Planning for Success

It’s that time when our summer is over and kids are back in school. Time to buckle down and get back into the workflow with a new vibrancy. Do you realize this is also the time of year when you need to be reviewing that Strategic Plan and setting the course for 2018? Your plans, both personal and corporate, need to be addressed now and completed by the first of November if you are a January-December fiscal planner. If you wait until year-end, or worse the first of the new year, you’re already too late.

So why should you complete a personal strategic plan? It’s simple. Strategic Plans keep us on track and direct our every move. Recently I read “Secrets of the World Class” by Steve Siebold. As he puts it, “Champions are famous for concentrating their energy and efforts on what they want and blocking out anything or anyone who threatens that focus. While average people haphazardly pursue loosely defined goals, champions concentrate on the attainment of a singular purpose with an intensity that borders on obsession.” It’s a matter of whether or not you want to be a champion.

Stop thinking middle-class dreams and set your sights on something bigger. I love what Nido Qubein offers: “Nothing can add more power to your life than concentrating all your energies on a limited set of targets.” Without a good strategic plan, you are easily distracted by things that pop up in your path… I call them “bunny trails.” They seem important or fun at the moment but they distract you from your long-range goal and take you off your track to world-class position.

Begin with the end in mind. What do you see for yourself in the future? What are your dreams and aspirations? Once you can identify those, begin going backwards until you know what you need to do today to accomplish your dream of the future.

Don’t let each day pass you by only to regret one day that you never lived the life you always wanted. Plan for it now.