2013 Goal Setting - Part 1

Last year I only set goals (aka resolutions) for my personal, Sharpen The Saw needs: Physical, Mental, Social and Spiritual.

This year I want to also consider my Roles and goals for them.  Am I taking on too many goals?  I don't think so.  In each of these roles I want to improve and in each of these roles I will have to make decisions on how to best use my time.  With goals in place it should be easier to decide how to spend my time.  Now following those decisions is another matter.

I see my roles, in no particular order as:

• Family Man (father, husband, son-in-law, son, brother etc.)
• Abbott Worker
• District Commissioner
• Writer
• Girl Scout Leader
• Archaeologist
• Job Hunter

I might expand "District Commissioner" out to  "Scouter" so it would encompass District Commissioner, my work with the Chicago Lincoln Avenue Trail, OA member, and any other Scout oriented role.  The problem with this is that I really want to concentrate on the DC role and not sacrifice it for the other things.  I'm conflicted, but I may have to expand it.

I found an article in About.com regarding setting goals.  They mention 6 steps.  I see them more as points, but I will number, summarize and paraphrase them here:

1. Desire the goal
2. What do you (what does the world) look like having accomplished the goal?
3. Have a plan with interim steps (sounds like GTD's Next Actions)
4. Write down and share the goal
5. Set due dates (for those interim steps)
6. Review your progress

Number 2 is new to me, or at least not a goal planning strategy I've used before (I had heard of it somewhere).  I had looked at interim steps before, but I don't think I had laid out a whole list of steps before.  I had only thought about what each next step would be as I accomplished the previous step.

This is what I am going to do in Part 2 of this Goal Setting work.  I'm going to set goals for each role and then apply the 6 steps to each.  I may have to do this in one post for each role.