Goal Setting: When To Review

This is post #6 in the Goal Setting Series. Next: Keeping it all “In Check”

In order to stay motivated to reach your goals, you must review them often.  My summary list is a useful reminder of what I have committed to achieving, but it doesn’t do anything for me if I see the same thing over and over again.  On the first day of each month (or as close to that date as possible) I update my goal sheet with the current statistics.  Once I have that ready, I can immediately see where am with each of my challenges.  The review time allows me to determine which areas may need more attention and which ones I can cut back on temporarily.  As I make progress towards a goal and I can visually see that gap closing between where I am and where I want to be, it pushes me to work harder to make it to the finish line.

Make a Cheat Sheet

Yup.  I’m encouraging you to cheat on this one.  Well, it’s not really cheating, but it does help with the math.  ;) For goals like “Create 50 new designs,” I can count to fifty easy enough.  However, a handful of my goals involve some number crunching – like coming up with weekly averages.  For these items, I keep a separate sheet to track the finite details.  A simple spreadsheet application will make this a snap, or you can join me in embracing Google Docs for this type of task.  If you do use a “cheat sheet”, make sure you update your summary goal sheet (the one that you print) so it reflects the current data. Tip: you can automate the update process by linking the cheat spreadsheets to the summary.

Another “cheat” you can use to speed up this process is to make yourself a simple checklist.  My checklist is just a short list of what I need to update on my Goals List.  I use a Google Doc for this checklist and embed links where appropriate so I can jump directly to certain sites – like Google Analytics for my site stats, or to Cafepress for my sales figures. Here is a sampling from my checklist:

• Update Monthly Visitors (Google Analytics)
• Update Monthly Sales (Cafepress)
• Update Number of New Designs (link to admin panel of my site)
• Update Monthly Income (Link to document for my finances)
• Update Current Alexa ranking (Alexa)

The checklist makes it easy to zip through and grab the data for updating.  Total time to process all my goals, including any number crunching involved is usually about 30 minutes.

Work That Calendar

I know it only takes me 30 minutes to update my goals, because I have it down on my calendar as a repeating appointment with myself.  Review time should be blocked off on your calendar.  Your review time is just as important as all of the other events you’ve got in your planner so treat it as such.  If you can’t review on your preselected date because you have to chaperon your kid’s field trip, just reschedule.  But don’t skip!  Skipping will just allow the review work to pile up.

Remember when I said this will involve some basic math?  The review time is where math comes in to play. This is where you sit down and figure up where you stand.  Total up income, sales figures or whatever statistics you need calculate in order to update your goal sheet.  Get out a calculator and get caught up.  If you skip the review, you will have that much more math to deal with next time.  Trust me, it’s better to do it in smaller bites.

And again – don’t sweat the calendar blocks if you are allergic to scheduling.  At the very least, write “review goals” down as an untimed event on your calendar or use a dated todo list.  Just make sure you have that written reminder placed where you can’t miss it on the day it’s due.

How Often

I suggested monthly intervals, but in some cases, weekly check-ins can be important. I do try to scrutinize my goal sheet once a week to make sure my todo list is on target with my goals, but I don’t update my printout until the beginning of the next month.  Mentally, I have a pretty good idea of where I am from month to month.  Any longer than a month and my brain gets really fuzzy and I start forgetting details and end up guessing at numbers which usually makes them way off.  I find that a weekly skimming and a more thorough monthly review are enough to keep me on track.  You will need to experiment to see what works for you.

This is post #6 in the Goal Setting Series. Next: Keeping it all “In Check”