THE OBJECTIVE Why set objectives? Begin by establishing personal goals. Set your objectives.

THE OBJECTIVE

There are many people who feel as if they are adrift in the world. They work hard, but they don't seem to be achieving anything worthwhile.

One of the main reasons they feel this way is that they haven't spent enough time thinking about what they want out of life because they haven't set formal goals.

After all, would you embark on a great journey without really knowing where your destination is? Probably not!

Goal setting is a powerful process for thinking about your ideal future and for motivating yourself to turn your vision of that future into reality.

The goal-setting process helps you choose where you want to go in life. By knowing precisely what you want to accomplish, you know where to focus your efforts. You'll also quickly spot the distractions that can so easily lead you astray.

Why set objectives?

Top athletes, successful business, and successful people in all walks of life all set goals.

Goal setting gives you long-term vision and short-term motivation. It focuses on knowledge acquisition and helps you organize your time and resources, so you can get the most out of your life.

By setting yourself specific, clearly defined goals, you can measure to take pride in achieving those goals, and you'll see progress in what might have seemed like a long, pointless period.

You will also increase your self-confidence, as you will recognize your own abilities and skills to achieve the goals you have set for yourself.

Start by setting personal goals. To do this, you should set your goals at different levels:

• First, you create your « big picture » of what you want to do with your life or in, say, the next 10 years by identifying the large-scale goals you want to achieve.

• Then you break them down into smaller and smaller goals that you need to achieve in order to achieve your lifetime goals.

• Finally, once you have your plan, you start working on it to achieve those goals.

Therefore, it's about starting the goal-setting process by looking at your life goals.

Then, to start setting your goals, look at the things you can do in, say, the next five years, then next year, next month, next week, and today.

1. Set lifelong goals: the first step in setting personal goals is to consider what you want to accomplish in your lifetime or at least, far into the future.

Lifetime goal setting gives you the big picture perspective that shapes all other aspects of your decision-making.

To give broad and balanced coverage of all the important areas of your life, try setting goals in some of the following categories or other categories unique to you where they are important to you:

• Career: what level do you want to reach in your career, or what do you want to reach?

• Financial: how much do you want to earn, at what stage? What is the link with your career goals?

• Education: is there any knowledge you would like to acquire in particular? What information and skills will you need to achieve all of your goals?

• Family: do you want to be a parent? If so, how are you going to be a good parent? How do you want to be seen by a partner or your extended family members?

• Artistic: do you want to achieve artistic goals?

• Attitude: is part of your mindset holding you back? Is there any part of your behavior that bothers you? If so, set a goal to improve your behavior or find a solution to the problem.

• Physical: are there any sporting goals you want to achieve, or do you want good health into old age? What steps do you want to take to achieve this?

• Pleasure: how do you want to have fun? You have to make sure that part of your life is for you!

• Public service: do you want to make the world a better place? If so, how?

Spend some time thinking about these things, then select one or more goals from each category, that best reflects, what you want to do.

Then consider scaling back again, so you have a few really important goals to focus on.

In doing so, make sure that the goals you set, are the ones you really want to achieve, not the ones your parents, family, or employers might want.

If you have a partner, you probably want to think about what they want, but also be sure to stay true to yourself!

2. Set smaller goals: Once you've set your lifetime goals, make a five-year plan of smaller goals that you must complete if you want to achieve your lifetime plan.

Then, create a one-year plan, a six-month plan, and a one-month plan of progressively smaller goals that you need to achieve in order to arrive at your life goals. Each of the levels must be based on the previous plan and in an overall vision.

Next, create a daily « to-do » list that you should do today to achieve your life goals.

At an early stage, you are more modest goals might be to read books and gather information about achieving your higher-level goals. This will help you improve the quality and realism of your goal setting.

Finally, review your plans and make sure they fit the way you want to live your life.

3. Stay the course: once you've decided on your first set of goals, continue the process by reviewing and updating your « to-do » list daily.

Periodically review long-range plans and modify them to reflect your changing priorities and experience. A good way to do this is to schedule regular exams and record them in a diary for future reference.

4. Intelligent goals: the following general guidelines will help you set effective and achievable goals:

• State each goal as a positive statement: express your goals in a positive way, for example, « Do this skill well » is a much better goal than « Don't make that stupid mistake. »

• Be precise: set specific goals, including dates, times, and amounts, so you can measure achievement. If you do, you will know exactly when you have reached the goal and can derive complete satisfaction from it.

• Set priorities: when you have multiple goals, give each one a priority. This helps you avoid feeling overwhelmed by too many goals and helps direct your attention to the most important ones.

• Write down the objectives: this crystallizes them and gives them more strength.

• Keep operational objectives by elements: keep reasonable goals that you are working towards one or a series of items that you know are achievable. If a goal is too big, it may seem as if you're

not making progress towards it. Keeping goals small and incremental gives more opportunities for rewards.

• Set performance goals, not outcome goals: you need to be sure to set goals over which you have as much control as possible. It can be quite disheartening not to achieve a personal goal for reasons beyond your control. For example, in the business world, these reasons can be an unfavorable business environment or unexpected effects of government policy. In sports, the reasons can include poor judgment, bad weather, injury, or just plain bad luck. Remember to base your goals on personal performance, so you can stay in control of achieving your goals and get satisfaction from them.

• Set realistic goals: it is important to set goals that you can achieve.

For example, all kinds of people such as employers, parents, media, or society may set unrealistic goals for you. They will often do this without knowing your own desires and ambitions. However, it's also possible to set goals that are too difficult because you might not appreciate the obstacles in your way or not understand how much skill you need to develop to achieve a particular level of performance.

5. Achieve the goals: when you have achieved a goal, take the time to enjoy the satisfaction of having done so. Let the implications of reaching the goal sink in and observe the progress you have made towards other goals. If the goal was important, reward yourself accordingly. All of this helps you build the self-confidence you deserve. With the experience of achieving this goal, review the rest of your planned goals:

• If you reached the goal too easily, make your next goal a little more difficult.

• If the goal took a long time and maybe at times daunting to complete, make the next goal a little easier.

• If you learned something that would cause you to change other goals, do it.

• If you noticed a deficit in your skills despite achieving the goal, decide if you want to set goals to address it.

It's important to remember that it doesn't matter that much about not hitting the intended target, as long as you put it into perspective and learn from the experience.

Essentially, goal setting is an important method for:

• Decide what you want to accomplish in your life. • Separate what is important from what is irrelevant, or a distraction. • Motivate oneself. • Build self-confidence, based on achieving goals.

First define your life goals. Next, make a five-year plan of smaller goals that you must achieve if you want to achieve your lifetime plan. Continue the process by regularly reviewing and updating your goals. And don't forget to take the time to enjoy the satisfaction of achieving your goals when you do. If you have not already set goals, do so now.

As you incorporate a sense of commitment, strategy and purpose into your life, your career will accelerate, and you will wonder how you would have managed to achieve any success without it!

Recommended reading and references

We suggest that you consult the works identified below in order to learn more about the particularities contained in this chapter.

BLANCHARD, Ken & BOWLES, Sheldon. BIG BUCKS! How to Make Serious Money for Both You and Your Company. Morrow, Harper Collins, ISBN 0-688-17035-8.

BOUCHARD, Jacques. LES 36 CORDES SENSIBLES DES QUÉBÉCOIS. Éditions Héritage. ISBN 0-7773-3944-7.

BOUCHARD, Jacques. L’AUTRE PUBLICITÉ : La publicité sociétale. Éditions Héritages. ISBN 0-7773-5478-0.

BRICKER, D. & WRIGHT, J. WHAT CANADIANS THINK ABOUT ALMOST EVERYTHING. Seal Books. ISBN 0-7704-3008-2.

DEL, Michael. DIRECT FROM DELL: Strategies That Revolutionized an Industry. Harper. ISBN 0-694-52023-3.

Kotter, P., John. THE HEART OF CHANGE. Harvard Press. ISBN: 1-57851-254-9

Kotter, P., John. LEADING CHANGE. Harvard Press. ISBN: 13:978-0-87584-747-4

COHEN, Dan. S. THE HEART OF CHANGE FIELD GUIDE. Harvard Press. ISBN: 1-59139-775-8