What’s your pathway to personal success?

In this era of disruption, innovation, and transformation, we often let other people define what success should mean to us. Their expectations create illusions that we believe we need to live up to in order to be successful. To avoid mismatched expectations of success, you must take control of your life and develop your own definition of success.

Ideally, you should define what success means to you early in your career, but it’s never too late to do so. Some of the happiest people you’ll ever meet are those who woke up in midlife and decided to change their trajectory. By this stage, people know themselves well and have developed the strength to do what makes them happy instead of allowing others’ expectations limit them.

When working with change and transformation, we often talk about critical success factors. Have you considered developing your personal success factors? What should they be? What does it mean to be successful at work and as a partner, family member, and friend??

Here are some things to consider when planning your own personal success formula.

# Know your values

When you let others define what your success should be, it often causes internal conflict with your inherent values. Even if you haven’t yet taken the time to delineate your own values, you will feel stress when you take actions that go against them in an effort to please others. I assure you that knowing your values and living by them will help you eliminate this unfortunate situation although it can of course also put you in some tough situations some times.

# Follow your passion

As you get to know your values, you will also discover where your passion lies. And you can only become successful in the true meaning of the word if you can live out your passion for most of your life. Passion is doing what comes naturally to you, and with a continued desire to learn and develop within this area. How do you let your passion out? How do you get pleasure and excitement out of life? Why not plan or at least prepare for this?

# Decide on your personal vision

We all know how important it is for a company to set a vision that makes concrete the results the organization aims to achieve over the long term. Similarly, you can define your own personal vision that combines your values and your passion into a brief, but meaningful, statement of what you desire to achieve in business, in your personal life, and as a member of your community.

# Set goals

Once you’ve defined your vision, you can determine what short-, mid-, and long-range goals will get you there. Share your vision and goals with the people who are important in your life; this will build in accountability, which will help ensure your success. Review your goals on a regular basis and make any necessary adjustments as you achieve progress or suffer setbacks. You will learn that working towards the goals rather than achieving them is what makes you happy, so be prepared to set new goals when you have reached your current ones.

# Reflect on your Ikigai

One of my favorites. What’s your sweet-spot in terms of what your passion is, what you are good it, what the world needs and what you can be paid for? See image.?

# Go for your BHAG

Don’t be too conservative when setting your goals. Challenge yourself to go for a BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goal). Interestingly, corporate people, in particular, really seem to struggle with setting lofty goals for themselves both on a personal and business level. To overcome this obstacle, you can link your BHAG to your three-year legacy.

# Develop your three-year legacy

Your BHAG and your three-year legacy are actually two different things, but they can be tied together. What I would like you to do here is think about what you want your (corporate) legacy to be three years from now. Imagine that you only have three years left at your current job. How will you be remembered?

Again, ambition tends to be fairly low here as well. So many corporate people seem content to “just” do their job rather than try to make a significant difference. If you are struggling to set the bar high enough, think of the colleagues (often former ones) who really made a difference at your company—a difference so stark that you still remember them and what them did.

# Be a leader, not a manager

If you are a leader - or aspire to be one - then you should act like a leader, not like a manager. A real leader sets a vision (think of your BHAG and three-year legacy) and then gets people to work together toward that vision. Have in mind that in this era of external collaboration, people are not only your colleagues, but also the people in your ecosystems.?

On the contrary, managers get lost in their day-to-day work and have forgotten the bigger picture.

# Work smarter, not harder

Many of the executives - and aspiring executives - I interact with work crazy hours. My theory is that the hours you put in beyond the first 45-50 don’t really add much value. When you start working 60-70-80 yours, you are becoming a type of manager—maybe even a micro-manager.?

In the near future, we will see organizations bringing people together seamlessly - from both internal and external sources - to get projects done. Work will be like a water tap; you turn your resources on and off as needed. In this type of environment, you need leaders who work much smarter and not just harder. This also ties into the opportunities of the hybrid of virtual and physical work approaches.

# Understand and respect your stakeholders

Who will help you achieve your goals and personal vision? It’s important to identify and understand your key influencers and what drives them. These are among your stakeholders and you must make sure they understand what you bring to the table. They need to know how to help you achieve success and you need to know how you can help them become successful.

# Work on your t-shape

Go deep in at least one skill area and have breadth and empathy for other areas. Think of it as innovation on a personal level. You need to accept that you don’t know everything and have the courage to seek help and advice from others. Gain a broader perspective by learning from those whose experiences and views differ from yours. This will help grow your t-shape.

# Stay current

While you’re working toward your own set of goals, the outside world will not stand still. Make sure you stay abreast of any external developments that could impact your ability to achieve your vision.

# Build and communicate your personal brand

How do you want other people to look upon you? You might not like this kind of thinking, but it does not really matter much what you think of yourself. What really matters is how other people perceive you. Build and nurture your personal brand and work on your personal messages and have in mind that perception often becomes proof in the lens of others.

# Manage time better

You might think that working hard for 60, 70, or 80 hours a week is what it takes to be successful. You might even think being a workaholic is a badge of honor. I have met many people who subscribe to these ideals. But, in recent years, some have found reasons to reconsider how to manage and spend their time. One guy had a heart attack. Several people got divorced. Others realized that they were going through life without seeing their kids grow up. They got to the other side where they understood they needed to manage their time rather than letting time manage them. Who are you in this picuture? Have in mind that personal success is more than just your job.

# Leave your job, if you are in the wrong place or doing the wrong things

If you know you’re in the wrong place, don’t spend valuable years of your life there. Neither you nor your employer can benefit from this situation. If you like your company, but don’t enjoy your job, seek a win-win by petitioning to do the type of work you want. If your efforts go nowhere, or if you already know you’re in the wrong place, move on. Don’t waste valuable time.

That’s a longer list and I could add many other things. However, let’s stop for now and hopefully this will give you reasons to reflect and even find some specific action points for your journey forward.