My first job out of University was on a Leadership Development Program for high potential future leaders. As with all good programs, they wanted us to identify what we wanted our future roles within the company to be. In my early 20’s, fresh from University, I truly had no idea, but I came up with some roles that I thought seemed a logical progression for my future. Lifestyle-wise, I knew that someday I wanted to get married and have a family, but leadership roles within this global company included massive amounts of travel and long hours, which does not align well with being home for dinner every night. The problem: I had two BIG goals that were not aligned.
So many of us look at our work life as one thing and our home life as a completely separate entity, but this leads to many conflicts with scheduling and other priorities. What should take priority? Some may say that their work life does because it pays the bills, but no one else is going to prioritize your life goals except for you. If you don’t make choices that lead you closer to your dreams or to God’s plan for your life, then you won’t ever get there.
I have two simple rules for a personal strategy.
1. It has to be memorable. If you can’t remember it, you can’t live it.
2. It must be a living “document.” Document is quoted because it doesn’t have to be formal, but you should write it down somewhere where you will see it often. A “living” document means that it should be updated and revised regularly. Life circumstances will change, dreams will be added, and values will be refined. It’s ok to change things as long as it isn’t fear that’s making you change them.
There should be four key components to your personal strategy.
1. Define your Core Values. In the book The Advantage, Patrick Lencioni defines four types of values. Core values are the two-to-four things that really define who you are and how you behave. By understanding what they are, you will have a lens with which you can view decisions. Understanding the other values will help you clarify your core values as well as weed out any behaviours you may not want to own.
a. Aspirational Values are values and behaviours that you aspire to achieve but isn’t necessarily something you embody now.
b. Accidental Values are values that you have adopted by accident…and they may not always be good. For example, if every meeting starts five minutes late, that is an accidental value within an organization that you may want to address.
c. Pay-to-play values. These are the easiest ones to confuse with core values because you are actually living them, but they are not the things that really differentiate you from someone else and may not be a key driver for decisions. Adding them into your core values can add confusion rather than clarity to decision-making.
2. Set your priorities. We all have many roles to play in life, so understanding which roles and activities out-rank the others is important both to planning your time effectively and to goal and strategy-setting. Examples of priorities are children, spouse, work, extended family, volunteering, hobbies, God, health, financial fitness, or many others. Some years ago I used to say that family was my priority, but I lived nine hours away and only saw them on major holidays. Taking a step back, I asked myself if that was still true. It turned out that it was, so I made a change to a job that would get me closer, physically, to them.
3. Your Bucket List. What are all of the big and small things that you would like to accomplish in life? It could be things like writing a book, climbing Mount Everest, or going on a safari. It could also be slightly smaller things like having an annual family vacation, reading the Game of Thrones series, or seeing a Billy Joel concert. Think big and outside of the box, but also think through your values and your priorities as you develop this list because they will drive ideas you may not have thought about.
4. What am I working on right now? Having a bucket list is wonderful, but if you never start working on the items on it, you’ll never achieve it. Choose 3-4 things that you’re focused on over the next 6-12 months. Take into account your values, your priorities, your bucket list, and other life items as they will all play a factor into the amount of time you can dedicate to working on your goals.
Putting all of this together may feel daunting, but there are a few activities that may help in clarifying things.
1. The Funeral Speech. If you were sitting in the audience at your funeral, what would you like to be said? Thinking in this way can bring things to light that you may not have realized should be on your bucket list or on the “what am I working on now” list. I realized that I wanted to be known as someone who volunteers her time to important work but noted that I wasn’t actually volunteering anywhere. Life circumstances keep me busy at the moment, but I decided that I would hand out food once a month through my church. It’s less than an hour of my time, and I can bring the kids. It’s small, but it’s something to get me started and that I can do right now.
2. Understanding your motivations. Understanding what actually brings you joy can help you determine if you really want something on your bucket list or if it’s just something that sounds like it should be on your bucket list. Additionally, it can also help you understand how you will achieve that bucket list item. For example, I would like to write a book some day, but knowing that Invention is in my Working Genius Competencies and that Tenacity is in my Frustrations, taking six months straight to write every day would be my worst nightmare. I would do better choosing one morning per week or 25 minutes per day to chip away at it. This way the process and the outcome will bring me joy.
Knowing what you want from your personal life first will help you gain better clarity for your business strategy because you need to design a business strategy that will support your life, not a life that is run by your business.
If you’d like help with your personal or your business strategy, book a 20-minute call so we can discuss your needs. Also, join the waitlist for my upcoming new course that will start in May 2024 where we’ll work through this important aspect to success.
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