WHY PROCESS MATTERS MORE THAN THE GOAL ITSELF.

We all want a result we want to achieve - whether it's a personal goal, career goal, relationship goal, or even simply as daily goal.

When setting goals and planning for change, whether in business or in our personal lives, we have to make sure we avoid a common trap. Most people set goals that help them understand the final objectives, and the problem (usually) comes when we become obsessed with the results we want and forget about the process that will get us there. 

The thing that initially motivated us to take action can end up putting us in the wrong perspective (mindset) and encouraging the wrong behaviors. When you become too focused on the result you want to achieve, you can actually program yourself into a negative mindset. If your goal is to lose 10 kilos, and you become consumed with that goal, you subconsciously tell yourself “I won’t be happy until I lose 10 kilos”.

These outcome goals, can be very stressful because you are focusing on what you don't have vs what you can actually control. Once this becomes your mindset, you probably will be obsessing about the weight scale - checking your weight 5 times a day, after a meal, after you go to the bathroom, after you cheat with delicious chocolate caramel cake, after you wake up and before you sleep.

Instead of focusing on the process, you become obsessed with the outcome. It’s exhausting; you’re wasting more energy on measuring and stressing than on taking positive actions.

If you don't do something about this and change the mindset quickly, then you can end up thinking of a short term solution to get rid of the kilograms, but neglecting your health for the long-term (e.g fast diet juice, weight loss pills, those magic ingredients that promises fast action fat burning process - and many more)

The biggest reason that people miss their goals is because they are not able to attach the desired outcome to the necessary process. In other words, they understand what they want to achieve but they don’t implement the how they are going to achieve. The how part is much more crucial than any other element.

When you realize you need to make a change, do you focus solely on outcome goals? Or do you look for ways to change the process in order to see results?

The trick is : Don’t tie your emotions to results. The highs can be just as dangerous as the lows because you want to keep repeating your great results indefinitely even though it’s not possible. Spend most of your time just following the process and not worrying about results. Only measure results after enough time has passed that you can actually draw some conclusions about what is or isn’t working.

Goal oriented people are people who strive and fight and move for the sake of attaining a goal. Likewise, process oriented people are folks who strive and fight and move because they’re looking to improve.

Both these types of people, will find their goal. One faster than the other. Can you guess which one it is? Yes, the goal oriented. But - if you look 10 years beyond that, I'd say the process oriented people would have a more stable career/business. Why? Because goal oriented people run the risk of getting to a goal and then sitting there, happily resting. These people can sometimes go the rest of their lives without realizing that while they may be achieving the goals they’re setting, they aren’t growing. By not focusing on the process, the goals they’re setting are a result of immediate necessity, and aren’t building anything up or learning anything.

There are many ways to do one thing - as many streets leads to Rome.

I am all about the goals, I'm very determined and persistent. Once I set my eyes on the goals, I would think of how we as a team can get there. I'd think about different ways to achieve it, including what could go wrong with that idea, and also have a plan to fix those too. It is not easy in the beginning, because each team member must embody the same thought-process.

To get them on board with the idea & how we want to achieve it, is something we need to go thru before we can make anything happen as a team. What makes things a bit challenging, is when the company doesn't want to know or invest time in the process - and only want the goal to happen.

This simply doesn't work, because it's not like taking one medicine and the flu goes away - let's face it even medicine takes time to process, and in some weird cases sometimes you end up with a medicine that made you feel worse than before :)

I've had my share of being given some tough goals in my life, ...... some of them seems impossible and the numbers scare a lot of people in the beginning, but we we're too busy focusing on what matters - the PROCESS - how can we make this work.

We would have our internal meetings to discuss any hurdles we face on each department from the managers, and discuss different ways on how we can solve the issue, and aside from that we would also do a general evaluation to understand the business from the operations sales, marketing and hear their part of the story, think about the current practices, and find ways to improve.

From all levels of the organization, need to understand the importance of the process, and that we need to change & improve, in order to be able to move forward and make things better.

My team can vouch for this on how many meetings we would sit down and go thru all the details on how we can improve something and move forward. And if we happen to fail one of the ideas, my brain would automatically check each and single part of the process, going over to see what we did wrong, what we should have done and how can we fix that so it won't happen again.

It's a mix of different things and it can be a tiring process, mainly because that means you are trained to be tougher on yourself than anyone else, ..... but the good thing is, once your brain is set to work that way, you will know what to do, what could possibly happen, and anticipate (well it's not 100% perfect plan, but at least you have 80-90% of the idea) - think of it like a 'brain muscle' that needs extra training, that's all. Once you have this perspective, you don't get irritated easily when people criticize you, and instead, you can take it as a "plan F you didn't think about".

For now, I think instead of waiting to celebrate until you achieve your results, celebrate every time you follow the process. This does not mean you're satisfied with the status quo, nope - not at all, but every day you work to get better is a successful day. 

Know that even if your results take months or years to achieve, each step you take towards them is just as important.

Thank you for reading - leave your comments below. I appreciate your feedback!