What are your success factors?

What does success mean to you?

A common trait among successful leaders is knowing and understanding what success means. Most leaders know what it isn't, but success differs for everyone, so defining what it means to you is essential.?

While for some people, success means having a 6 or 7-figure salary that can afford the “bigger than your neighbours” house, vehicle, vacation, and so on, for others, it may mean much less. This is why defining what success means to you before you head out to find it is essential.

Success may mean that you are in a career you absolutely love and would not dream of being anywhere else. This could be the goal as you work through many jobs that make you unhappy until you find that one that is precisely what you have always wanted.

The bottom line is that successful leaders know exactly what success means to them and go after it with everything they have.

But what does 'going after it' look like - here are some pointers to consider.

Set Goals

Successful leaders set goals for themselves and work as hard as possible to achieve them no matter what it takes. It is often said that true success comes from the combination of both heart and hard work. Setting goals can help you to keep focused on the result.

A common misconception when setting goals is that they must be larger than life to mean anything. The best plans are often small ones that you can set on your way to your larger goals but allow you to have success along the way.

Try sitting down at the beginning of the year, or the moment you feel motivated and identify at least one massive goal for yourself. Then create a plan to reach that goal broken down into stepping stones or small chunks.

Once you have your stepping stones, tackle them one at a time until you reach your ultimate goal.

Surround Yourself with Successful People

You have probably heard that you should surround yourself with positive, uplifting people who are also passionate about their goals.

Motivational speaker Jim Rohn once said, “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” If you think about it, friends become that way because they have common traits in most cases. This should also be true about the people you work with.

If you define success by the number of figures in your salary, large house, and expensive cars, then you probably should surround yourself with others who agree with this mentality. At the same time, if you define success as being truly happy in your life, find people who feel the same way.

Keeping yourself surrounded by the right people depends heavily on the ultimate outcome of your life. The right people will always be on your side, encouraging you to reach for the stars and keep moving forward.

Keep Learning

Successful leaders are often lifelong learners. They know that it is virtually impossible to know everything about everything in life, so they keep themselves open to learning new things every day.

Successful people are always reading; whether it is about their industry, news stories, or other things, they know the importance of gaining more knowledge. These read and engage in learning as a part of their daily routine.

If you spend about 30 minutes or more a day reading, you increase your knowledge exponentially over a year. This does not mean that you must always be reading only industry material, but reading for pleasure also allows you to gain specific knowledge you did not have before.

Learn from Failure

The most successful in the world have failed at some point in their lives. The difference between these people and others is that they became prosperous through the failures they once experienced.

When you attempt to accomplish something, it is natural that you may fail at it the first time or even several times after that. The best thing you can do for yourself is pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and try until you succeed.?

It is essential to understand that trying until you succeed does not necessarily mean that you try in the same way as before. The most successful leaders reflect after failing to understand why it did not work and rework the problem.

If you are genuinely passionate about the goal you have set for yourself, then you will not allow any roadblocks to stand in your way. Failure is just a learning experience waiting to happen. Learn from the failure and then find a way to move forward.

Prioritise

Succeeding with goals often means not putting off until tomorrow what you can do now. One of the biggest obstacles to leaders trying to find success is getting distracted when other things come up that take their attention away from the work they were doing before.

Successful people understand that prioritising their tasks is the only way to work Knowing what tasks to prioritise starts with understanding the urgency, impact and effort level.

Try prioritising your 'to-do' list based on those criteria and see what bubbles to the top. And give yourself plenty of opportunity to mark things off your list, giving you small successes throughout the day.

Delegate and Outsource

Successful leaders know the value of delegating responsibilities and outsourcing services. Both are time savers that allow them to focus on other, more important things.

Knowing the core competencies, skills and talents of your people will make this much easier.

And if you can afford it outsource as much as you can. My personal favourites are cleaners and gardeners.

Having someone else taking care of things that you have no passion for means you can spend your 'free time' doing things you love.

I cover all of these in more detail and help you figure out what they look like for you inside The IGNITE Mastermind. Message me if you'd like to chat about membership.