Chapter 2
I’m scared of setting goals
F – Fear
Setting goals is not something to be done when hungover just because the date changed to the 1st of January. And this is something that has infuriated me since I was young: just after the big man has come down the chimney (that’s Father Christmas, Santa, Saint Nick, etc.), there is still a house full of sweets and goodies, a ton of toys to play, it’s the worst weather of the year and all you want to do is hibernate. But, according to the TV, we should be setting goals to lose weight and get fit and walk into work with the burning ambition to have the top job by Easter.
The other culprits for forcing goals on us that set us on a wrong footing from a young age are teachers. Sorry teachers, but you do. Teachers looked down their noses in disappointment when I said I wasn’t going to university. That was their goal for me. But it was so out of sync with the person that I really was. They were completely unaware that I was so shy I wouldn’t have been able to ask someone where the nearest toilet was, let alone find any of my lectures.
Don’t assume a gobby teen is confident, because I most certainly wasn’t. Goals are set in our lives in the weirdest way: when it’s dark and cold and the house is full of tasty food, or by teachers who have never experienced anything other than education! It concerns me that in the 21st century we still don’t teach about achieving goals, or about motivation and confidence building in schools.
Even now my children come home and tell me how they are doing according to grades on a piece of paper. Thankfully they live in a house where they are encouraged to think about what they want to feel, where they want to be and what do they want to be doing, rather than being asked ‘What university do you want to go to?’ and ‘How much money do you want to earn?’ (Remember money may be a core value for you; however, it’s not for me or my family members. We are far more likely to achieve true success if we work according to what really floats our boat.) Thus, when you know what values excite you, how will you bring them to life? The answer is: goals.
The problem can be that people sometimes create goals that are so scary they’re the equivalent of saying ‘Today I’m going to walk naked down the motorway’, or ‘Today I will be walking two very hungry crocodiles that have not been fed for two weeks’, or ‘I will paint myself in my corporate colours with a sign on my head saying I’m the most successful business owner in the world with my contact details strapped on my head in a big glittery and feathered head piece, and that will get me world recognition!’
Well, quite. It is scary. Yes, it will get you noticed. But is it the best goal you could have set? And is it really likely you are going to go ahead with it? Have you really thought it through?
But for all my silliness, this is what so many people’s goals really look like: they are poorly planned, ill advised, unachievable, unrealistic and so massively huge. Your brain struggles to compute it, literally!
On the other hand, other people wander along hoping that success will somehow tap them on the shoulder and say ‘Hi, I understand you were looking for me?’
I can appreciate why many people shy away from setting goals altogether, or set goals that are so ambiguous that it would be sheer luck if they got there. Because somewhere in their past there could be a memory of an aunt failing at her diet by the 16th of January. Or feeling useless at school because Katie was always cleverer. (That is one I’ve heard so many times! So and so was so much brighter than me at school!) So what? Big deal! Why should that define your goals of success? Why should John at high school’s ability to run for longer than you mean you will always believe you are less competent in the boardroom or at the meeting table?
These may seem like daft analogies; however, in my experience when you dig down with a client and explore their beliefs, you will discover that the reason they walk into a new situation or opportunity thinking ‘Oh no I’m dreading this!’ is because of a deep-rooted belief that says ‘Yep, you have never been that good at that, have you?’
So ask yourself: ‘What kind of goals do I set?’ Do you set goals that are too easily achieved – almost so easy they’re as unimpressive as telling your boss you brushed your teeth this morning? Or do you set goals that are too unrealistic – so huge you feel like giving up before you even get started? Most people would not plan their dream trip around the world and think ‘Right, all I need is a pair of trainers, let’s do this,’ would they? So what makes a goal, big AND achievable? What makes a goal scary AND achievable? What makes a goal work?
You don’t just run around hoping for the best, shouting instructions and hoping someone heard you and will do some of what they might have heard. If you do, you are far more likely to end up feeling demotivated and stuck. People that set the wrong goals or fear setting any goals end up procrastinating and invariably don’t get the results at work that they want. I see this fear manifest itself with so many professional people as negative feelings, results and actions. And all because they fear setting goals.
E – Examples and exercises
Let’s shake up your attitude to goals. You may be reading this thinking, ‘I already set goals!’ Yes, you may do. However, are they the right goals? Do they make you feel a little bit like the first time you got on a bike?
Take the business owner who told me they wanted to bill more hours, but when pushed on how many more hours they had no idea. And when I pushed further, they had no idea how many hours the company could cope with or what their maximum capacity was! And when I pushed even further, they didn’t have a clue what they wanted the company to look like in three years’ time. How can you work towards a goal if you don’t know what it is? Surely it’s madness when attempting to win at work to set random goals with no definition, and use hope and ambiguousness and pray to the random gods of luck?
Goals should make you feel like you wish there was a hand to steady the seat for you, because it can feel really scary and that road can look really hard. Do your goals push you? Do you feel fear? If a goal doesn’t make you feel a little like you are standing a little too close to the edge of a tall mountain, with a little too much breeze in your hair, then it’s not the right goal.
A goal should make you say ‘woo hoo!’ and ‘uh oh’ at the same time. A goal should be scary. It should make you feel a little bit like you need to hold on to something. You should feel like you desperately want to tell someone but you are a bit scared, because if you tell someone about it, well then you have to go and do something about it, right? That means it’s a good goal.
But it’s so much more than that. And we need to help you create goals that have the right level of fear, that are right for you and only you. These three exercises will help you define your goals and give you the confidence to override the fears that stop you going for it.
Exercise 1 – Power goals
So let’s start at the beginning. What do you want? What do you really want?
I want you to create a sentence that sums up what you want. For me, I imagine that I can see the words to my goal written on my forehead. Why? Because every time I wash my hands there’s a mirror and in every mirror I visualise those words. When I get ready in the morning, I can see those words. When I’m driving the car, I can see the words. When I walk past a window, I can see the words. Even if I don’t notice my reflection, I’m sure my subconscious spots the visualisation and keeps working on my goal, because I’ve a habit of hitting targets pretty quick! It’s obviously not a long sentence. It’s a short concise sentence that my brain knows and adores. It’s so powerful I feel like I own the goal and the contents of it already!
What would be in your sentence? You need to phrase your sentence in the positive. Here are some rules to follow:
| Do not include these words | Do include these words | Do add |
|---|---|---|
| Don’t | Aim | Dates |
| Won’t | Will | Figures |
| Hope | Going | Addresses |
| Should | Have | Times |
| Like | Achieve | Locations |
| Want | Ask for | Facts |
| Need | Speak | Names |
| Try | Concise | Amounts |
Your sentence could look like this:
‘I will have 10 new clients by the 16th of next month that will give me an additional income of x.’
A poor unresponsive goal could look like this:
‘I will try and get some more clients in the next few months.’
Another bad example for you is:
‘I won’t let people take advantage of me at work anymore.’
A powerful goal could be:
‘People respect me at work and appreciate me and my own goals and ambitions’.
Exercise 2 – The power of words
I don’t see my working week as work. I see my working week as my time to be with people who want more out of life, and I get the joy of helping them achieve that. It’s not work. I adore it. Work is a word that I associate with things that are hard. Scrubbing the barnacles off of my Dad’s boat as a kid, now that was work! I used to go home with bleeding knuckles! As much fun as it was to be by the sea, the bleeding knuckles were not. So I chose to get rid of the word ‘work’, and I don’t ‘work’. In fact, when I’m gardening that too is not work, that is fun.
You see how for me there is very little work in my life? Why am I telling you this? Because I choose my words (even in my head) very carefully. I want to achieve. And I know that with what I share here with you in this book I get to achieve my goals, and I want you to get the same results. And if I use words that have negative connotations, even in my head, I risk damaging my chances of success. For me the word ‘work’ is a negative word. And any undesirable words that are allowed in my head can risk stopping me from taking action and can cause procrastination.
It’s not just about choosing the right goals. It’s not just thinking about every aspect of the goal. It’s also about choosing the right words to describe your goals. The words are very, very important. The way you talk to yourself will power up your goals. For example, if you are someone that loves being outside and hates hard work and being stuck indoors, and you know that to achieve your heart’s desire is going to take a lot of commitment and dedication, then use those words.
Don’t use words like ‘it’s going to take a ton of hard work and hours in the office’. Let’s think this through. You are an outdoorsy person, who has thought big on a goal. And you know the goal is going to need things from you that take you outside of your comfort zone and stick you indoors in an office. (In Chapter 7 we will look at a massive fear for so many people and how to overcome that fear you need to get so far out of your comfort zone that you can’t see it any more. Even if that fear is not one you face, the skills that we look at in that chapter will help in all aspects of your life, especially when we are looking at achieving your goals.) However, what do you do to your success if you use words that work in a very contradictory style to your natural way of thinking and your very beliefs?
Words can easily drag us down. Our minds can be easily entrenched into thinking something is too hard to achieve just by the way we choose to talk to ourselves. You can, in effect, convince yourself it is too hard. Scary right? You can literally talk yourself out of getting started on a goal, just by the way you are talking about a goal in your head! So power up your chances of success with the words you use. What words are you going to choose to use on yourself?
Exercise 3 – Break it down
When you know what you want, you need to break down every last detail of that goal. Therefore, as you plan your goals, you dismantle them. Remember to choose your words wisely. What words do you like? It sounds a bit like you are back at school and any minute now I’m going to ask you to talk about imagery, but seriously, are you a person that loves city life, the buzz and the commotion, or do you wish for peace and quiet and the sound of bird song? Think back to your values: what are your core three, what are the other seven, and how could they impact on your goal success?
We need to break your goal down into manageable pieces. If you had said to Richard Branson at 16 years of age. ‘Here you go mate, here’s a global empire’, I wouldn’t mind betting he would have struggled or at least scratched his head and thought ‘Right, what do I do now?’ Every great success needs to be broken down into manageable pieces. And you start in a way that works for you. And that means breaking it down, using your natural style.
There is a saying I use a lot: ‘How do you eat a mountain of cheese? One bite at a time!’ So look at the big picture, the big dream, the big goal. And start chipping bits a way at it. You can do this by actually writing each piece down on a notelet or creating an Excel spreadsheet. The choice is yours. Just go with your natural style of working. How would you tackle a task that you are good at?
Now you need to ask lots of questions. Here are a good few to get you started.
- Who is there with you?
- What does your goal look like?
- How many hours a week do you work?
- Do you work?
- Do you see it as work?
- Do you travel?
- Do you work alone?
- What needs to happen?
- Do you have all of the skills you need?
- What jobs do you hate doing? What will you probably learn to do first or outsource?
- Who can you rely on to support you to achieve this?
- Who can you rely on to give you honest feedback?
- Who will keep you on track?
- How will you know you are making progress?
- How will you overcome failure?
- How will you finance this?
- How will you stop your passion for X from getting in the way of you achieving this?
- What are you not good at?
- What beliefs do you hold about yourself that are risks to your success?
- What time scale do you need to set for the goal?
- Are you realistic in this goal?
What questions could you ask yourself? (Remember I don’t know what your goal is, so considering you do know what your goal is, think about any additional questions you need to ask of yourself to be able to chip your big goal into manageable pieces.) I’ve sneaked into that list some questions I think you need to answer to really help you succeed in your goals at work. I want to constantly recap with you:
- You need to know the person you really are.
- You need to know what you really want (and not what someone else’s version of success is).
- You need to set clearly defined goals.
- You need to break goals down into manageable pieces.
For a goal to work you need to break it down. From going for a promotion to getting your products in every store in the world, whatever your burning ambitions are, whatever your goals are, you need to break them down.
A – Action
Big goals should be massive goals that make you smile from ear to ear. They should make you smile so much that you sleep the sleep of kids with a new shiny bike at the end of their beds, because you begged your parents to let you put it there, because it’s such a cool present and you can’t bear to be parted from it.
We started in Chapter 1 by understanding what you believed in, what mattered to you most. Now ask, what do you want? I asked you in Chapter 1 about the Ferrari. Now, if that makes you grin from ear to ear, what are you going to do to get it? If it’s not a Ferrari, then what is it that you want?
Bring your goal into focus with the exercises above. And make them so clear in your mind that you can feel them. They should light up your mind as if you’ve already achieved them. What emotions would you be feeling if you did? Using the exercises from this chapter, what actions are you going to take?
The fear of setting goals will haunt your success at work forever unless you take action today. Not next week, or after this piece of work is done, or after you’ve finished working with this client. Today, right now. And remember it doesn’t need to start with a grand gesture. Think back to the goal of walking naked down the motorway, with two very hungry crocodiles that have not been fed for two weeks in your corporate colours with a sign on your head to get your company known? It’s extreme and it wouldn’t work. There are easier and far more effective ways to achieve. So where will you choose to start?
Goals are as unique as you are. So ultimately you need to focus on just you. If your goal is going to require you to take yourself out of your comfort zone, your words will need to be powered up and to do that you will need to start by being nice to yourself. If you wouldn’t say it to your best mate or your mum, then don’t say it to yourself.
Seriously, by the end of this chapter when you’ve set THE goal, to get THE results you want, you need to be walking out of the door, every day saying the right things in your head. We will look at this in more detail in Chapter 4. You need to ask yourself challenging questions that ensure you have set yourself up for success. The fact is that if you believe in yourself and you hold firm to that belief, that no matter what happens, even if it all goes wrong, you will find a way forward, and you will pick yourself up. Maybe you will even have a chuckle and a nod of your head at the obstacle in your way, and then move forward. Then you will not be scared to set goals. Goals are supposed to be scary, and they are supposed to make you step back in awe for just a moment. You should think to yourself: wow, this is what I want.
R – Result
The fear of not setting goals is one that can manifest in so many ways. And ironically, with all our passion for motivational quotes and empowering posters adorning our office walls and our social media streams, it’s hard to believe it’s a real fear at all. However, so many professional people set goals in the wrong way. People looking to win at work can set goals that are so unachievable they cause their success rate to take a nose dive and their finances to take a dip as they invest in more personal and professional development courses and books but still use the same, wrong, methodology. If you change the method you use and access your natural style, you could drastically change your results.
Like the business owner that said they wanted to increase their agency’s billable hours, but when I challenged them and asked by how much they said ‘Lots!’ When we delved deeper and to work out how much, it became clear that they didn’t know. Thus we worked out what the company could viably look after with their current work force and what they would ideally look after in three years’ time and in five years’ time. (They currently saw billable hours between 40 and 120 a week.) From this we were able to create a new billable hours goal for the end of the month and for six months’ time. (The homework was to figure out what one year’s and three years’ billable hours would look like!) Within four days they had hit their one-month goal of 500 hours. And within three weeks they had hit their target of 1,200 hours! Now that is creating a clear goal, breaking down the actions, working to your natural style and taking the right actions, and it was a joy to get a message saying they’d smashed their targets so fast.
Not all goals are big like that. Sometimes a goal is far more subtle, but just as powerful. Your goal could be to become more confident in the work place and stand up for what you believe in. For instance, I had a client who was rather shy and had great ideas, but didn’t have the confidence to say what they were thinking because they were new to the company. However, their boss had made it clear they valued their opinion and wanted to see them achieve, because they saw real potential in them. The goal was set to help this person to be more vocal, confident and assertive. And the goal was achieved.
The joy of this process is that no one need ever know what you are doing. It is your private road to success. There is the possibility that you may wish to or need to share aspects of it with others; however, the nuts and bolts, the dismantled intricacies of your goal, are yours and yours alone. And only you need ever know what you aim to achieve. Goals are very individual, private and personal. And by honouring what matters to you and creating personal goals, you are far more likely to reach them. And then you can smile confidently and you get on with it. And that leads us nicely into Chapter 3.