Why You Should Get Moving and Make Your Plans Anyway!
As we step into the new year, we often find ourselves amidst the hustle and bustle of wrapping up the previous year’s work, holiday festivities, and the rush of tying up loose ends. It’s common for us to hear from clients, friends, and family members that they feel like they “missed the boat” when planning for the upcoming year.
It’s crucial to recognize that we can ACTUALLY miss out on numerous benefits of setting goals and making plans for the new year by skipping the process completely. There is always time to chart a course for the coming months!
Let’s be a little more forgiving…the passing of the arbitrary date of January 1st shouldn’t prevent anyone from creating actionable goals and attainable plans for the year ahead. Let’s explore some important reasons you should take time to make plans for a successful 2024.
The Planning Phase
To start, establish achievable expectations as you embark on your planning journey. Everyone is unique, and your process of planning will be too. Some individuals breeze through goal setting and planning effortlessly and swiftly, while others may encounter challenges and shine during execution. Reflect on your strengths and challenges before crafting your plan. Then you can set expectations that are realistic for you and you alone. Don’t stress about creating a “perfect plan”; instead, focus on working through the process and finding joy in the satisfying results.
How Planning Helps
Planning pays off before, during, and after taking action. We all have dreams for ourselves. Consider planning as a form of “dreaming” with common benefits. Both can direct actions toward desired outcomes. Reflecting on my agency’s journey, without the dream to start it, I wouldn’t have one today. It took about ten years to put the dream into a plan of action, emphasizing the significance of marrying dreams with actionable plans. I have been an agency owner for over a decade…the same amount of time I dreamt of it becoming a reality!
Actions Speak Louder Than Words
Once you have a plan in place, you are ready to put it into action. Planning pays BIG dividends while you are taking action. First, it gives you a vision, a roadmap to follow. It helps you make sure you don’t go too far astray (as long as you look back at the plan!). Also, you can avoid problems and take advantage of opportunities when they arise. And this may be a “glass half-full” perspective, but there will always be unexpected opportunities! Keep your eye out for them, and don’t worry about the speed bumps and potholes that you encounter along the way. Some of the most challenging situations that arise provide us with important chances to discover new insights about ourselves and become better humans.
Lather, Rinse, Repeat
As you take the actions outlined in your plan, results will emerge. At Robb Digital, we revel in seeing these outcomes, as they provide the basis for learning, and sometimes pivoting. With results, data, and metrics, you can make informed changes, constantly improving. It’s natural to face setbacks, but the goal is to keep learning and growing, understanding that progress is often a journey of one step forward and sometimes two steps back.
While setting big goals may seem overwhelming, taking significant steps toward change can be both intimidating and worthwhile. Embrace the opportunity to dream and pursue your goals, regardless of the challenges that may arise!
