Goal Setting – Danielle King
Goal Setting is something that I am super passionate about and have been using it from the start of this year to apply to my business and life as I work towards launching a business. This is the first time I have ever worked for myself, so it has been a big learning curve for me and this tool has really helped me move forward and not become overwhelmed!!
In this blog post, I will give you my top tips for goal setting and the things I have learnt along the way that have worked for me!
My first top tip – block out a few hours of time for this. You want to make sure you are really sitting down and focusing. These are the things you want to achieve over the course of the next 12 months, so take the time to think about what you want to achieve!
Secondly, one of the biggest downfalls of goal setting, or the other common ‘New Years Resolution’ is that the goals are not manageable. If you are going to set a 12-month goal make sure that you can Measure it. This sounds obvious, but you need to be able to track the progress of the goal along the way.
A great example would be if you were saving money – you have an end goal of the amount you want to save in the 12 months – this can easily be broken down into smaller milestones that you can slowly work towards.
These type of goals are known as SMART goals – Specific, Measurable, Actionable, Realistic, Time-Bound.
Once you are thinking along these lines its time for some reflection. Think about what you have done over the previous 12 months, what has changed, how have you moved forwards, this might help you to think how you want the next 12 months to look.
My biggest goal setting tip here is to think of your life as a whole! Some goal setting tools are very business-like and cold! If your thinking of your life as a whole it means you can set both work and personal goals. If all your goals were completely work related, you might find that your personal life might suffer a bit! Remember, life is all about balance!
Now that you are really thinking about your life as a whole, use this time to think big!!! They call this part ‘visioning’ think about how you would like to feel in 12 months reflecting back (like you have just done about the last 12 months) where would you like to be? Get a pen and paper and scribble away! This will help you untangle what is going on in your head – have a look at continuous writing technique if you are struggling to let go here.
Next top tip!
Do not set too many goals!! I would say no more than 5. You want to feel nervous about these ‘big’ goals you have set, but not overwhelmed by them!! Otherwise, you won’t do them!
Make sure they fit into the SMART principles.
My final tip for setting goals – break them down!
So you have your 5 big goals for the next 12 months – break them down into 90-day chunks. So what can you do in the first 90 days to get you closer to that big 12-month goal? This should make these big scary goals a bit more bitesize!
When you get to the end of the 90days reflect back, did you hit that goal, if not why? What are you then going to set for your next 90 days to ensure that you do??
Finally, my bonus tip!!
Its ok for your goals to change!! You might set your self up with some great goals and over the course of the year things and circumstances change and that ok!!! Use this and just adapt them! One of my first 90 day goals was based on getting back into my gym routine of 4 days a week, unfortunately I keep getting injured, so I have now changed this goal to incorporate more yoga sessions as I am aware that I need to now improve my flexibility as this is the cause of my injuries!
If you want to know more about my goal setting journey, check out my first blog on my 12month goals.
Before I start, I will give you a little background!!! Hello!!! My name is Danielle King, I am a ladies fashion designer, which I have done for the last 10 years. My last role was heading up and building the design team at Pretty Little Thing, before that I was the Senior Designer at Missguided. So stepping out of the industry to set up on my own has been a super scary/exciting challenge!!!
Thanks for reading, I hope you have found this useful and happy goal setting!! If you want to follow my journey of goal setting and working towards launching my business check out my blog
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