Sticky Goal Setting: Learning for Better Living

Posted: October 28th, 2009 | Author: A.J. | Filed under: Uncategorized | No Comments »

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To all my readers, mom and dad, I apologize.  It has been awhile and I’ve had a few things weighing on my mind.  You know those phases, things seem out of sorts, and well they need to be sorted.  So now I’m back.

I’ve been reading Keith Ferrazzi’s Who’s Got Your Back, a book that deals with creating peer support systems to excel in professional and real life.  The book is almost completed, but I re-read a section on goal setting last night.

I found it apt as the year is almost at a close.  I’m sure I’m not the only one who battles with making goals stick, from the day-to-day, to the yearly and beyond goals.  Ferrazzi suggests a streamlined approach.  Instead of laying out a goal, look behind the goal at the steps, or process, necessary to achieve it.

Two Types of Goal Setting

Ferrazzi presents two types of goals, performance and learning.  “Performance goals,” he states, “imply a finite result, like a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.”  He cites as examples, landing a job, losing 10 pounds or boosting sales by 10 percent.  Conversely, learning goals “involve thinking about the rainbow, not just the pot of gold,” such as picking up new language to get the job, or refining marketing tactics.

My Performance and Learning Goals

Performance Goals:

• Pass the February Texas Bar Exam
• Get a job
• Blog three times a week
• Decrease my 5K time to 30 minutes
• Save money

Learning Goals:

• Learn how to condense great amounts information for greater understanding and recall.
• Learn new networking techniques and strategies.
• Find five new techniques for creating and drafting quality content.
• Learn how BMW maintenance/repair (saving potentially hundreds of dollars)

That is all I have right now, and that’s enough I think!  I’d like to hear from y’all.  What are some performance and learning goals out there?

//A.J.

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