Thursday 13 April 2017

Better Late Than Never - My 2017 Goals!



So how did it get to be APRIL already?! I have had a reminder on my lengthy To Do list for months now to post about the goals I set for myself in 2017. Sorry it's taken me so long, but here we go...

At the start of January I carried out an exercise to review the success/failures of my 2016 goals, and then carried forward my learnings for setting my new goals for 2017. I decided to stick with the same goal tracking process as I'd implemented in 2016 because I felt it had been so successful at getting me to actually TAKE ACTION and get stuff done.

First of all I determined the 3 key areas I wanted to focus on for the year, and I loosely named these:
1. Personal Nurturing
Anything falls under here which I want to improve in terms of my health, fitness, relationships, wellbeing and personal development

2. Giving Back
This covers things such as donations and help for charities, fundraising efforts and any help or support I can offer to family, friends, acquaintances and people seeking my help

3. Achieving Freedom
This is all about my entrepreneurial and FIRE related endeavours - my ultimate goal is to achieve freedom from working for someone else - so whether I achieve that through early retirement, funding myself through my own money making endeavours, or a combination of these two it goes under this category!





Next I spent some quiet time listing out everything which I ideally wanted to achieve this year, and these evolved into 30 goals (yes you read that right...30!). I wrote these up in a spreadsheet and for each of them added a column in which I listed how I would know that I had achieved the goal - so that I would know when I could say it was "DONE"!

Since 30 is really too big a number to track and share, plus some of the goals are personal ones, I've opted to pick 10 good 'uns to share with you below. In each case I've listed underneath the goal how I know that I will have achieved it.

Personal Nurturing
Goal 1:  I will easily have read 6 new books by the end of 2017
I will know I have achieved this goal when I can list the 6 new books which I have read

Goal 2: I will easily attend and eagerly learn from the Tony Robbins Unleash The Power Within event
I will know I have achieved this goal when I have attended the UPW event and have made a list of notes from it

Giving Back
Goal 3: I will easily maintain a monthly presence in the personal finance/FIRE online community
I will know I have achieved this goal when I have either posted a blog update, or commented on a personal finance/FIRE update from a member of the online community, at least 12 times

Goal 4: I will easily hold 3 free coaching sessions in personal development or personal finance to get experience at how to coach
I will know I have achieved this goal when I have provided 3 free coaching sessions

Goal 5: I will easily donate £400 to charitable causes this year
I will know I have achieved this goal when I have donated at least £400 to charity this year

Achieving Freedom
Goal 6: I will easily have 4 published and promoted books on Amazon by the end of the year
I will know I have achieved this goal when I have at least 4 books published in KDP and Createspace

Goal 7: I will easily attend and learn new tips from FinCon in Dallas
I will know I have achieved this goal when I have attended and made notes at Fincon 2017

Goal 8: I will easily attend and learn new tips from the UK Money Bloggers conference
I will know I have achieved this goal when I have attended the UK Money Bloggers conference (SHOMO awards 2017)

Goal 9: I will easily follow my 2017 Freedom Plan so that I achieve freedom from working the 9-5 by the end of 2017
I will know I have achieved this goal when I have finished my last freelance contract onsite

Goal 10: I will easily follow my FIRE by 50 plan so that I remain on target to retire by age 50
I will know I have achieved this goal when I have achieved the targets for 2017 on my revised FIRE by 50 plan


Once I determined my 2017 goals, I have since been breaking them down into quarterly and monthly action plans so that every month, and indeed every week, I am focussed on working toward achieving them.

My thinking is if I can do just one thing every day to get me a little bit closer to at least one of my goals, then over time I'm going to achieve them eventually.

So that's all for now folks. In a future post I'll do a run-down of how I'm progressing with achieving these, and whether I'm on target to tick them all off by the end of the year.


Did you set any goals this year? Now that we're over a quarter of the way through the year, how are you getting on with them? I'd love to hear your thoughts below...