So this week we’re talking about really wanting to set a goal and why we don’t do them. Isn’t that right? Because my bet is that anyone reading last week’s blog said to themselves “Hey, that’s a great idea. I should do that” but then didn’t follow through. Maybe some people even wrote it down in their goal list. But still didn’t follow through. My congratulations to those who did something about that great suggestion for increasing revenue! Let’s hear from you.
As a coach, this is what I face time and time again. The attorney and I will plan out the next two or three weeks with real important, well thought out goals that will advance the attorney in the direction he or she wants to go. Three weeks later, the attorney comes back to me and many times, few or none of the goals have been worked on.
Then we go back to the old trick, that goals have to not only be written down, they need to be put into the attorney’s calendar so they get worked on. If that is done and the goal is still not moved forward, then it’s time to find out why? Is it fear of failure? Is it coming out of the attorney’s comfort space? Is it just because so many more “important” tasks need to be done? Is the goal too big?
I believe that one of the landmines here is that many attorneys have never done consistent goal planning in their careers. Yes, they passed the Bar and get work done in their practices but there is very little growth or change because of poor strategic planning. So with little or no forward growth, lawyers get discouraged and depressed. Of course they find little validity in the idea that good planning can produce the success they want because they have simply never experienced it before. They simply don’t believe in it.
So if you are one of those attorneys who have trouble with planning, goal setting and follow through, what do you do? You need to prove to yourself that it works! That means you will make a tiny little goal that you can accomplish. Then you will next make a more difficult goal and keep on until you prove to yourself that this works. A coach can help in all of this and also with the follow up. You can commit to email your coach every day, what goal you worked on and how much got done. Or you can figure out a way that you can do this with your own knowledge of your habits.
So, next week I want to see one small goal that you wrote down and actually did. Email me the result to my blog!