[This builds upon my previous blog post about annual goals. If you haven’t read that one, you might want to read it first.]

Tomorrow I will meet with my brother to discuss and refine our individual 2020 goals. Doing this will be one of the highlights of my year because it will literally give me my road map for 2020. Preparing for this meeting has prompted me to share a few more thoughts about this important task.

  1. Meeting with an accountability partner is really helpful. I know my brother loves and cares about me. He too is goal driven. So he can challenge me to do better and say hard things to me. By listening to his goals, I sometimes get ideas for myself. He also gets excited about his goals which is very motivating for me.
  2. Simplicity is always better than complexity. You should be able to remember most of your goals without looking at them. To be able to do that, you need to keep them as simple as possible. Remember that you are striving mostly for improvement, not necessarily perfection.
  3. The way you word your goals is important. For instance, in 2020, I want to read 8 books. If I make that a single goal, then if I only read 6, I will have failed completely.  But if I break it into 8 individual goals and then read 6, I will have have a 75% success rate. That will help me so much if I get to December having only read 4 books. Setting my goal at 8 books would demotivate me since I’d not be able read 4 books in a month. But if I know I could go from a 50% success rate to a 75% success rate by reading two more, I’d be highly motivated to read! So much of goal setting is psychological.
  4. Before my annual goals are set in stone, I use the month of January to refine them. I “try them on” for a month to see if they are still compelling to me. Usually I ditch or modify a handful of them. Only then do I feel confident in pursuing them for the next 11 months.
  5. Consistent and repeated review of your goals is essential. I have found that monthly reviews don’t work for me. I forget to do it and can go months without review. In 2020, I’m going to review my goals every day while I make out my daily note card of “Most Important Things” to accomplish.

Good luck. I hope you achieve more in 2020 than you ever thought possible!