Benjamin Franklin is attributed to have said ‘if you fail to plan, you are planning to fail’ and I certainly believe this to be true. For the past decade James and I have started each year by goal setting. We often start with an informal structure (e.g. a lovely glass of wine and some cheese) while we chat about our plans. Once we’ve agreed on our key goals we distil our priorities into our goal map. So how do you set a meaningful goal plan? Well for us we’ve focused on the 6 following things:
1. Family
2. Pleasure
3. Health
4. Social/Community
5. Wealth
6. Business/Career
As your life and career evolves it’s important that your goals keep up with this. I often hear from people ‘you and James have achieved so much, what’s left to do’. Which to me is a redundant question because there is always more to do…!
But you do have to keep challenging yourself and have clear goals and measurable targets that you want to achieve. Some examples from our goal map this year include ‘ensuring a successful transition to school for Tom’, ‘reading one book per month’, ‘Saturday is family outing day’, ‘improving overall health and wellness’, ‘work from home on Friday morning’ as well as in a professional capacity preparing MFB for a successful IPO.
While I believe many try to include goals such as work/life balance, I don’t believe that in this day and age you can compartmentalize your work and life. Because if your work is your passion then it forms part of your life. And on the flip side, in particular when you have children there are often times when you actively choose to fit your work around your kids. So for me – it’s just life.
So as I wrap up todays post I am glad to have started 2017 living my goals. Which today has meant kicking off with an achievable work out, quickly followed by taking Tom to a specialist appointment and then coming home to juggle our daughter while writing this blog post. As I pop in to see my team (while Leila sleeps) at the end of the day today, I’ll feel satisfied knowing we’ve started out right. So tell me what are you doing to start 2017 on the right path and achieving your goals?
