Goal Setting Tips to Start the Year

The beginning of the year is always the best time to set goals. You are starting off the year with a clean slate and hopefully you have a great deal of motivation and drive to get better. Goals are important not only for growth but for clarity as well. They help you to ask yourself these three questions. What are my priorities? What’s important to me? What do I want to accomplish?

One of the things that we know to be true is that goal setting will enable you to become an even more focused giving you more direction in your life. To accomplish your goals, you need to know how to set them. So here are five tips on how you can set goals.

1. Set SMART goals. SMART is a very well-known goal setting acronym that I believe is far more known that it is used. So, lets walk you through it.

· The S is for specific: Don’t be vague. Exactly what do you want? Do you want to work out more and eat better or do you want to lose 10 pounds?

· The M is for measurable: Quantify your goal. How will you know if you’ve achieved it or not? Do you want to prospect more or do you want to spend 50% of your day prospecting?

· The A is for Actionable: Be honest with yourself about the precise action you want to take. Do you want to get more organized or do you want to spend the last 15 minutes of everyday planning for the next day?

· The R is for Realistic: It’s got to be doable, real and practical. The consequences of unrealistic goals are significant. Not reaching goals results in negative emotions: disappointment, frustration, and feeling like a failure.

· The T is for Time Specific: Associate a time frame with each goal. When should you complete the goal? This will create a genuine sense of urgency in you every day to go after your goals in an inspired manner.

2. Write your goals down.  Writing helps you to clarify your goals. As you commit them to paper, you will quickly see they fit the SMART formula and you can determine whether or not they could be better defined.

3. Put your written goals in places so that you can see them every day. When they are right there in front of you it is a constant reminder of what you are trying to accomplish. It also makes it easier to track your progress.

4. Read your goals first thing in the morning, every morning. When you read your goals every morning, they begin to sink into your subconscious mind. Every single day at every single opportunity, your subconscious mind is trying to find ways to help you reach your goal.

5. Break bigger goals down into smaller goals. Then ask yourself “what am I going to focus on today”? Having a daily goal will bring a level of prioritization to your day and help you to focus on what really needs to get done.

 From the laboratory of human experience in the last 36 years one quality that I have observed in salespeople that are leading a goal-oriented career is their enthusiasm. Their goals make them focused and their genuine enthusiasm is a byproduct of that focus. In my opinion enthusiasm is one of the most highly compensated qualities in sales mostly because it is the rarest yet, it is the most contagious. Enthusiasm is the yeast that rises the dough. If you want to develop even more enthusiasm going into 2021 one sure fire way to make that happen is to set some goals.