Evaluation follows up

Hopefully you have taken the time to do the evaluation exercise I have suggested in my last post. I cannot emphasize enough how important this simple exercise is to your success. You need to take the time to evaluate your progress, rethink, strategize and move forward.

For those who have done it, I congratulate you. For those who have not, I hope you will change your mind and decide to give it a shot.

This week, I’d like to comment on a few outcomes of this evaluation process.

I’ve personally done my evaluation 2 weeks ago and man, I was surprised. I was shocked to realize:

• how much I’ve accomplished in 3 months period;
• how much my priorities have changed and as a result, how many goals I don’t want to pursue anymore;
• how many goals I have identified as VERY important in December and have managed to slipped my mind, therefore I am way behind;
• how many new goals I have.

It was a really stimulating exercise for me because it helps me re-focus and reminded me what is important for ME.

However, a few people emailed me or call me and say they did not like this exercise at all. The 3 most common reasons I was given:

1. Discourage them to see how little they have accomplished;
2. Frustrate them to see that things are not moving regardless of their hard work;
3. Anger them to realize some of the goals they have set are not achievable.

After hearing them talk, my questions were as follow:

1. Would you rather not knowing how little you have accomplished?
2. Now that you know you are so far behind on your goals, what are you going to do about it?
3. If you are sincerely working hard on your goals and things are not moving, is it maybe time to come up with a new action plan?
4. Why isn’t your goal achievable? If you were to give yourself an extra year to work on it, will it be feasible then?

So yes, this exercise can create a lot of frustration, discouragement and anger but I am happy to report in 100% of the cases, when these emotions are turned into positive and optimist thoughts, people come to appreciate the process.

Many blessings,
Jephtee E.

Evaluation time

Today is an exciting day for me. Wondering why?
Because the exercise you are about to do is very stimulating.

Remember back in December, I gave you guys some homework… well its time to hand them in. :-)

We just ended the first trimester of 2008, now it is time to go back and look at the goals you have set for this year and see how they are coming along. So here is a simple process:

1. Pull out your goal folder or sheet (yes I know you wrote them down).
2. Read thru all the goals you have set up. While reading them, if there is a goal that you have already achieved, do a check mark.
3. Go thru the list a 2nd time, each goal that is still left in the list need to be evaluated. For the evaluation, you need to ask yourself:

a) Is this goal still relevant to me?
i. If no, delete it. (The answer can be no because as human our priorities change.)
ii. If yes, how much progress you have made toward achieving it. Write down, a percentage (20%, 25%, 30%... 90% etc...)

b) Is my timeline realistic?
i. If yes, (meaning you still believe that this goal can be achieved by that time) just leave it as is.
ii. If not, set up a new deadline.

c) For the goals that are remaining, what concrete actions you will take to advance them?

What are the new goals you want to set for this year? If there is any, and there should be a few if your priorities have changed at all, follow the process you’ve learned to set SMART goals.

As you reading this post, you will fall into one of the following categories:
1) Thumbs up: if you are in this category, you will say that is great. Thanks for reminding me Jephtee to do that follow up.
2) Crazy: in this category, you are thinking Jephtee really lost it if she really thinks that I have a sheet somewhere with some goals OR if only I could find where I wrote them in December.
3) Clueless: in this category, you probably thinking I have no clue what she is talking about. Two things can explain being in this category: you either new to this blog OR you were “sleep reading” my posts last December.

No matter which category you find yourself in (especially if its 2 or 3), I strongly encourage that you go back and read the archived posts. To make your life easier:
http://readysetgoal.blogspot.com/2007_12_01_archive.html See how nice I am. :-)

In my next post, I will explain the importance and the impact of such exercise. Till then, I WANT to hear your comments on this exercise. If not, I AM GOING ON WRITER STRIKE. lol

To more accomplishments,
Jephtée E.