Prioritize to Maximize Success

Ok, the new year is now 7 days in motion!  (as of this writing, obviously)

How’s it going?  

Are you a bit overwhelmed by the tasks that have been put on hold during the holidays? 

Are you super excited to tackle your new business and life goals? 

Are you getting to the end of your day discouraged about your progress?

Are you good about prioritizing your daily tasks?

As an entrepreneur and busy mom, one of my biggest challenges is figuring out which tasks to tackle each day. Have I delivered everything I committed to each client?  Do I check in on the “groups” I am running?  Do I make doctor appointments for the kids?  Do I work on my taxes? Do I work on finding new leads? Do I start the laundry? Should I be writing my copy for social media, the blog, the website?  There have been days when I’ve been so overwhelmed by my options that I make minimal movement on anything significant.

The reality is that single tasks will not unlock fulfillment in business or life unless it is prioritized in alignment your goals and vision. When I am working with my clients for successful transformation, we start with a life vision, then specific goals, then milestones and then drill down into required tasks.  

Honestly, it is super common for most of my clients to struggle with creating a life vision and even 1 year goals because they haven’t prioritized the time their life to get crystal clear.  We may not be able to predict exactly where we’ll be in the future, but we must have specific goals to take intentional action that drives our life forward. Setting specific goals and deadlines is necessary to prioritize day-to-day work and make progress on unlocking our best life.

For today, I am going to assume that you have done some work on your life vision and goal setting.   If you have big goals for 2020 and beyond, here are five key strategies that will support unlocking your success:

PRIORITIZE creating your 90-day plan: 

Spend the time to clearly spell out your three to five measurable S.M.A.R.T goals that you want to accomplish within the next 90 days.

Specific: Be very clear you are about exactly what your goals are.

Measurable: Identify the milestones required and how you will track to be successful.

Attainable:  Evaluate the timing and resources and be sure it is a reasonable goal.

Relevant:  Know exactly why you for setting this particular goal. 

Timely:  Make sure every goal you set has a target for completion.

PRIORITIZE reviewing your 90-day plan daily:  

I have my 90-day plan in a binder and in my planner and on my wall.   We need to keep it front of mind, every single day. As I accomplish each milestone, I mark it off in celebration! Sometimes, I do a lil happy dance!

PRIORITIZE your daily task list from your 90-day plan:

Whether you use a planning app or you are a pen to paper person, your daily task list needs to align with your 90 day goals.  Capture as many tasks as you can for each milestone.  Prioritize them and assign them in sequence to the days ahead.  Identify specific tasks for a week at a time or maybe a month out that will get you to your 90 day goals.  I have greater peace and confidence when I can focus on my tasks for any given day and feel confident, I have assigned other critical tasks to days in the future. 

PRIORITIZE some accountability:

I am personally very easily excited by new ideas and adventures in life and business.  I also get discouraged when challenges get personal and overwhelming.  Both of these emotions can work against momentum on reaching my goals.

I have a business coach, a therapist/life coach, professional peers and a workout buddy to help me define and stay accountable to my goals.  Ok, of course, I am totally biased because I am a professional coach.  Please, consider that hiring someone to help you see your blind spots and stay on track can be the game changer.  It has been life changing for me and my clients to get big results.  If I fail to meet my incremental milestones, I answer to my accountability partners.  If you don’t have the means to hire a coach find an accountability group online or ask someone to be your accountability partner.  Just be sure to clearly set expectations around the nature of the accountability relationship.

PRIORITIZE your energy:

I am a mom to 4 busy, amazing kids that value my input and support.  My work is a client service business. It’s challenging not to spend each day sporadically jumping into e-mail, responding to texts, making phone calls, checking social media and researching questions that pop up.   All of these are valuable activities but if I don’t prioritize when I spend time on each activity, I mismanage my energy.   I aim to exercise first thing every morning and choose foods, drinks and habits to support my best energy.  However, we all have times of day where we have more energy to work on specific critical path tasks.

I am literally energized by people and ready to coach clients or speak any time before 9:27pm (then I turn into a pumpkin 😊)   But, many of my tasks to reach my 90day goals and big vision include research and content creation.  I am 100% my most creative for writing and developing materials in the morning hours. I have created my schedule to support honoring that time so that I am creating with excellence. I have had to identify the times when my energy is low to do tasks that don’t require as much from me.   When you know how your energy aligns with your critical tasks, prioritize that time to maximize your results.

This week on #tuesdaywithtammy, I shared 5 specific daily habits to prioritize and maximize your success, once you have your 90 day plan. 

DAILY, incorporate these 5 specific actions:

• Review: Your 90 day plan daily to keep it front of mind
• Reset: Plan your day the night before with top 3-5 achievements
• Rank: List and prioritize your responsibilities and tasks for the next day
• Reflect: Consider what went well and where you need to improve tomorrow
• Reward: Celebrate your progress for today!

If you want to hear my chat with more information about prioritizing and aligning all the tasks for all of your goals and responsibilities, here is the link to the #tuesdaywithtammy.