With Christa, the Christmas Elf with a Plan – 20 December
Christa is planning her goal related efforts for the year using a future log page. I suppose each chocolate represents a step goal she’s identified to reach her goals for the year. After all, her End of the Year Planning Tip for today is to break down your goals into interim or step goals. Seems like the logical next step to the goal planning she suggested for yesterday. So let’s get right to it; the new year will be here soon.
Setting Interim Goals for Your Yearly Goals
When we followed Christa’s Tip #19 – Set new goals, we completed most of our goal planning process, we may have even done much of what she is suggesting us for Tip #20. We started our Goal Planning with a single long-term goal that summarizes where we are heading. We used that to guide us in setting up our near-term and current year goals.
For the near-term goals, we looked at the differences between where we are today (Current State) and our long-term goal (Ideal State). Then we set interim goals that would reduce the differences and move us closer to our long-term goals. These were our near-term 5-year goals. We repeated that comparison and created interim goals for the next year, that move is closer to our near-term goals. The goals for the next year define our Future State.
As we completed goal worksheets for each of our yearly goals, we identified interim goals and even created action lists of tasks, habits and projects to complete. We’ve already done much of what Christa is recommending for today. All that is left it to map out the interim goals into our plans for the year.
Creating a Plan for Achieving Our Yearly Goals
We could just put all the tasks from our actions lists on our master task list and create trackers for all the new habits we need to adopt. Then on 1 January, we begin all our new habits while trying not to be overwhelmed by our task list. But I’m pretty sure that isn’t going to work well for most of us. Certainly, it wouldn’t work for me. Perhaps we need to create a plan to tell us when we need to achieve each interim goal to complete the actions for each of the yearly goals.
We need to map the interim goals and the associated actions over the course of the year. Using a Year-At-A-Glance calendar can be helpful for this. Another way to easily visualize and adjust the plan is to use small sticky notes and space on a wall or table. Write each interim goal on a separate sticky note. (If you have multiple colors, you can use a different color for each of the yearly goals.) Add sticky notes to mark out the months or quarters and then begin allocating interim goals on the “calendar”. You need to consider the amount of effort the tasks for each interim goal require. Try to level out the effort so that you don’t have weeks with little to do followed by weeks that are overwhelming.
It is usually best to “front load” the plan and try to do as much as possible as early as possible in the year. This builds up “slack” toward the end of the year that might be needed if unanticipated obstacles arise, or life presents new challenges. However, it is not good to try to start too many new large tasks (projects) or habits at once. This is especially true for habits. It is best to get a streak going with one habit before introducing another.
Documenting Your Goals Plan
Once you have your interim goals mapped out, you can record them on in your calendars – a future log style page, year-at-a-glance, or monthly planning pages are some good places. If you are using pages like the Goal Worksheets page (from the free downloads), you can record planned start dates for each action there. If a task should be a recurring task (i.e. daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, or annually), add it to the appropriate recurring tasks list, if you have one. You want your plan recorded where you’ll be able to access it during your monthly and weekly planning so that you can add any new tasks or habits into your plans for the coming month or week.
There are future log and 2025 Year-At-A-Glance printables in both US Letter (8 ½” x 11”) and Classic (7” x 9 ¼”) available on the free downloads page.
The previous post on Tip #19 – Set New Goals can be found here. And if you’ve missed any of Christa’s earlier tips, you can start with Tip #1 by clicking here.
Summary
Once you have identified your yearly goals and broken them down into interim goals and action steps, you need to map them out over the year ahead and create a plan for achieving your goals. You can visualize the plan as you are developing it by using a year-at-a-glance calendar or mapping it out with sticky notes on the wall. (It’s rather fun to do it this way!) This can help you pace your efforts and avoid feeling overwhelmed and can help you to re-plan in case unexpected challenges are encountered. The result is a plan for achieving your goals that you can use during your monthly and weekly planning sessions to stay on track.
Happy Planning,
Linda
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