your life, (health, family etc), one risks creating imbalance. This imbalance can jeopardize not only the success of attaining the goal but risks creating a negative impact on other areas of life.”
Sandler training has been working with professionals to develop, execute and achieve goals for more than 30 years. By utilizing a proven ten step methodology, people are able to identify, organize and plan activities designed to move them towards goal attainment. The Sandler Goal Setting System is designed to address all areas of life so that goals work in harmony thereby accelerating success rates.
Sandler’s 10 Steps To Goal Setting
1. Label eight sheets of paper each with one life goal area:
Social, Physical, Financial, Mental (Educational), Professional, Family, Personal, Spiritual. Reflect on your current status within each life goal area and write it down.
2. List everything you would like to accomplish for each life area
Don’t pre-judge your thoughts, write them all down as if nothing is out of reach
3. Prioritize goals in each of the eight areas from most important to least important.
4. Create a master list of the top three goals from each of the 8 areas.
5. Prioritize the master list. Check for balance and any possible conflicts
6. Write a detailed description of each master list goal and how you are going to achieve it.
Goals must be SMART: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Time-bound.
Goals are made to make you stretch so don’t make them too easy.
7. Develop a timetable for each goal
Break down long term goals into short-term activities with deadlines
Include daily, weekly and monthly activities
8. Share your goals with others – Hold yourself accountable.
9. Review your goals regularly and track your progress
10. Be persistent – DO NOT QUIT
Priorities change over time so be prepared to redefine or realign you goal
Only abandon a goal if it becomes irrelevant, never because it’s too difficult
by Lynda C-L Allen
Sandler Training is a global training organization with over three decades of experience and proven results. Sandler provides sales and management training and consulting services for small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) as well as corporate training for Fortune 1000 companies.
For more information, please contact Karl Schaphorst at (402) 218-2144 or by email at kschaphorst@sandler.com.
You can also follow the blog at www.davearch.sandler.com/presspages/show