Effective Goal Reaching

EFFECTIVE GOAL REACHING

by Randy Schwantz

Follow this four-step planning strategy to reach your goals.

The key to achieving anything is to have a plan. More important, you need a plan that you believe will work.

Companies are willing to pay for sales training because it increases sales, meaning more money. The additional income allows you to get more of the things that you want in life. It also offers intangible benefits, such as having the opportunity to become really good at what you do and to attain success and the power that comes with it.

Reaching goals is a skill. There are ways to do it that work well and ways that fail. Many people are highly successful at setting and reaching goals. You can learn from the way that they implement goal reaching.

People who reach goals use a conscious, planned strategy to attain them. Most things you get in life come easily, with little or no planning. Arriving at work 15 minutes earlier than normal or buying a new suit might require some planning, but not enough to require a written plan. However, if you wanted to build a house from scratch, you certainly don’t rely on the hope that it will somehow materialize. You wouldn’t just buy wood and fixtures and hope they’d all fit together. The key to attaining complex or elusive goals is to come up with a concrete strategy.

KEYS TO SUCCESSFUL GOAL REACHING

1. Develop a clear, concise plan.
2. Take time to anticipate any obstacles that might stop you from reaching your goal. List potential problems and the actions you’ll need to take to overcome them.
3. Check to see if you have “mixed feelings” about your goal.
4. Use a goal-reaching method that works.
   

DEVELOP A CLEAR, CONCISE PLAN

“A man without a plan is not a man,” says a gangster in the movie Dick Tracy. Your mind is like a computer. You have enough experience with automation to know that a computer is only as good as its programmer. Bad software, bad results. How can you expect your computer to give you outstanding results if you haven’t done an outstanding job of programming it? A plan is your program.

ANTICIPATE PROBLEMS

Now that you’ve programmed your bio-computer with clarity and precision, something will probably change. Start asking yourself what could prevent your plan from working. Asking yourself questions at this point will help you solve problems before they happen.

One of the best insurance agents I know has a great strategy for writing large accounts. He is constantly asking, “What if?” What if the insurance company doesn’t want to write this account? How can I persuade them to act differently? If I need additional sensitive information, how can I ask for it in a way that will cause a resistant client to cooperate?

This strategy of “what if” eliminates surprises and enables him to stay prepared.

CHECK FOR MIXED FEELINGS

Do you have mixed feelings about what you want? Here are some examples: I want a new car but I don’t want that high monthly payment. I would like to make more money, but I don’t want to take time away from my family. I need to learn to sell better, but I can’t find the time to practice.

If you have mixed feelings about your goal or the steps you need to reach it, ask yourself a few hard questions.

1. What do I really want?
2. What am I willing to sacrifice to achieve my goals?

The first step to being successful is to effectively communicate so that you get your subconscious in sync with what exactly you want in your conscious mind. Do this by writing it down. Next, set a deadline for accomplishing the goal. Finally, list the obstacles that stand in your way.

This seemingly simple method of formal goal setting is tremendously powerful. Many people are shocked by how often they get something they want because they finally put it into words. How powerful is this method? In a 1953 study of the graduating seniors at Harvard University, only 3% had written goals. A follow-up study 20 years later showed that this 3% was worth more than the other 97% combined. When Napoleon Hill asked the 500 most successful men in America how they had achieved what they did, they said they had SET GOALS.

Paradoxically, we often program ourselves to attain exactly what we don’t want. We focus on our fear instead of what we want. For example, you might say to yourself, “I don’t want to run out of money and become unable to pay my bills.” Your brain will picture you running out of money. This negative thinking will be at best a distraction and at worst a self-fulfilling prophecy. On the other hand, if you truly want to pay the bills, you must state so positively. Check your goal to see if it includes the word “no.” If it does, restate the goal in positive terms. Make the goal even more motivational by being specific: for instance, “I want X dollars to pay the bills and X dollars to spend and save.”

EXERCISES

1. Think about your life. Make a list of things that you didn’t want to happen that did.
2. Listen to people talk, and notice how they use negatives: Don’t, won’t, can’t. Think of how you could replace each negative with positives.
3. Get a pad of paper and brainstorm about what would motivate you to become a successful salesperson.
   Write your ideas down.
4. List what you want to have or do that greatly increased sales will make possible.