Public Relations Tips

Goal Setting For Small Business Owners Getting What Matters Done

Every successful business owner has goals. Goals help you accomplish the results and outcomes you really want. Goals make the things that really matter, happen. Goals need to be big enough and exciting enough to challenge you, but not so challenging that they are intimidating, or truly unreachable.

Don’t just set the goal. Be very specific. Describe the goal in detail. What will achieving this goal get for you? Imagine what it will be like when you achieve it. Where will you be? What will you feel? What will you hear? How will you be celebrating and who will be celebrating with you? Make this as vivid and realistic as possible.

Goals need to be:

•  Written down!
•  Specific
•  Attainable
•  Measurable
•  Realistic
•  Have deadlines
•  Be prioritised
•  Have action steps
•  Be revised and changed as necessary
•  Be inspiring!
•  About what you really want and need to do

Your subconscious can’t tell the difference between fact and fiction! This can be a blessing or a curse! If you expect the worst and imagine things that could go wrong – guess what is more likely to happen? However, the upside is – if you expect the best and rehearse and visualise a positive outcome this becomes much more likely.

Try using positive affirmations. You don’t even have to believe them. Whatever you say to yourself will go into your subconscious mind. So instead of saying “I have a terrible memory”, or “I always forget things”, tell yourself – “I can always recall important information.”

Remember the 80/20 Rule:

80% of our results come from 20% of our efforts.

Identify the key tasks that give you your 80% and do these things first.We overestimate what we can do in a week and we underestimate what we can do in a year!

As you are planning your work, ask yourself:

• What would I do if I knew I couldn’t fail?
• What would I regret most in life if I didn’t accomplish it?
• What is the most important task to accomplish this week?
• Am I really spending the majority of my time working on the actions that will repay the most dividends?
• What is the bigger picture I need to have in mind?
• What assumptions am I making and are they really true?

Another key to successful planning and goal setting, is focus. Avoid multi-tasking and work on one task to completion. Clear, prioritised, written goals, coupled with focus and commitment can take you further, faster, personally and professionally.

Try this system for goal setting and achievement:

A great idea to try is sometimes called “reverse engineering”.Fast forward to the end date, then work backwards to each major step that needs to be in place.  Viewed from that future point to the present, what actions need to happen by what date.

• Think about what you want to achieve.
• Set a date when you can realistically achieve this goal. Add in some contingency to allow for unforeseen hold-ups. Don’t be over ambitious.
• Working backwards, block in the major steps that need to happen and the dates they need to happen by.
• Block out the action steps that need to happen for each major part of the project. 
• Be sure to include periodic reviews and due dates in your plan.

Shona Partridge is a small business marketing and PR expert and coach. She works with women entrepreneurs and the self employed, teaching PR, Marketing, Writing and Confidence skills. Shona is a licensed “Get Clients Now!” facilitator, PR professional, experienced coach and trained journalist. She’s the author of “Self Belief for the Self Employed: How Boosting your Confidence Can Boost Your Business” a new CD and workbook programme and creator of the marketing and PR training system”Marketing Mastery, 12 Key Steps to Success”.

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