Staying on Track

My businesses are in the process of growing our revenues 10X.  We’ve done it twice before, and we are currently working to do it again.  Of course, growth like this takes time and anything that takes very much time, has a tendency to get off track, and not get done, without a lot of discipline.

Someone asked me today, how I stay on track to continually reach goals and milestones which often take many years to accomplish?  I’ve used a number of tools throughout my career to do this, but none of them have approached the effectiveness, for me, of the, “Pocket Coach” from The Strategic Coach program.

The Pocket Coach is a tool created by Dan Sullivan, which allows the user to track lifetime goals, goals for the next three years, one year, along with the projects, people and to do lists necessary to make those goals happen all on one sheet of paper.  I’ve used the tool for the last 10 years and found it highly effective for me.

I’ve found that the key is to organize my life, both personal and professional, around a quarterly system.  Each ninety days, I take time to review my goals and the progress I’ve made during the last ninety days towards accomplishing them.  I find this very motivational because I can see the progress I’ve made.  I also take the time to plan the next ninety days and update the projects I’m working on, the list of things I need to get done, and the people I want to engage with.  Then, throughout the quarter, I continually review my progress and check off things as they are accomplished.

In the Old Testament, the people of Israel were told to bind the 10 Commandments in little boxes and wear them on their foreheads so that the Commandments will always be, “before them.”  They were also commanded to post them on the doorposts of their homes so that they would see them “in their coming and going.”  By keeping the things I want to accomplish always in front of me, and reviewing them often, I find I get a similar result.

One other benefit of using a quarterly approach to staying on track with my plans and goals is that it’s enough time to see results, but it’s also short enough not to get overwhelmed.  I’ve learned that the way to accomplish my life’s ambitions is to focus on the next three years and use the current year to move toward the three-year goals.  Similarly, each quarter is an opportunity to accomplish progress toward the annual goals.

It’s been interesting to me to see how much can get done when I use a simple and effective tool, like the “Pocket Coach,” to stay on track.  Hopefully, you’ve found a way to do this that’s effective for you, but if you’d like to learn more about the Strategic Coach method, go to www.strategiccoach.com.