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SMART Goals: How to Make Your Goals Specific and Measurable
Part 1 of 2: Use the SMART acronym to set better goals. Learn how to make your future goals specific and measurable. When you go to set goals, I suggest you try to set smart goals. Smart is an acronym. It stands for specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound. These are the key characteristics of a good goal. Now there are multiple versions of smart out there, but they all get to the same thing: creating clear and actionable goals that matter. This week, let’s focus on the first two smart characteristics: specific and measurable. Specific The first characteristic of a good goal that you should focus on is that the goal is specific. Make the goal
Who’s the Best Person for the Job? 5 Tips to Find ‘Culture Fit’ in a Candidate
The way a potential hire interacts with your staff can be just as important as their resume. Keep your team chemistry strong with these hiring tips. Today’s post is by Joel Patterson, founder of The Vested Group and the ForbesBooks author of The Big Commitment: Solving The Mysteries Of Your ERP Implementation (CLICK HERE to get your copy). Many factors go into a company’s decision to hire someone: the candidate’s experience, talent, skills, and ability to communicate, for starters. But while a sparkling resume and impressive job interview are still important considerations, a job prospect’s ability to fit the company’s culture has never been more critical in the hiring process. Companies head into a new year full of uncertainty and are coming off a year of so much change and disruption. These challenges test the strength of a work culture, and as companies seek stability, adaptability, and growth, finding the right culture fit is the most crucial factor in choosing a new hire. An aligned team will work far better together, be more productive individually, and feel more satisfied in their roles overall. And with more people working remotely, keeping your culture strong and your workflow cohesive is imperative. Adding new people should only serve to enhance it. Here are five tips on how to hire for culture fit:
How much have you grown as a leader in the last 12 months?
Our reader poll today asks: How much have you grown as a leader in the last 12 months? Somewhat. I’ve grown in a few specific areas: 50% A lot! My leadership skills have improved dramatically: 22% Not much. I’ve grown in very few areas: 15% Not at all. I’m about the same as I was a year ago: 14% A decent amount of growth. 72% of you report at least some up to a lot of growth over the past 12 months. For those who feel you didn’t grow, ask yourself why. Was it because you didn’t have a development plan? Weren’t provided growth opportunities? Didn’t take advantage of opportunities presented to you? Simply not interested in growth? If we stagnate, we fall behind because everyone around us continues to grow. For the coming 12 months I encourage you to identify your skill gaps and build a development plan. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy – it can simply be a list of “here are 2-3 ways I want to grow and the activities I’ll pursue to make that happen.” Enlist your manager’s aid in creating those opportunities. Seek out mentors who can guide you to the best ways to get these opportunities. With a deliberate and focused plan, you’ll be amazed at how much you can grow in a short period of time! Do you agree with these poll results? Let us know in the comments below! – Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!
The 4 Negotiation Styles: Which Should You Choose?
Your negotiation style should change depending on the situation. Learn four negotiation styles and when to use them. You should be deliberate in choosing a specific style of negotiating. The way I encourage people to look at choosing a style is first, understand the importance of your relationship with the other party. The relationship can have low importance (somebody you’re just meeting for the first time and you won’t have an ongoing relationship with), or high importance (a strategic, long-term relationship). The second thing you should consider is the importance of the outcome of that specific negotiation, from low importance (there’s not a lot of value on the table), to high importance (there is a lot of money for your organization or it’s a high-risk outcome). And what you end up with is a two-by-two matrix with four different negotiating strategies:
5 Questions to Ask Yourself Before Taking The Leap to Entrepreneurship
Don’t underestimate the commitment it takes to become an entrepreneur. Ask yourself these questions before you dive into a new business endeavor. Today’s post is by Tim Mercer, founder of IBOXG, and the ForbesBooks author of Bootstrapped Millionaire: Defying the Odds of Business (CLICK HERE to get your copy). As COVID-19 causes layoffs and extends uncertainty about employment in 2021, many people are considering new options, reinventing themselves, or trying to decide whether working for themselves is more desirable than finding another 9-to-5 job that might not last. Entrepreneurship brings a lot of freedom, responsibility, and risks, and before people commit to taking that big step there are several important questions they should ask themselves. Entrepreneurship is a career that offers a kind of freedom and personal satisfaction you simply cannot get from traditional 9-to-5 employment. You will never know if you have what it takes to be an entrepreneur unless you take the leap of faith and experience it yourself. It’s a big decision, though, involving many factors and inherent risks. There is a lot to navigate and endure en route to reaching your dream destination of professional and financial freedom, and many don’t make it because they simply weren’t cut out for the challenge to begin with. People who are considering entrepreneurship should first ask themselves these five questions:
When you put a team member in a stretch role, how much of that role should they know how to do?
Our reader poll today asks: When you put a team member in a stretch/developmental role, how much of that role should they know how to do before you give it to them? 90% or more: 2% 70%-90%: 16% 50%-70%: 51% 30%-50%: 25% 0%-30%: 5% Balancing risk and growth. Developmental roles are purely a balance between risk and growth. If you don’t take any risk on people, they can’t grow. If you take too much risk, they’ll possibly struggle and fail. Finding that sweet spot can be challenging. Most successful growth roles I see put someone in the “they know 70% of the new role” range. About 67% of you fall in that space. If they know too much about the new role, they’ll grow a bit but then that growth curve flattens out. For those of you putting people in roles where they know less than 50% of the new job, be prepared for them to fail if you don’t provide them significant amounts of coaching and support along the way. Most important of all – have a conversation with this person and clearly communicate how much of a stretch it is and ask them how you can best support them in that role. Do you agree with these poll results? Let us know in the comments below! – Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC Did you enjoy this post? If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog. It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!). SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!
Using The 80/20 Rule to Think Critically
Learn how an Italian gardener’s simple principle can make problem solving much easier. Critical thinking doesn’t only apply to coming up with recommendations. You need to think critically about the way you’re going to spend your time and energy. Those things are limited. You have too many problems to solve and not enough time. I encourage people to follow the 80/20 rule, also known as the Pareto principle. The Pareto Principle The Pareto principle was coined by Vilfredo Pareto when he noticed that 80% of the land in Italy was owned by 20% of the population. He was also a gardener, and he noticed 80% of the peas coming out of his garden came from 20% of the pods. He said, “That’s interesting. Two totally different realms demonstrating the same principle.” 20% led to 80% of the impact, and that’s the 80/20 rule. 20% of the drivers will drive 80% of the results. You need to think about your work the same way. You can’t focus on that 80% that only drives 20% of the results. Focus your efforts on the meaningful. Let me offer an example.
Turn Off Your Brain: How to Regain Control of Your Sleep as an Entrepreneur
Establishing good sleep habits can improve your health and productivity as an entrepreneur. Reclaim your sleep with these tips. Today’s post is by Brad Wayland, Chief Strategy Officer at BlueCotton. If you are anything like me, you are no stranger to long, sleepless nights – no matter how bad for your health they might be. But take it from me, this is not something you want to make a habit. You need to reclaim your sleep. Here’s how to do just that: It is three in the morning, and you are on a roll. It does not matter that you need to be up at eight tomorrow. You have work to do, and now is the time to do it. Except it is not. At all. Not only are you killing your productivity by pulling these all-nighters, but you are also slowly killing yourself. I will spare you the details. I am sure you have already heard repeatedly that sleep deprivation is directly linked to a range of very nasty illnesses. I am sure you already know that you need to start sleeping more and sleeping better. And I am also sure you have no idea how. I have been there.