The problem with goal setting… 3 common mistakes

We are at that stage in the year where most of the organisations I work with are

coming towards the end of their financial year and starting to get their heads around next year’s goals.

Whether you are an individual considering your own goals for the coming year, or a leader considering the team or organisational goals, you have the opportunity to set yourself up for a positive or negative spiral.

If the goal involves a positive reward the expectation of a reward can have an impact on your mood and the way you think about things, building momentum and motivation as you progress.

Whereas if the goal involves you moving away from a problem you will spend a lot of time focussing on the problem itself rather than solutions. This can draw you into a negative spiral facing all the reasons why it exists in the first place and all the things that are place that help create it. It can sometimes feel overwhelming and difficult before you even get started!

Setting the right goal is like a gift that keeps on giving – you continue to get positive benefits all the while you head towards it. This is easier said than done. Being able to establish simple, motivational goals takes practice.

In my experience many people make the following mistakes:

Time

The first mistake is that not enough time is given to the process. It’s seen as a task, or worse still a chore that has to be done. It’s either put off until the last minute to the exercise, or squeezed in to your diary to get it done and out of the way. In both of these circumstances not a lot of thought is given to really consider what the focus will be and how to language the goal appropriately.

 

Set some quality time aside to consider what it is you really want to achieve. What will make a difference to your strategy and is it achievable?

What is missing in your activities that will take you further towards your vision?

Take some time to really craft how you word your goal(s) using positive language and meaningful measures (see below).

 

Problem Focussed

The second mistake is that often goals are structured around solving a problem rather than creating a solution.

For example we’re not hitting or profit targets, or a drop in customer numbers, or  a system problem. This is no surprise as our brains are wired to find and fix problems. Problems are easier to find and identify with so we get side tracked and drawn in to looking for them. We are often really clear about what the problem is whereas we don’t always know what the solution could be.

This causes us to use more negative language, or language focussed on fixing the problem. On a personal level we use language such as; lose weight, don’t smoke, don’t fight, stop drinking…. This simply encourages us to focus on the problem.

The way around this is to focus on the solution you are trying to create. A question I often ask is what do you want instead of the problem? This way you build a world around the solution you want to create – even if you’re not sure what this will be exactly. Using the above examples you might focus on a particular dress size, level of fitness, the type of relationship you want…

A goal written this way allows you to visualise what you want and connect with it. You brain will then register what you’re aiming towards and you’ll start o feel good as you make progress towards it.

        

Results Focussed

Mistake number three is that we often establish measures for the end result. This is great and certainly better than no measures at all. However, if we want a ‘gift that keeps on giving’ it’s worth setting up some measure that let you know you are making progress.

• What would be the first sign that you are on track?
• What small achievements do you notice along the way?
• How do you see people responding?
• What are people saying?
• How do you feel?

These may be tangible (qualitative) results or more quantitative - how people are responding and behaving or the general mood.

So before you start to consider your goals set aside some quality time and focus on the solution you want to create. If you’ve already started the process go back and review what you’ve written.

Remember it takes practice to write positive motivational goals.

Good luck and let me know how you get on.

‘Whatever the mind can conceive and believe the mind will achieve.’

Napoleon Hill

The one thing most people forget to consider in goal setting and New Year resolutions

Are YOU ready?

The reason we don’t achieve goals is often because they aren’t important enough for us to commit to them, or because we have some pattern of behaviour that prevents us from achieving them.

So, before you ‘fall off the wagon’ with your New Year goals I thought I’d share some of the areas you may want to explore before you fall prey to some of your unconscious patterns.

Your brain is fundamentally lazy and will follow the path of least resistance and our unconscious patterns are so ingrained that they work on autopilot. We (our brain) don’t even have to think about them. However, they are usually triggered by an event or situation. Think about your morning routine you don’t really think too much about what you’re doing because your pattern (routine) is fully embodied and you are pretty much operating on autopilot.

This is just one example and there will be many more throughout your day, so I put together some questions to hopefully prevent you from sabotaging your future achievements.

Spotting potential obstacles – 5 questions to accelerate your success 

1) What is your perceptions of your goal? Do you think this will be easy of hard? Is it going to be fun? On a scale of 1 – 10 how much do you want it where 10 is high and one is low.

If you consider your goal difficult to achieve break it down so it appears more manageable. How can you make it more playful?

2) What excuse are you making about getting started, or staying on track? Some excuses might be:

• I’m not quite ready yet, I need x, y or z in place before I can make a start.
• I haven’t found the time to fit this in/make it happen.
• Someone else hasn’t given you what you need yet.

If you find you are making excuses the chances are it’s not important enough for you, or you’ve hit another obstacle. In which case read on…

3) What sabotage patterns are you running? Here are just a few examples:

• Keeping busy so you don’t have time.
• Agreeing to do things for others without considering the impact to your own commitments.
• Relying on others to make things happen for you.
• Following your ‘old’ routines/patterns…

 What is triggering this behaviour? Pay attention to what, where, when this is triggered. Is it a particular thought you have that is conflicting with where you want to get to (your goal) or how you feel at a particular moment in time, or when you are in a certain place or with a particular group of people.

Once you’ve identified the trigger, what can you do to avoid these situations or think differently about them?

It may take you some time to identify the trigger, particularly if it’s one of your unconscious patterns, and I’d encourage you to stick with it. The more aware you become of what you’re doing automatically the more you are likely to change.

4) What changes do you need to make either in your self, or your environment in order to ensure you achieve your goal in the long term? (See your answers to the questions above).

5) What support do you need to achieve your goal? We all need encouragement and support to keep going, who can you ask for support to ensure you stay accountable? Who may be able to join you? How can you make it more fun?

When we set goals, or intentions, or New Year resolutions we are aiming for a future that we don’t yet have and there will always be an internal battle between your present self and your future self.

Staying ‘on track’ requires self-discipline, a muscle that needs to be exercised regularly. It’s easy to forget what you are aiming for when your present self is here and now, which is why identifying your own self-imposed obstacles can make a difference.

"The ultimate reason for setting goals is to entice you to become the person it takes to achieve them."

Jim Rohn

The secret to creating new habits

As humans it’s very easy for us all to stick with our normal pattern of behaviour and forget to do something new.

The way we respond to situations is often habitual.

The patterns we all have of reacting to the external world have become ingrained and automatic to us.

It’s only through conscious practice we can change this.  

Through conscious practice we’re aiming to create a new habit. We’re training our mind and body to do something different, so you’re undoing 20/30 or 40 years of an old habits.

How many times have you been on a training course or leadership programme and walked away with lots of new ‘stuff’ to put into practice?

How many times have you actually followed through with this?

In my experience many people go back into the workplace with great intentions only to find these good intentions fall by the wayside.

I have been coaching now for over 15 years and one of the many things I have learned is that you can’t bring about new ways of being with out practice.

It takes time.

Think about how you learned to ride a bike, drive a car, learned to swim or any other activity that requires your co-ordination. It took practice, and I’m sure you made some mistakes along the way AND you still learned. You made adjustments and kept practicing.

Changing anything you do is no different. This may be the way you respond to a situation, a way of thinking, or trying out something new, it takes practice and adjustments.

To build mastery as a leader, you need to be more than just our automatic self.

So now is the time for you to consider what you want to practice on a regular basis in the New Year.

I’ve put together some simple steps to help you develop this. I hope you find them useful.

There are six steps in total, so let me talk you through them: 

1. Focus on one thing: Consider one thing, and only one thing that you want to change.
2. Make it manageable: Break it down into bite size chunks. What will be enough to take you out of your comfort zone and not stress you out?
3. Practice: Determine how often you are going to practice. Do you want to practice several times a day, or once a day? Whatever you decide do it as regularly as you can.
4. Review: After each practice reflect. How is it going? What worked and what still needs practice?
5. Adapt: What do you need to adjust? What will help you get a better result? Do you need to change the frequency of your practice?
6. Celebrate: Acknowledge the progress you have made. If you forget to practice be kind to yourself. Your aiming to do something you haven’t done before so take it one step at a time. Imperfect action is better than no action at all. 

We all work better when we have someone who will support us and hold us accountable to do what we have committed to.

If you know someone who will play this role ask them to check in with you regularly and celebrate with them.

If you know you want to create some change in 2016 and you are ready to move to the next level email me at Dawn @aurora4success.co.uk. I would be more than happy to explore with you how you can become and even better version of yourself.

Let me be the one to hold you accountable for your practices!

In the meantime good luck and have fun becoming the leader you were born to be.

Have lots of success.

"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit." 

Aristotle 

What are you paying attention to as a leader?

My latest posts have been built around my model Stepping up and Standing out – how to harness the invisible power behind leadership presence and impact. There are 4 principles and so far I’ve covered how you show up as a leader and your intentions – what outcomes do you want in a given situation.

The third principle feels particularly pertinent as we ‘run’ into Christmas and this is about being present.

How present you are in any interaction you have?

Think of being present as where you put your attention.

I am sure you have been with someone and thought that they were not really with you their mind was somewhere else. When someone seems distracted in a meeting, I’m sure you notice that too.

So here’s the question:

How often are you really present with the person in front of you?

How often are you waiting to speak rather than actually listening with an intention to understand what the other person is saying?

How often do you find you are thinking about something else rather than what someone is actually saying in a meeting?

If leadership presence is what others’ sense and feel when they are with you and reflected in the quality of the relationships you build, then you have to be attentive. That means that you are here right now, in this moment.

It is NOT about:

1. Thinking about the next meeting, or what you are going to have for supper tonight.
2. Thinking about the meeting you’ve just had and how it went, or that email that’s just landed in your in box, or your ‘to do list’
3. Wondering who has just called you as your phone goes off in the middle of the conversation.
4. Figuring out when will be the best time to get your point of view across.

Leadership is about connection and the people around you know AND remember when you are paying attention to them.

So as we move into the season where we’re usually aiming to finish things off for the Christmas break and prepare to spend time with the family and socialise I’m going to ask you to experiment with this principle.

Experiment

I thought we’d have a little bit of fun with this, so we’re going to play a game called resisting temptation, and you’ll be pleased to know that this is not about resisting food.

Technology invades our space and we’re always reaching for the phone, the i-pad, the laptop, to check emails, texts, Facebook or whatever else you have as a distraction on your ‘device’. Paying attention to these stops us being present with the people around us.

You get to choose where you play this game. You may choose to play it at home rather than at work, or you may choose to play it in every meeting you have. It’s entirely up to you. My only request is that you play it at least once a day. So here’s how to play; 

• You put all of your attention on the person or task you are working on at that time and be fully present in the moment.
• If it’s a task that is on your laptop/computer, turn off your email and phone. 
• If it’s a meeting you do the same, and focus on every person as they speak.
• If you are playing this at home do exactly the same.
• If you are having a conversation with someone put all of your attention on that person and the conversation. Close your laptop or move away from your computer, phone, ipad…

The essence of this game is to remove all distractions and put all of your attention on the person or task in hand.

I can’t wait to hear how you get on with this. Email me to let me know what you discover.

Remember, this is a game so have some fun with it.

“You don’t build a bond without being present.”

James Earl Jones

How successful are you at creating the right impact as a leader?

In my last post I talked about the first principle of having a greater impact and

leadership presence – how you show up as a leader.

Right now I want to build on that and share the second principle - purpose.

I see so many leaders simply ‘going through the motions’ – ‘doing what they have always done’ and wondering why they didn’t get the results they wanted.

This is why purpose is important.

Purpose is all about your intention in any situation – being clear about what you want to achieve.

How often do you go into a meeting with a very clear intention of what you want to achieve from it?

If your answer is less than 100%, then there is some work to be done here.

As a leader you are on show all of the time and people are always watching you.

You are judged by the impact you have on others.

We all judge others on what they say, what they do and how they act, and yet we judge ourselves by our intentions.

To be an effective leader your actions have got to match your intentions.

If you aren’t clear then the chances of the person on the receiving end understanding are pretty slim. If you are thinking one thing and saying another people pick up on this.

What is his intention?

When you are clear about your intention your mind and body are connected, how you act and what you say will be completely congruent.

Let me tell you why this is important.

Leadership is about connection, so you need to make sure you connect in some way with everyone you meet – and yes I did say everyone.

You have to take the other person into consideration to connect. Some questions you may want to ask yourself are:

• What is your current relationship with them?
• What history is there between you (or their department)?
• How do you want this relationship to develop?

So how do you want to be influencing your relationships with others?

Once you are clear on this you can then consider your intentions for the meeting you are going to have with them.

Setting an intention

Here are a few examples of things you could consider as intentions:

• Is it simply to connect and build rapport with the person – believe me that is a good intention to have  - remember presence is…what others sense and feel when they are with you.
• Is there a particular result you want from this meeting?
• Is there a system, structure or process you want to review, put in place, or agree?
• Is there something you want to learn?
• Is this a topic you simply want to understand?
• If so what is it that you want to learn/understand?
• Is there an idea you want to share and get some feedback on?

These are just some examples to consider and I’m sure you’ll come up with your own.

Being really clear about your intention helps you focus your mind and your energy.

I know you’ll have many meetings every week, so here is an exercise for you.

Here is what I’d like you to experiment with: 

1. First set an intention for every meeting you go to. Yes! Every meeting.
2. Second consider how you want to be seen.  
3. And then put this into practice.

Now, if the thought of doing this for every meeting sends you into panic – good! This is about doing things differently and consistently as consistent action gets consistent results. Force yourself to try this out and see what happens.

This is simply to raise your own awareness of how you show up as a leader, so you can have a greater impact and presence.

Send me an email to let me know how you get on.

“What you think you become.”

Buddha

How are you showing up as a leader?

More and more leaders are asking me to work with them to develop their presence and personal impact.

What I’ve noticed is they are typically faced with these 3 challenges:

1.   They’ve been told that you need to develop a greater presence yet no-one has given you any idea how you’re supposed to do this, or what specifically you need to do.

2.   They are mixing with the right people but can’t seem to get the airtime or their attention to get your message across.

3.   They have way too much to do and don’t have time to spend on developing your presence, after all that’s not going to get the job done!

When I ask anyone what leadership presence is they often struggle to define it and yet they know it’s important.

The truth is no one really teaches this stuff… until now.

For me there are 4 key principles needed to develop an authentic presence that will allow you to:

·      Get the air-time and attention of the people you need too,

·      Influence others and take them with you, and

·      Be seen as a calm and credible leader

I’ve developed a framework around these 4 principles, all equally important and necessary if you want to be successful. You can come back to them time and time again as you progress through your career.

Today, I want to share the first element – how you physically show up as a leader.

You are on show all of the time and people are always watching you and making assessments. Whether you like it or not you set the tone and standards for those around you.

So it’s not good enough to just ‘show up’ and hope for the best.

Whether you like it or not you are judged by the impact you have on others.

People are watching how you act, how you walk, how you sit and how you talk…it’s therefore the quality of your visibility that counts.

It’s the quality you bring to any situation and how you actually present yourself that matters.

This is the foundation piece for presence and impact.

Here’s an example.

I was working with a Board Director; let’s call him Joe. He recognised he’d got more and more drawn into tactical issues and had lost the influence he once had.

When I first met him what I saw was someone who looked frail, ‘mouse like’, and seemed to be making himself look small and blend in.

He certainly didn’t look like a Board Director who owned his agenda let alone his own space.

In just one session we worked on his posture. How he walked and how he filled his own his space. I encouraged him to pay attention to this in meetings and as he walked around the office.

When I next saw him I hardly recognized him. He looked taller. He was walking more confidently and appeared much more comfortable in his own skin. He told me how practicing these subtleties were paying off in his approach to managing meetings and leading discussions.  

So why have I chosen to share this particular story?

LEADERSHIP PRESENCE IS HOW OTHERS EXPERIENCE YOU!

It’s what others sense and feel when they are with you, how you project confidence and credibility.

It's reflected in the quality of the relationships you build, the levels of safety and trust that people feel when they are with you, and in the working environment that you create.

When you get it right this ‘presence’ resonates with, stabilises, and influences others.

So, as presence is something that we experience I thought you might like a little exercise to assess your own presence.

This is an opportunity to raise your awareness of how YOU show up and how that feels to you.

As I’ve already mentioned presence is a felt sense of who you are and how you come across. We often don’t take time to get a sense of this for ourselves.

Let’s start with paying attention to your posture.

Over the next few days start to notice:

How you are walking.

• Are you leaning forward?
• How are you holding your shoulders? Are they rolled forward or hunched up?
• Do you walk fast or slow?
• Where are you looking? Do you look around you or at the floor?

When you are in a meeting or at your desk..

• How are you sitting?
• What are you doing with your feet, do you have your legs crossed or are your feet planted firmly on the floor?
• How are you sitting on the chair? Are you taking up the whole seat, sitting on the edge, or are you leaning to one side?
• In meetings what are you doing with your hands? Are you doodling, fidgeting, working on your computer, or do you have them resting on the table?

These are just a few things to look out for and you may notice others.

What I’d like you to do is make a note of what you observe and ask yourself these 3 questions:

1.   What word would others use to describe you right now?

2.   Is this how you want to be described?

3.   If not, how do you want to be seen instead?

It’s a simple exercise and I just want you to observe yourself and make any adjustments you think will help.

Leadership starts with self-awareness.

I hope you get some great insights and I look forward to connecting with you soon. 

If you’d like to explore how you can develop your own leadership presence further email me and we can set up a call to explore this further.

‘There is more wisdom in your body than in your deepest philosophy.’

Friederich Nietzsche

5 Mistakes people make when thinking about personal brand

When I introduce the topic of personal branding I often get blank looks, resistance or people start talking about social media.

As the conversation progresses the following objections are often revealed:

1.    Branding is only for products.

Whether you like it or not you have a brand. It’s the reputation you have. The question for you to think about is, is that reputation aligned to how I want to be known? If it’s not then there is some work to do.

So, you can choose to own your brand and maximize it to achieve your aspirations; or let it manage you and wonder why the same things seem to happen to you!

If branding were only for products it wouldn’t be something recruiters are interested in understanding about possible candidates...

2.    Branding is inauthentic, you can’t possibly pigeon hole people!

That is correct you can’t pigeon hole people. What you can do is discover what your real assets are and how to best utilise these so you get to do the work you love. It’s more about how you stand out.

When you take the approach I do, which is to discover you from the inside out, it can only be authentic. It is being authentic to who you are that stands the test of time. This is how great brands last!

 

3.    It’s all about your online presence.

True. There is an element of this that will link to any online presence you have. The trick is to be consistent in how you come across both online and off line.

If you appear one way online and when people meet you you’re different they will be confused and potentially suspicious.

4.    I’m too busy and it’s not important now.

Well you may be busy and it may not seem important right now, AND you are communicating a brand already! You could be doing this inconsistently so people don’t really understand the value you bring to the work place.

Spending time on your brand will help you focus your efforts more effectively and be noticed for what you want to be known for.

This IS important.

5.    This is far too difficult and I don’t have the time or money to invest in hiring a Marketing consultant.

This doesn’t require an awful lot of investment and in the process you’ll get some really great and valuable feedback that reinforces all the good that you do.

It doesn’t require a Marketing consultant either.

I have a process that will allow you to get to the heart of your brand within 3 to 4 hours. Having achieved that you’ll be motivated to do more and find it VERY easy.

So… if you are ready to own your brand and stand out send me an email. We can set up a complimentary discovery call to assess how best you can move forward and be the leader you were born to be.

"Be yourself - not your idea of what you think somebody else's idea of yourself should be."  

Henry David Thoreau