How I Ended 2018 with COT and All Goals Checked

31st December 2018 - The last day of 2018. Did it mean anything to you? It certainly bore an immense significance to me as it commemorated another key milestone. That was THE DAY I checked off all my goals which were set in early 2018 and even over-hitting one which was the Court of Table (COT).

2018 seemed to have flown past in a whirlwind. It just felt like yesterday that I attended our team's goal setting event in January. In the past during my corporate HR job days, goal setting was frequently done in a 'reverse-engineering way'. We used to set retrospective KPIs to ensure that we hit our performance targets and as a result, to receive that coveted yearly bonus. You might be wondering how is that possible? That's because of the sheer size of the MNCs. By the time the Executive Leadership Team have decided on the KPIs set for the Global, Regional and various Business Units, and then cascaded to the respective countries for individuals' to set our own KPIs, sometimes Q2 or even Q3 might have passed already. That's how people tend to manipulate KPIs to set it favourably for themselves.

On the contrary, I realised when I became a Self-Employed (Financial Consultant), this is the time we are forced to be independent and even more responsible for yourself. Nobody would care if you set a goal so low that you know you can just achieve it without much effort. But on the other hand, if you dare to declare goals that are so big that you are scaring yourself, then perhaps that's the best thing you have ever done for that year. That's because the goals you set would eventually determine how you will want to steer your life around towards the goals to manifest the outcome you wanted.

Honestly for the longest time that I've lived, i.e. for 33 years, I have never really done a goal-setting on a personal basis before. Until the year I attended NLP, one of the key takeaways was:

If you fail to plan, you plan to fail. ~Benjamin Franklin

In January 2018 during our team's annual goal-setting event, I decided to anchor my goals and declare them out loud based on the 5 key pillars of Career / Family / Health / Social Relationships / Self-Development in my life.

And the outcome? I've literally hit and even over-hit some goals!

1. Career

• Achieving the Company's highest accolade in terms of award (Premier Summit) - YES, the first to achieve this award
• President's Club (Top 30 of the Company) - YES, ranked Top 12th
• MDRT - YES, achieved Court of Table (3 times of MDRT)
• To be promoted to Management rank by mentoring 3 direct Financial Consultants - YES, I have 3 FCs who have joined me and attained their awards too!

2. Family

• Keeping weekends free for my family - YES, most of my weekends are free to spend with the kids!
• Have time to supervise Kids' homework along with weekly spelling quizzes. - YES, Claire was amazing. Her English & Chinese spellings were often all correct ;)

3. Health and Fitness

• Continue to run or workout every week - YES, engaged a Physical Trainer last October!
• Continue to be asthma-free - YES, my asthma has been in remission for coming 2 years!

4. Social Relationships

• Cultivate and foster meaningful deep relationships - YES, I gained more than 80 friends who were my new clients in 2018! You guys know who you are!
• Keeping in close touch with existing inner circle of friends - YES, especially with the advent of social media, we are more frequently in touch compared to the past. One of my friends even told me that he felt I was 'omni-present', which I guess is probably due to my social media presence.

5. Self-Development

• Achieved IHRP (Institute of HR Professionals) Senior Professional Award, a Singapore Nationwide HR Award - YES, I was a proud recipient alongside with 50 other fellow recipients, after rounds of written assessment, many hours of study and preparation for the written exams!
• Read a book every week - YES, so far I have read about 48 books.
• Publish a LinkedIn article once a month to inspire more people - YES, till date this is my 17th article with a cumulative views of 103,360 readership and 2500 followers!

Whatever the mind can conceive, it can achieve ~Napoleon Hills

This is one of my favourite quotes because it has truly helped me to materalise whatever I had envisioned and manifest them into a reality today.

Looking at the above long list of goals - Miraculously I achieved them all. Honestly I do not know how (the process) I did it. But I believe it was because I have a Strong WHY. Throughout this year, I have been asked frequently this question: Jaslyn, you seem to be over the top for everything. How do you even find time to ___________ (fill in the blank with any of these 'Exercise, Read, Have Me-time, Be with the Kids, Recruit"). And my response to that is:

IF IT MATTERS To You, YOU WILL MAKE TIME FOR IT. Only if it matters.

In the last 2 years, this is something which I have discovered. If the goals we set have no attached value to you, you will never ever have time for it. Even if you started, you would eventually fail to follow-through.

From the day I switched out of Corporate HR, I know I only have ONE SINGLE GOAL.

I want to achieve an optimal balance of all the 5 pillars in my life.

I want to have time for the kids that's why I work really hard and productive on weekdays so that my weekends are freed up to spend with them.

I want to be have a fulfilling job, that is why it spurs me everyday to speak to more unfamiliar faces to share with them the importance of protection and building a good protection wall even if the unforeseen circumstances happen. In the midst of all these conversations, many meaningful relationships were fostered and therefore many times my clients eventually became my friends.

During the process of getting to know more people, it also opened up the possibilities of attracting the like-minded people to join my team with the same vision of protecting more lives. And that was why I recruited up to date 5 team members to join #JaslyNGroup.

And the underlying premise of achieving any of the above means that I need to maintain a good health and physical fitness because I truly understand what it means by "Health is Wealth" after being burnt out in corporate days before.

The above strong WHY was what it drove me to push my limits further and further each time and eventually expanding my original (small) comfort zone. I broke my own limiting beliefs. In the insurance industry, being bestowed an MDRT status is already remarkable. Never did I imagine that I could be one of the recipients to the virtually impossible COT (3 times of MDRT) with my rookie status. Afterall I have only been in the industry for only 18 months. Many COT recipients I know of are deeply experienced veterans with several to decades years of experience with a bigger pool of clientele base.

Then the epiphany hit me: When you truly put your genuine heart and soul with the intention of protecting others' and their families, the clients (friends) will eventually treat you like their own and have a strong desire to help you build your dreams too. I have been a great beneficiary of all the rooting cheers which spurred me all the way to the finishing line.

2018 has been the most remarkable year for me. I hope to inspire more to dream big. Because I am a true testimony and living example of how miracles can happen if you believe you can do it with great support from your family and friends around you.

This article was penned on 4th January from 4am to 5.30am. Why so early? Because Jaslyn needs to get her daughter ready for school. We missed the school bus yesterday! That's the real true life of a working parent. Kids first, then sleep =)