Which of your goals are you willing to sacrifice this week?
How many goals are you pursuing at the moment? If you narrow it down just to work, it’s probably still a lot. Most organisational strategies I’ve read set out ‘major’ goals running well into double digits. Even if I stopped you in the corridor, I bet you’d list 3 ‘big goals’ you have for this week.
Yet what if your pursuit of some of these goals is hurting others? This short blog by Rich Hirst challenges us to rethink:
- our goals should always be prioritised
- we should be honest about the achievability of each goal
- we should ruthlessly ‘sacrifice’ goals which shouldn’t receive as much effort as others
This is a powerful if painful challenge from Rich Hirst as he reflects on leadership wisdom from Dr Peter Fuda. Too often, we don’t let go of goals which should have lower priority or which we just don’t have enough control over. The result is that we waste time and energy – AND under-deliver on our top goals and the things we can control.
So which goals do you need to sacrifice, in order to focus on what matters more?
- Do you need to begin by reviewing the priority order of your goals?
- Have you rated how ‘controllable’ or achievable each goal is?
- What actions would shift energy onto the goals that matter most and are the most in-control?
This is definitely something I’ll be asking my coaching clients this week!