175. The Best Tip to Keep Goals Front and Center

Episode Transcript

Verbs Boyer:
All right, Courtney, so here we are well into January, and we may be starting to feel some friction on our goal journeys already. Already, it’s happening.

Courtney Baker:
Yeah.

Verbs Boyer:
My question to you is what kind of tips, or do you have any tips that you could share with us, about how to overcome that or at least ease the way on the journey?

Courtney Baker:
Yeah. I think when you get to this point, some of that, like you said, maybe the enthusiasm is starting to wane, and I think if you’ve set up your goals well, if you’ve used our SMARTER Framework, it’s not going to be easy. It’s going to take some extra focus, and at times, it’s hard. Again, if we could just do these things, we would’ve already done them, and so what do we need to help carry us through those times, where it’s like, “Okay. That new morning ritual with that workout that I was doing, just my willpower is starting to run out.”
And so I think today our goal is to give you some really tangible, practical ways to make your goals more visible. Again, part of the problem with goals is, many times, we come up with them, we may write it on a piece of paper somewhere maybe, but then we forget about it. We lose focus on what the thing was that we were even trying to achieve. So the fact that our enthusiasm wanes is no surprise, and so I’m excited today to talk about, again, really tangible ways to help you have more visibility.

Verbs Boyer:
Welcome to another episode of Focused On This. This is the most productive podcast on the internet, so you can banish distractions, get the right stuff done, and finally start Loving Mondays. I’m Verbs, here with my co-host, Courtney Baker. Happy Monday to you, Courtney.

Courtney Baker:
Happy Monday, Verbs, it’s so good to be here with you. I love this time of year, this natural fresh start. It’s just like everything feels good in January except the weather.

Verbs Boyer:
This is true, especially here where we are located, down south in Tennessee.

Courtney Baker:
Absolutely, yeah.

Nick Jaworski:
Can I just say that I’m, hi, it’s Nick, I’m pro cold. I like cold weather until dinner on December 25th, and then it can all go away. January and February, and even parts of March, are miserable, and I hate it.

Courtney Baker:
I am with you on this, Nick. I feel like the temperature in Tennessee this time of year is actually nice. It’s like you get fall, you’re kind of working yourself into a nice, cold December, and then all of a sudden in January, it started to work back towards spring. If March was January, what an idyllic world we would live in.

Nick Jaworski:
I’m going to say this now. Everybody, listeners, listen to me. I’m saying it right now. It took me 38 years or something to realize that March is cold, and for one year, I figured it out. Then, last year, I forgot, and so I was like, “Oh. Spring break is in March.” You’re supposed to be excited about it, but then it’s always cold. It’s rainy.

Verbs Boyer:
Yeah. My march is soggy for sure.

Courtney Baker:
Okay. Here’s my tip, because y’all knew I’m going to come with a hack for this one. This is why you always had to plan a vacation in January or February. Forget spring break. Forget summer. Go in January and February, and go somewhere warm. It is what you need. Trust me.

Nick Jaworski:
That’s interesting.

Courtney Baker:
All right. So let’s talk about goal visibility. Verbs, you want to kick us off?

Verbs Boyer:
I do, indeed. Matter of fact is we’re talking about planning. To go somewhere warm, you could use these tips to make sure you mark it down and keep it visible. But one of the first questions we want to just clarify is, question number one, what do we mean by goal visibility? It seems simple. Goal visibility is just making sure that you’re putting the goals that you’re working on right now in places that you normally frequent, places where your eyes would rest on, whether it be your phone, whether it be a bathroom mirror, places where you’ll see them consistently, and be reminded of the goals that you set, and hopefully those reminders will also set the triggers for the next steps that you would hope to accomplish, so it’s literally just keeping your goals in front of your eyes physically. Again, this could be a multiplicity of places: your car, doors in your house, things of that nature.

Courtney Baker:
Okay. The second question we want to pose is why does it even matter, this whole thing about goal visibility? So seeing our goals, it’s just going to keep them top of mind. Again, I mentioned this earlier. A lot of times, we come up with goals, and we never think about it again, and so having it visible is just going to refresh your focus, keep that focus alive, especially when it starts to wane. Another thing is seeing our goals recalibrates our thinking and our day around what we’ve said matters most to us this year, what we’re trying to achieve.
It’s easy to get sucked into just busy work or things that other people need, and forget the thing that we’ve said we want to achieve for ourselves this year. Another thing is seeing our goals can even become a visual cue to take the next best step and keep moving forward. I’m always surprised when people set goals, and they get stuck, and it’s just because they’re missing a phone call that they need to make an appointment they need to set, someone that they need to call and ask for advice about, a coach to hire, or a gym to try. Sometimes it’s a small thing that people get stuck on.
The last reason goal visibility matters is, we can only act on what we remember. I’ve said this multiple times now. I think so many times we set goals for the year, and then we just forget. We get to the end of the year, and we’re like, “Oh. I didn’t have any goals this year,” but you did. You just forgot it. Like Verbs, the other day, I was talking about a trip that my friend and I went on last January, like 12, 13 months ago, and it seemed like ages ago. Do you ever do that? If you actually try to think of something 12 months ago, it feels like a very long time.

Verbs Boyer:
No, absolutely. Absolutely. That happens all the time. I mean, especially when it’s things that occurred during the beginning of the year, when you’re in that season of trying to ramp everything back up, you’re trying to think about these goals and where you’ll place, so a lot of things that are attacking your random access memory already, so to kind of go back and refer to it 12 months down the road, it’s like, “Oh, yeah. That did happen within the year ago.”
Question number three, what are simple strategies that you can use to increase goal visibility? And we alluded to this a little bit earlier in the first question, but wherever the normal things are to where you find yourself looking at, those are going to be some of the best places, or you can do things like create sticky notes, again, on your glass bathroom mirror or on your refrigerator. You can frame them. A lot of people actually have designed goals that they’ve created. That way, they can frame them and set them on their desk or set them in their office. You can create wallpapers, either on your phone or your laptops. When you open up your screen, you’re reminded of those goals that you set.

Courtney Baker:
What about actual wallpapers also?

Verbs Boyer:
I’ve never heard of that. That is excellent, but wait, when you say that, are you actually designing the wallpaper with your goals on it?

Courtney Baker:
Yeah, that’s what I’m saying. You know, like you said phone or laptop, but what about actual wallpaper? I mean, whoever does this-

Verbs Boyer:
That’s a commitment, for sure. That is a commitment.

Courtney Baker:
I’m going put $100 towards this idea for someone. If you put this in your house and message us, I should say the first one, what if 500 people messaged me and are like, “Look at this wallpaper I did”?

Verbs Boyer:
But here’s the thing. From a person who’s put wallpaper up, the old school way with the glue, you’re going to have to swap that wallpaper out 12 months from now, but again, if you are committed, by all means, if this helps you, keep them visible.

Nick Jaworski:
If you have to design a wallpaper with your goals on it, get all the glue, get it printed, and put it on your wall, you better accomplish those goals.

Verbs Boyer:
I’ll vote for that. I’ll vote for that. People, here’s the one that really fits in nicely to the Full Focus system as it is, is you can review your goals during your workday startup ritual or even your weekly preview. So Nick, do you have any goal visibility techniques that you find yourself using that are the most helpful for you?

Nick Jaworski:
Okay. I don’t have it right now, so I’m sort of full of it, but in the past, and it feels like this might be hard to do, but it’s not. There are online things you can do this with, is I made a list of my goals. I printed it. I exported it as a PDF or whatever. Then, there are websites online where you can take it, and you can have the algorithm of the website scale it up.

Verbs Boyer:
Yes.

Nick Jaworski:
Like, smart, so I took it, and I scaled it up, I think, twice. Then, I took it to FedEx office. I still call it Kinkos, but I took it there. I had it printed out. I mean, it was like this big.

Verbs Boyer:
Huge.

Nick Jaworski:
And it was huge, and I put it up here next to my desk. That was last year’s set of goals, and that was really helpful. Now, I will say this, though, about that, is if a goal has to change, which is going to happen, life will happen. I have a baby coming very soon, and I’m planning for that, but perhaps things will change even with that in mind. Then, I did find that I had an issue not correcting the poster, so I would change a goal, but for some reason I never changed, so then the poster started to feel like a monument to failure in some way, and so that actually is why I don’t have it up this year, but I could have just reprinted it. It’s not a big deal. It’s very cheap.

Courtney Baker:
Okay. Listen, whoever does my wallpaper idea, you also are going to have to have some markers that you’re willing to go over and update all of them, because we do believe in quarterly review.

Verbs Boyer:
So here’s one real quick. If we just said, “I’m going to write my top three for the quarter,” you can go to one of these. Nick, you said this. It gave me this idea, so I’m giving you credit.

Nick Jaworski:
Cool.

Verbs Boyer:
But if it’s not good, then nevermind what I just said.

Nick Jaworski:
I’ll cut it.

Verbs Boyer:
So you can design your own T-shirt with your goals on it and, at the top of the T-shirt, have the words “Ask me about…” and then boom, boom, boom. Now you have built-in accountability and visibility. Mic drop.

Courtney Baker:
We should give away a few of these shirts. That would be so fun. Basically-

Nick Jaworski:
Well, I think what he’s saying is to ask them specifically. Are you saying to have printed on?

Courtney Baker:
Yeah. Basically, we do a contest, and then we draw three people that we will make them a shirt with their three goals on it.

Verbs Boyer:
Oh, great. With their three goals for the quarter.

Nick Jaworski:
All right.

Verbs Boyer:
Because if you put all 12.

Courtney Baker:
I love it.

Verbs Boyer:
You might wear the shirt one time.

Nick Jaworski:
How do they contact us, Courtney?

Courtney Baker:
To get their prize? Do you know many things I’ve given away on this podcast with no way for people to actually follow through? You know what? Let’s give away [inaudible 00:12:33], guys. Let’s do it, okay?

Nick Jaworski:
I think that solution is, we’ll put a post on the Full Focus Planner community page.

Courtney Baker:
Yes.

Nick Jaworski:
And we’ll choose, at random, three people.

Courtney Baker:
Yes. I love this. Great.

Nick Jaworski:
There you go.

Courtney Baker:
Great. So some other things that I’ve done with goal visibility… First of all, I made my very first reel last month, guys, okay? Look at me.

Verbs Boyer:
All right. All right. On Instagram?

Courtney Baker:
30 years old, making a reel. I used the hack that one of our certified pros gave us, about tearing out the first few pages, so you opened to your goals in your planner. I love that, especially if you use the coil, it’s very easy to do that, a little harder when you have the other versions. But also, I want to say all of these are fantastic ideas, and they work until they don’t, so be mindful.
If something is visible for a while, and then your brain gets used to it being there, and you’ve got to change it app, even if it’s on your mirror in one place, and you just erase it and do it in a different color, in a different location on your mirror, to just give your brain a new thing not to see it, because I think so many times it just starts to blend in. As you’re thinking about visibility, think about changing it. Maybe every month, you think of a different way to display your goals.

Nick Jaworski:
What if, hear me out, in your planner, right now, you went every three weeks or whatever and just wrote in, “Change your goal location”?

Courtney Baker:
It’s a great idea.

Verbs Boyer:
There you go.

Nick Jaworski:
You don’t have to think about it? Then, you turn the page, and you go, “Oh. It’s time to move it to this side of the mirror,” or “It’s time to do whatever,” or “It’s time to change wallpaper.”

Verbs Boyer:
Last one, guys. I know we did an April Fools thing not too long ago, but hear me out as well. Full Focus socks. You have your three goals for the quarter printed onto a pair of socks. You put those on in the morning time, bada-boom bada-bang. Constant reminder of your three goals for the quarter right there.

Courtney Baker:
This is amazing. I think I like the socks even better than the shirt, because it’s like you’ve got your shoe, you like a little surprise. Then, people are going to be like, “Hey, what’s written on your sock there?” You don’t even have to tell them to ask you. Nobody is not going to ask you about what’s going on with your sock there.

Verbs Boyer:
All right. Last one, and then we can move on to the full-

Courtney Baker:
I think he’s just [inaudible 00:15:13] time.

Nick Jaworski:
Wait. I do feel like, Blake’s not here.

Verbs Boyer:
Yeah.

Nick Jaworski:
I almost said RIP.

Courtney Baker:
Oh my gosh.

Nick Jaworski:
Blake’s not dead, everybody.

Courtney Baker:
Blake is fine.

Nick Jaworski:
He’s fine. Blake’s not here, but I know what he would say here. We’ve heard him say it before, is that, I don’t know if he’s still doing it, but in the past he has actually written his goals out on a card and kept the card, either in his wallet or in his pocket, and so that that’s something that he can carry around and actually just feel, and remind him that they exist. I think that’s a really nice idea as well.

Courtney Baker:
Nick, but is that practical? I mean, we’ve got wallpaper over here. We got shirts. We got socks. I mean, we’re talking practical over here.

Nick Jaworski:
You’re right. Tattoos. Just get them tattooed on yourself.

Courtney Baker:
Okay. Y’all know, Verbs, Nick, and I, we love the weekly preview, weekly preview all the way. In your weekly preview, one of the steps is to review your goals. It’s just like a check-box, but I just want to encourage you, do not skip that step. It is one, maybe, the most important step in your weekly preview. If I could get everybody’s planner and highlight it every week to do that, to make sure you’re reviewing your goals at that step in your weekly preview, it is really going to help you with this visibility. That’s the most practical tip I can give you. Hey guys, today I have my coworker and friend, Erin Perry, with us to talk quarterly preview. She is our chief experience officer at Full Focus, and she knows her stuff when it comes to quarterly preview. So Erin, welcome to this show. Have you been on Focus on This?

Erin Perry:
I have not been on Focus on This, so this is my first time on this podcast. I’m super excited to be here.

Courtney Baker:
That is hard to believe, as many times as you have been over on our sister podcast, Business Accelerator, that you’ve never been over here to talk planner.

Erin Perry:
I know. I’ve been waiting for my turn, Courtney.

Courtney Baker:
Well, here it is. Well, let’s just get started. I mean, obviously the quarterly preview is a big part of the Full Focus system. Do you have any tips, tricks? How do you approach your quarterly preview?

Erin Perry:
Well, I’ll tell you what. The first thing that I’ll say is I noticed such a huge difference when I prioritize this and I actually do it. I have found I had one quarter, where I just didn’t have enough time. I had so much on my schedule. It was one of those things where I went, “I just don’t have time to do this,” and I massively regretted leaving out that piece. I think, for me, the biggest tip that I can give around the quarterly preview is all around accountability. As I was sitting here thinking about it, I’m like, “Why is that such a game changer for me?” And whether it’s on the professional side or on the personal side, I make it a point to share my quarterly preview.
For me, that looks like sharing it with my EA, and sharing it with my spouse on the personal side, and the reason for that is, not only to be communicative and make sure I haven’t left anything out or just help my brain moments, but it’s really about accountability for me. I’ve found that if I don’t tell someone else what I’m going to do, then I’m less likely to actually accomplish that, whereas if I make it a part of ongoing conversations, I have that accountability partner that’s helping to cheer for me, root for me, push me to get things done, and also to help me prioritize my time around things that I’ve identified. That keeps me from going into firefighter mode, where I’m just in the moment and not thinking strategically about what needs to be accomplished, so I just find that that accountability is really, really helpful.

Courtney Baker:
So I think that is really helpful, and that totally resonates with me. I certainly find for people that have an executive assistant, now might be a great time to turn to them and say, “Hey, I really want to prioritize these quarterly previews this year. Can you help me with that? Can you go ahead and get the times scheduled? Can you remind me? I’m telling you now it’s important. Can you remind me of why I wanted to do that, if I try to not do it?” Really equip them to help you with that, but Erin, for people that may not, especially on the professional side, have an executive assistant that can provide a little bit of accountability when it comes to a quarterly preview, what would you recommend for everyone else?

Erin Perry:
Yeah. That’s a great question. Well, I think you can do a couple of different options. Number one, you can share it with your boss, so likely everybody’s got a boss, unless you’re a solopreneur. Then, in that case, usually people have a mentor. Even a friend, I think, can help push you. The other thing that I advise people to do is, even if it’s another coworker, you can kind of create a cohort there in your business, and be able to all do it together and have accountability partners. That could even be your direct report, somebody that reports to you, and you’re saying, “Hey, hold me accountable to this.” That might be a good way to do it too, but really I don’t think the “who” is as important as empowering that person to help keep you accountable to your goals.

Courtney Baker:
Yeah. I think that’s one of the, certainly, wonderful things about Full Focus, is you kind of naturally have other people around you that are doing a quarterly preview, and speaking of people around you, Erin, it sounds like there’s a party over there at the Full Focus office.

Erin Perry:
Yes. We are laughing and having a good time over here at Full Focus today to start off the new year.

Courtney Baker:
That’s right, but I think for those of you that are thinking like, “Oh, wow. That’s just because y’all work at Full Focus,” that totally doesn’t have to be true. You can do this with anybody that uses the Full Focus Planner, the Full Focus system metric. Really, honestly, you don’t even have to use the full focus Planner. You could just say like, “Hey, I want to do a quarterly preview and really think through my work.” That might be a good way of bringing some people on. If you’re like, “Hey, they would really benefit from the planner, but just haven’t gotten into it,” that might be a great entry point. Erin, any hacks, things that maybe people haven’t thought of when it comes to their weekly preview, that they could try?

Erin Perry:
Oh, goodness. Well, whether it’s on the weekly or quarterly preview, something that I really think is an important, and this is probably not new, but doing it on Fridays. I know a lot of people tend to do it on the weekends. For me, I have got to have that weekend time to shut off, and so what I prioritize, every Friday on my calendar, is just a quick last 15 minutes to look at my day, and go all the way back from the beginning of the week, try to remember what happened, and be really diligent about protecting that time.
That helps me to be able to shut off, enjoy my weekend, and actually make it restful. I find that that’s a good, almost, self-care activity, so that then I get the rest I need to show up as my best self starting on Monday, and really avoid that Sunday scaries feel, and hit the ground running in a productive way on Monday. I also find it helps me catch things that might be sneaking their way into my calendar that really aren’t a priority, and so catching those early enough to where I can adjust or somebody else can go to a meeting that I don’t have to be in, in my place, or even that we could say, “Hey, do we really need that meeting, or can we handle this in a quick text message and be done with it?” I think, is a really, really powerful, powerful tool.

Courtney Baker:
Yeah. That’s interesting too on the quarterly preview side, the idea of doing it on Fridays as well. What you’re really saying is it doesn’t have to be the actual last day of the month. You really can make it work with, “Hey, take a Friday off.” That’s something that I’ve utilized and found it incredibly helpful. Once you’ve put in a PTO request for the day, it’s planned. It’s like once you book a flight for a trip, the likelihood that you’re going on that trip, pretty high at that point,

Erin Perry:
We know what gets scheduled, gets done, right?

Courtney Baker:
There you go, friends.

Erin Perry:
So, making sure you get it scheduled and prioritized ensures that it will actually happen. Courtney, before I go, the favorite part about the quarterly preview, for me, is looking at, what do I want to improve? I’m a person who normally sees all of the problems first, and that’s great for firefighting and solving problems; however, I won’t focus naturally on the solution. I’ll focus on the problem first, and so that question around, “What would you like to improve,” helps put me in the mindset of looking for the solutions instead of just focusing on the problems. I find that to be really, really helpful in just getting me in the right mindset to approach my work, and that helps get me excited about the work in a different way, where I’m not feeling dread about all the problems that surround me. I’m feeling empowered about, “Hey, I know what the solutions are going to be to these problems,” and I can get started on the work and make more progress in a meaningful way without feeling weighed down.

Courtney Baker:
That’s so helpful, and I think that small mindset shift, I think the results that you start to get from that are astronomically bigger than if you’re just like, “Let’s list all the problems.” Those problems are a dime a dozen. It’s the solutions that are the real valuable pieces in a business and in life, in every day.

Erin Perry:
Yeah. No, that’s it, in my personal life. If I’m thinking about, “What can I do to be a better parent”” instead of, “What are all the problems that I’m trying to solve as a parent?” or, “What can I do to be a better spouse, and where can I make improvements?”, I think that’s really, really powerful. I’ve even used it to think about, “How do I deepen friendships with people? How do I show up as a better friend in the day-to-day?” And I think keeping that tension, too, between your professional and personal, and making sure it’s balanced, I also really love that that’s included in the quarterly preview, because it helps you show up as a whole person, and honestly, that’s going to lead to you being happier and more fulfilled at the end of the day.

Courtney Baker:
Erin, thank you so much for joining us today. It was so great to have your wisdom and thoughts on the quarterly preview, and I can’t wait to have you back on Focus on This another time.

Erin Perry:
Yeah. Let’s do it again soon.

Verbs Boyer:
All right. Today’s tip to level up your focus, write the goals you’re working on right now on a piece of paper, and post them somewhere that you will see them every day. This is going to help your visibility and help you remember the things that you’ve committed to accomplish.

Courtney Baker:
Hey, guys. In case you missed it, and your goals like, “I haven’t done it. I’m behind. I guess 2023 is over,” you’re totally wrong. It’s not too late to get our Full Focus goal setting course. Now is the perfect time to work through your goals for 2023. I promise it’s not too late. You can get that course at fullfocus.co/goalsetting. I say every year, I can’t even imagine using the Full Focus Planner without going through this course each year. I promise it’s going to make that big of a difference for you. Go check it out.

Verbs Boyer:
Thanks for joining us on Focus on This.

Courtney Baker:
This is the most productive podcast on the internet, so share it with your friends, and don’t forget to leave us a review. It’s a great way to help us grow the show and expand the people listening to it. And don’t forget, we have our Full Focus Planner community where you can win things like wallpaper, sock, and T-shirts.

Verbs Boyer:
Yes, socks.

Courtney Baker:
All the things. We’ll be back next week with another great episode. Until then, stay focused.

Verbs Boyer:
Stay focused. That was probably best one yet.

Courtney Baker:
That was a real good [inaudible 00:28:24].

Verbs Boyer:
Boom.