Goal Setting – Feedback

I want to round out the goal setting discussion by focusing on the importance of feedback.  To illustrate, feedback has played a critical role in a current client business coaching engagement.  To begin the coaching process this past summer, we employed a 360° feedback mechanism to help set priorities for the client’s development.  Feedback was first necessary to set goals and priorities. Based on areas for improvement, we developed four questions that she asks herself each and every day.  These are all “yes” or “no” questions.  (As example, a question I ask myself every day is “Did I do something to develop new business

Goal Setting – Diminishing Returns

In my last post, I talked about the importance of goal commitment when setting goals for yourself and/or those you lead. Today, I want to discuss the law of diminishing returns and how it relates to goal setting.  I have honestly thought about a dozen different things that I want to focus on for the New Year, have you?  The law of diminishing returns tells us that the more goals we set, the less likely we are to achieve them.  One goal distracts from another, leaving us less likely to accomplish anything. From a personal perspective, one way to avoid

Goal Setting – A Series

Research has shown that goal setting, if done correctly, is one of the most supported motivational techniques (Jex & Britt 2008). Setting goals can help you maximize success for yourself and/or the people that you lead. We’ve all heard of the acronym “SMART” that guides good goal setting: Specific Measurable Attainable Realistic Time bound I certainly advocate for following these guidelines with any resolution or goal you set. But there are three things that I want to focus on over the next few weeks that have been shown to be important components of goal setting that are not emphasized as

Set Goals Then Forget About Them

Hopefully you’ve gotten your 2015 new years resolutions down on paper and have a way to track attainment towards them. Once you’ve done this, I’d encourage you to forget about the goal(s) for 2015 and instead focus on the process that leads to achieving the goals.  Why? Focusing on the long-term often leads to paralyses in the short term.  For example, if your goal is to lose 100 pounds, this could easily become overwhelming.  If you instead focus on a sub-objective towards that goal of limiting your calorie intake to say, 2000 a day and exercising for 30 minutes 5

New Years Resolutions 101: Don’t put the cart before the horse

It’s a new year. Have you set your resolutions or goals?  Most of us do, but then give up on them by the end of January. One key reason I see people fail at goal setting in the leadership and career coaching we do (and for myself as well) is because we put the cart before the horse.  We set a goal and don’t have any method put in place for measuring progress towards it or achievement of it. Maybe a couple of examples will help: 1.  I’m so guilty of this, so I’ll use myself as an example first.