10 Steps to Focus and Completion - Planning Your Plan

Is the art of focus a difficult concept for you to grasp? If you’re an entrepreneur, most likely it is. You see, entrepreneurs are typically blessed with busy, brilliant, creative minds. The downside is that it’s difficult to curb that right-brained activity for long enough to focus on completing our goals. What a dilemma! We’d be hard-pressed to succeed without those right-brained qualities, but how do we let the left-brain function take over when the right-brain wants to run the show? How can we follow through on the action steps that are necessary to make a goal or plan come to fruition? Create, create, create; that’s what we do. We’re always chasing the answers, ideas, and permission to make our wonderful ideas even better but when it comes to bringing those ideas fully to life; well that’s where the waters get murky. Sound familiar? If it does, here are some steps that may help you get from here to there with both oars in the water….

Remember, in these times, a successful businessperson must use whole mind thinking. We need to create processes, systems, and solutions in addition to being creative and utilizing our out-of-the-box thinking skills. Hopefully, these 10 steps to planning your plan will help you do just that. Use these steps to create focus so that you can get these fabulous ideas out of your mind and cashing in at the bank.

1) Tell it to three people, not a village: When you create a new concept, plan, or goal for your business discuss it with 3 people. That’s it – 3 people. Perhaps your coach, a close friend, and a peer. You will drive yourself crazy if you put your idea in front of too many people; everyone will have a different opinion and enough feedback to fill a sizeable hard drive. Some will love your idea; others will think you’re a lunatic to believe it will work, and everyone will have a way to “improve” upon it. Remember, this business is about your clients/customers and only you know what makes them happy. It’s also about your passion and values; and only you can possibly connect to those. Let your ideas be representative of your passion and your clients’ needs, not the opinions of a multitude of friends, family members, and peers. You’ll soon discover that the true answers are within you, so why create stress and waste time when you already have the answers? Brainstorming with your Mastermind Group or your coach is critical at times, but no need to ask the opinion of every person you know.

2) Compare yourself only to YOU: At times it’s tempting to take a look at the competition, and that’s good and necessary. But it stops being useful when we begin to beat ourselves up for not achieving everything that the competition has achieved. When I began coaching, I would frequently go to other coach’s websites and make myself feel wholly inadequate because I wasn’t doing everything that every other coach on the face of the earth was doing. Yikes! How is that possible? Thankfully, I’ve learned to rein myself in and realize that we each have a unique offering and there is room enough in this Universe for thousands of successful coaches. There is room in this Universe for millions of successful people and your unique offerings will make you one of them. When you compare, compare your achievements to your own goals and how far you’ve come – not to the goals of others.

3) Examine it: Write down all of the reasons that you want to achieve this goal and all of its benefits. Are you doing this for the right reasons? Do you feel that it is in integrity with your values and your business model? If not, this is the time to revise the goal until it feels right, don’t wait until you’re knee deep in problems. Also, why limit yourself to logic in this phase? Use that outstanding intuition as well.

4) Analyze it: Don’t over analyze, but be diligent in examining the logic and the feasibility of your idea, and ask yourself, “How will I know when I’ve successfully achieved this goal?” and “How is it measurable?” Ask, “At what point is this goal complete and how will I know that I’ve succeeded?” Most importantly; “Is this idea a good fit in my long term vision?”

5) Plan for it: Identify your end-goal and write it at the top of a piece of paper (or a Word doc). Then create the steps you will take to achieve that goal. Be very specific so that each step has one or more action steps. So, whether it’s information gathering, writing content, individual marketing steps, or creating infrastructure, each category may have a number of action steps. In other words, every large step must be broken down into bite-sized pieces so you know exactly what to do next when the time comes.

6) Challenge it: Identify any possible blocks or obstacles in your plan or goal. What might they be and how will you address them if they arise? Now, don’t go getting all pessimistic on me here. Simply take a look at technical challenges, marketing challenges, etc. and the resources that you possess to address any questions as they arise. Is your marketing plan for a new product or service strong enough? Do you need new software or hardware to implement your idea? Who do you know who could help you in these areas – or others? These challenges, if you encounter them, are simply detours that you WILL maneuver successfully if you plan for them.

7) Make it friendly: Referring to step #5, where you’ve identified your bite-sized action steps, create a user-friendly document for each series of steps. For instance, if your next step is adding a shopping cart to your site, have a “shopping cart” document that details each step along the way. Now give yourself a timeline to complete all of these steps. I leave this document open on my desktop, and between my client sessions I refer to it to see what the next action step is – and I DO IT. No thinking about how I can change it, make it better, or even how I can procrastinate on it. I am now on auto-pilot because all I have to do is read and ACT. Wow, what a difference it makes when you don’t have to decide what to do next….ahhhh.

8 ) Create the habit: Now the trick is to remember to look at your working document. Until it becomes habit, put a reminder in your Outlook calendar or sticky notes throughout your home. Referring to your task list needs to become a default setting for you so that you don’t get off track with other projects and grand ideas that can wait until another time. Stick to this project; put other ideas in a separate “idea” document so that your mind is free and willing to stick to this one goal until it’s complete.

9) Get the psychological edge: Sometimes, larger goals lead us to feel like we’re on a treadmill; working hard and going nowhere. I like to use the “double strike through” feature in Word to indicate that I’ve achieved my steps…I don’t delete them as I go. This way, when I refer to my action plan document I can see how far I’ve come. Eventually, I accept that I’m making progress and I delete the completed tasks – that feels good too!

10) Celebrate along the way: The big picture is just that – BIG. Get off the treadmill every now and then and celebrate all that you’ve achieved. Describe it out loud to one of your 3 people; when you do this it really sinks in and you will feel good about yourself and your goals. It’s important to feel like you’re achieving and not sinking in the quicksand of it all. This will keep your motivation strong and your vision secure.

Summing this up; it’s critical that you write down your goals, talk them through with someone who will offer solid feedback and perhaps some accountability, and create the daily habit (and time) to achieve something on your goals list. I keep my Fridays as an “admin and marketing” day and focus on my goals all day long – every, single week – no exceptions. If you can’t take an entire day then schedule in 2-hour blocks of time at least 3 times a week. You have the time. Think about how much time is either spent doing non-entrepreneurial tasks or mentally processing and re-hashing the same information. That’s right; if you outsource and get focused you will have the time.

OK. Go create the plan, follow the 10-steps and let me know what you’ve achieved in 3-month’s time! Most importantly, have fun with it. You’re an entrepreneur because you have spirit, creativity, and passion – enjoy them!