January Connections video: How to keep your goals from slipping away

Pop quiz.

No cheating!

What are the goals you set for yourself for 2022?

Do you know them without looking at your notes?

If not, you may have the same problem I do. At the end of the year, I get so excited to set fresh goals for the new year … only to lose sight of them as the new year unfolds faster than I expected.

In recent years, as Syte Consulting Group has continued to grow and evolve, I’ve had to figure out ways to keep my important goals front and center all year long.

In today’s short video, I’m sharing two of my “tricks” for staying focused on what’s important — no matter how busy things get.

Hey, Erin Koss, CEO at Syte Consulting Group here. I can’t believe it’s already two weeks into January! We’re in a new year and I know many of us look back on how did the prior year go for us. What were the wins? What were the losses? What were the challenges? What do we want to do better next year?

In the process, we start creating this new year. Many of us set goals and intentions for that year. One of the things that occurred to me just felt like I was in the hustle and bustle of 2022 already and how easily it is to forget those goals and intentions so quickly or to lose sight of them.

I was thinking about that this morning and I had a couple of ideas and thoughts I just wanted to share with you and see if maybe they resonate with you. For starters, I know that most of us go into 2022 or went into this year and as we set our goals and intentions, we might forget what those are. As we do, one of the things I’ve been starting to do is on a Monday morning is trying to get grounded even for five minutes and remind myself what those are in the process of doing that.

I have found during the week that I’m more aware, more focused, and more thoughtful about how I spend my time. The other thing that I did this year that I thought was kind of interesting for me is that we all know what goals are. We set our goals every year and we think about the goals as being defined as the outcome. We want to achieve the desired results. It is super important for us at Syte Consulting Group for us. We are about growing the business and adding key people to our organization this year. Those are some of our big goals that we’re striving for. But, underneath all of that, are what we call intentions.

Intentions can be viewed a couple of different ways. No matter how you skin it, they’re more detail-oriented. One way to think about intentions is the process of reaching the goal. It’s the “How?”.

It’s the “What are we going to do?”  It’s the “How are we going to do it?”. It’s the process for reaching the goals. What are the steps? What are the things we’re going to do? How are we going to approach reaching our goals?

Another way, and maybe even a more meaningful way, that has shown up for me recently is I like to create a theme around intentions so I think about intentions even more broadly than just a process. I think about it in terms of how is it that I’m going to choose to show up in the world? How is it I’m going to behave in the world in addition to the process and the steps that I’m going to take? They both kind of work together.

One of the things I do is like to create a theme, which is sometimes a lot of folks will think about. This is what’s my one word for 2022 that will kind of cover the way in which I want to show up and behave this year and the way I want to focus this year. For me as an example is that word for this year is accepting. Maybe your word is gratitude or organized or joy. Any word that suits your intention is totally perfect.

For me, it’s accepting and what that is for me is as I go through the process of trying to reach my goals this year, I’m trying to be more accepting for me that starts with accepting myself. I have to accept that I am not perfect, that I’m doing the best that I can, and that I’m trying as hard as I can to be the best that I can be. This extends to them accepting other people around me and how they show up, whether it’s what I want or not, how I want it, or no matter what I think about it, it doesn’t matter. I’m accepting the people around me, exactly how they show up, just like I’m doing with myself.

It also goes to how can I accept the things that I can’t change. For me, this is recognizing that I don’t have control over everything. This is for me, some important themes for the year that go into as I approach the goals that we have both personally and professionally. I mentioned a few that we have at Syte this year that are really going to be how I focus and how I think about the ways that I approach meeting those goals. If I think back to the things that we’ve talked about today, the thing that strikes me as we go into a busy year is that it’s going to be as busy as they come.

But I want to be thinking about my goals for the year, both personally and professionally. Those are the end results. Where it is exactly that I’m trying to go? Yet I want to also be aware of my intentions and maybe even set a theme for those intentions.

One word theme work for me because I want to be intentional. Forgive the pun in the way that I show up and behave and approach the goals that I set. I think each of us does that in a unique way. For me, I’m looking at those every Monday. Each Monday, I hit my chair in my office and I take five minutes to think about both of those things. What are my goals and how am I going to show up and approach meeting those goals? It just keeps that reminder in my mind as we get busy and start to get mired in the details of what we do. I hope this has given you a little bit of nuggets and hopefully, some additional things to think about as you approach your goals and intentions this year. I would love to hear how you think about goal setting and meeting those goals. I know it’s something that’s important to most of us as we lead the people and the companies that we care about.

I would love to hear what you have to say as well and what’s working for you. In the meantime, we look forward to chatting with you again in February. Don’t stay too busy and don’t work too hard and do the best you can to be the best you can. We care about you. Take care.