2024 is here and it’s going to be a phenomenal year!
Setting yourself up for success starts with a positive mindset and a solid goal plan. Sometimes you get lucky but for most entrepreneurs and business owners, success comes to those who work consistently towards their goals.
In our December newsletter we talked about the benefits of proactive marketing and branding. Reflecting on the year behind us and creating a plan for the new year that ensures your brand and marketing strategies are linked to your core values and target the right audience. Along with that plan, it’s also important to create a success plan for yourself and your business.
Unlike the brand marketing plan, this one is all about your personal growth and business goals. What does success mean to you in 2024? When you get to the end of the year what do you want to have achieved? And we are not just talking about your financial goals, think about what is going to fill up your cup and ensure 2024 is happy and fulfilled year.
Start off by reflecting on the previous year. What did you achieve that made you feel accomplished and gave you a sense of self-worth? What challenges did you face and how did you overcome them or are they still a work in progress? Are their skills that you successfully developed and are really proud of or perhaps some weaknesses that you discovered and have identified you want to work on this year?
Self-reflection is the key to creating realistic and achievable goals for the year ahead. Once you have reflected on 2023, it’s time to move your thoughts into planning for 2024 and set your intentions and aspirations clearly. You need to be clear and concise and set actionable and measurable goals to truly set yourself up for success.
Decide exactly what you want.
Perhaps your main goal this year is to improve your work-life balance and make more time for family, friends and having fun. Or it could be about improving your health, emotional well-being or increasing your knowledge or skills in a particular area either business oriented or something that just enriches your life like learning to paint or travelling. It could be about improving the quality of your relationships with the people in your life or making a difference within the world around you. Defining what success looks like for you is the most important step!
Set Measurable SMART Goals.
Write down clearly your goal plan for 2024. Make sure they are specific and include details that allow you to measure your success such as specific timelines or the frequency of your actions. For instance, if you want to get fit, rather than just saying I am going to exercise more, set your intention to do some kind of physical activity for at least 30 minutes, three times a week. If you want to learn to paint, set a goal to book into an art class by March and to spend your Sunday afternoons once a fortnight creating your artworks. Remember to be realistic about what you can achieve if you want to succeed.
Learn more about SMART Goals here.
Determine what matters most.
Set your priorities. If you have identified ten things you want to achieve in 2024, determine which ones are the most important and will be your main focus. Are there some goals you want to achieve in the first half of the year and some that you can work towards slower or later and achieve by the end of the year?
Break them down.
One of the biggest reasons people fail to achieve their yearly goals is due to a lack of success goal planning. Our brains struggle to focus on big lofty goals. If you want to succeed you need to break your goals down into bite sized chunks that won’t overwhelm you. Create a plan with actionable baby steps, deadlines, and definitions of what success at each point looks like.
Keep it front of mind and revisit your goal plan every 3 months.
It’s all well and good to create a goal plan but that is only part of the process. To stay focussed on your goals you need to keep them front of mind. Write down your goals in a list or create a vision board and put it somewhere you will see it every day. Make sure you take a moment to read through your list and set your intentions to take active steps towards achieving those goals.
Every three months, sit down and think about what you have achieved. Refer to your SMART goal plan and tick off the small goals you have achieved to date. Be proud of what you achieve and make sure you acknowledge these small wins to yourself, perhaps even reward your success to date. Then, look at what your next small goal is and create a plan for how you will achieve it in the desired timeframe. Set your intentions and act on them.
Remember not to be too hard on yourself though and be flexible. Sometimes our circumstances change, and we don’t always achieve what we set out to do. That’s ok, setbacks are inevitable sometimes, however it’s how we pick ourselves back up that matters. Be open to changing your goals, pivoting to alternate plans or simply learning from your failures and striving to do better over the next three months. If you’re just struggling to action your goals, perhaps consider making yourself accountable to a friend of family member. Often, just knowing someone is going to ask you how your going with your goals can be enough to give you the kickstart you need.
Starting the year off with positive mindset and a goal plan absolutely helps set you up to succeed. Investing a few hours now and regularly throughout the year into planning and checking in on your goals will help ensure you can look back at the end of 2024 and be proud of what you have achieved and how far you have come. Remember too, not only is this a fantastic way to achieve personal growth, but you can also use these same techniques for business success too. Just remember to set actionable, realistic SMART goals and to check in regularly on your progress.