Setting a goal is easy.
Getting a goal? Not so much.
Perhaps the vast gap between the number of people who set goals vs. the number who get them is due to a misunderstanding of the steps in between. We all know that it takes more than a wish to make things happen, but often don’t connect the steps in order to turn a dream into a reality.
If you live in the Pacific Northwest, you can set a goal to sink your bare toes into the warm sands of Florida, but if you never take the step needed to reach that goal, it will never happen.
9 Steps of Goal Getting
- Goal Setting- You guessed it; this is the easy part. During this phase, you identify the goal by setting a destination. With the freshly unfolded map in your hands, you take a red pen and circle the destination for your trip.
- Goal Strategy- What is the strategy that needs to be implemented to accomplish the goal? This is the plan you will use to get to the destination. Are you going to fly? Drive? Teleport? (For the sake of our illustration, let’s say you drive.)
- Goal Tasks- Here’s where you determine your resources, finances, and the personnel required to meet the goal. When are you going to have pit stops, where and how often? Who is coming with you? Are you going to drive the whole time or trade off? Who is paying for the gas and who is paying for lunch?
- Goal Schedule- By scheduling your trip onto a calendar, you’ve created a visual representation of how you plan to accomplish your goal in a set amount of time you’ve determined. You can define each milestone along the way. Do you want to stop at the world’s biggest ball of yarn along the way? Listen to some blues in Nashville?
- Goal Systems- These are repeatable actions you can recognize and outsource as you continue to repeat your goal. These systems act like legitimate shortcuts. If you hit rush hour on the first day of the trip and are scheduled to drive through major cities every day during rush hour, this is where you decide to take lunch on the road to beat the traffic or take a detour through a country road to avoid it altogether. By implementing a structure to prevent unnecessary work, you’re creating systems to streamline for the future.
- Goal Execution- During the execution phase, you do all the steps that brought you to this point. By pursuing your plan, performing your tasks, following the schedule, and applying your systems, you can drive mile-after-mile and stay focused on the reward of reaching your destination.
- Goal Measurement- To assure that you maintain your goal, you need to measure along the way. What are the hard numbers? How fast are you going? Do you need additional breaks? Are you allocating money in the right areas? You should always quantify these internal metrics.
- Goal Optimization- Here’s where you analyze the measurements you just took, and then changing the plan, tasks, and strategies, and rework the measurements to reach the goal. If you’re driving too slow, you can push the pedal down. What is preventing you from meeting your goal? Your calendar? Your schedule? A partner who doesn’t want to help move the vehicle forward? Revise the output of work to guarantee the result you desire.
- Goal Scale- You made it! The sun is heating your cheeks, the sand is wedged between your toes, and you have a sweaty cup of iced coffee in hand as you watch the water crash against the shore. Now, your next step is to identify ways to scale up your travel know-how for next time. How can you evaluate each phase of your goal getting to make your business better? How can you take it up a notch? What are the areas of opportunity?
One last nugget to take with you on your journey. If you get a few hours or days into your “trip” and you reach a roadblock, have an argument stew in the back seat of the car, or for any reason grow frustrated, it’s best if you just give up and go home. I’m kidding, of course! Why would you do that!? Yet how many start the drive only to return home prematurely with memories of unfulfilled goals?
The journey is important, so lean in and keep driving!
To Your Success;
Lee A. Arnold
CEO
The Lee Arnold System of Real Estate Investing
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