Tag: Action

Personal Goals that Inspire and Motivate

Personal Goals that Inspire and Motivate

Are you feeling motivated to set some strong goals for this year? Write down those New Year’s resolutions and get going, right? Most people write down lofty resolutions that they think they should want and rarely stick to them, losing motivation and focus within three weeks of their “good intentions.”

This is a brand-new year of limitless possibilities. Do you want to:

Increase your income?
Write a book?
Attract a relationship?
Start a new business?
Become a professional speaker?
Have more personal time?
Take a really great holiday?

I have a gut feeling it is going to be a GREAT year, a BIG SUCCESS year. So, forget writing down resolutions. They don’t work. In fact, the whole idea doesn’t

 really inspire action. So, lets change that.

Start thinking about 3-5 things you want, really want for yourself this year. Not what you should want, or what you think would please others. Dream a little. Think big. What are you passionate about? Entertain several ideas that make you smile, excite you, make you giggle, make you feel really good inside, no holds barred. Remove all mental barriers to holding these ideas clearly in your mind.

Now, put your attention fully on one of the things you want for yourself this year. Visualise and see yourself already there, living it! Creative visualisation is a powerful tool of attraction. Our minds cannot tell the difference between something real and something intensely imagined. Hold that picture in your mind. (Do this daily!)

Does this picture excite you – make you want to have it?

How would your life change if you got (achieved) this one thing you really want?

What would you have in your life that you don’t have now?

Now, the next step is very important. You must decide to go for it. Choose to have what you really want NOW, not someday or tomorrow. NOW. Say YES to yourself instead of saying no. Making the decision fuels your intent to take action.

3 Tips to Get on Track

1. On paper, clearly describe the 3-5 things you really want. I suggest using statements beginning with the phrase” I intend to”. Don’t use “I want”, “I hope for”, “I wish to”, “I’d like”, “I desire” etc. as these are too wishy-washy. Taking a stand with strong definitive statements reflects your commitment to succeed. (This first step is important in creating your road map to achieving your goals. If you don’t define the results you want, how do you know where you are going?). Feel like being creative? Make a collage or dream board for a visual aid in keeping your focus.

2. Moving forward, break down your action steps into smaller steps over a shorter time period like 30 days. For example: your goal is to increase your income, your first step may be to explore options to generate more money. Another step may be to look at your skills and talents for further ideas. A third step may be choosing something you have always wanted to do, something that you love that has the potential for additional income. Maybe it’s a total change of career. The first month may be devoted to doing research and personal exploration.

3. Identify potential obstacles and struggles that could prevent you from reaching your goals. Develop strategies to keep yourself motivated and focused such as reading and listening to positive materials, surrounding yourself with encouraging, uplifting people, joining a mastermind group. HIRE A COACH! Note: let go of using the “money excuse” that you can’t afford to get what you want. Invest in your success. It costs money to make money. How much do you think NO is costing you to stay where you are?

5 Tips to Stay on Track

1. Resolve unfinished business. Either clear the past (make apologies, speak your mind, forgive someone or yourself) and let it go.

2. Stay strong, if you are feeling FEAR. Bring your attention back to the present. Fear creates uncertainty, worrisome and anxiety producing thoughts. (“What if” thinking, Am I going to be okay?) Fear looks at the future and worse case scenarios. Focus on past successes for confidence.

3. Eliminate negativity. Notice the chatter in your head. How do your emotions speak to you inside? What you think affects how you view a situation. Ever heard the phrase self-fulfilling prophecy? Your viewpoint affects your decisions and actions; therefore, your attitude directly affects the outcome. Take a look at the people you associate with. Are they uplifting or do they bring you down? Be selective about who you are with, being around consistently negative or fearful people is draining and disheartening.

4. Keep up your self-care. Taking good care of yourself physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually is a key factor in staying strong and focused under pressure.

5. Celebrate along the way. Taking the time to recognise measurable successes motivates continual commitment to your goals.

“The big challenge is to become all that you have the possibility of becoming. You cannot believe what it does to the human spirit to maximise your human potential and stretch yourself to the limit.” Jim Rohn

Business Owners Toolkit – Problem-Solving

Problem-solving should be in every property investors and business owner’s toolkit, invariably things will go wrong, and you need to know how to get to the root cause so that you can put it right, so it does not happen again. However, problem-solving is not just for when things go wrong as it can also be used to look at deals that have gone well and find ways to make improvements so that it is even better next time.
To become proficient at problem-solving a simple nine-step process should be followed. Although it may seem complicated at first glance, with a little bit of practice it will become second nature.

The Process

1. Problem Statement

The first step is defining the problem statement, this is where a lot of people go wrong including professionals who should know better. All too often people want to dive into corrective action and put things right believing that they already know what the problem is, and invariably the problem raises its head again at some point in the future, or the problem has become worse. So you need to be patient and do not pass this first step until the problem is defined.
Guidelines to a good problem statement are as follows:

  • What has been seen?
    This should include factual information, measurements, photographs, what specification is being deviated from, who found the problem, is it a repeat concern? If it is possible, the originator must physically observe the issue and go to the place where it was found or created to gain clarification.

 

  • Where was it found?
    It is important to identify where the problem was discovered, as this is relevant to later stages of the investigation. At this stage, no attempt should be made to predict where the problem was caused.

 

  • When was it found?
    The date and time a problem was discovered, it may be relevant to the investigation.

 

  • How was the problem found?
    Understanding how the problem was found will assist in later stages of the investigation.

 

  • How many?
    It is important to record the details of the scope of the problem at the time of discovery; this will assist in containment action. Specific details should be recorded to prevent duplication and assist later stages of the investigation.

The following are examples of poor and good problem statements:

a) Poor Statement – The bathroom in the HMO is flooded

b) Good Statement – The bathroom in room 10, became flooded at ten last night, the ballcock valve in the toilet cistern was broken. The water has not only flooded number 10 but has also seeped through to the room below at number 5 causing the electrics in that room to short out.

As can be seen, the first statement just tells you that a bathroom has been flooded, it gives no indication of which room or the extent of the damage. So, armed with this information you would be looking at sending a plumber to fix the problem. Whereas with the second statement you know which two rooms have been affected, you know that not only is a plumber required to fix the problem but that you also need an electrician, and because of the water damage you may also require a builder. In the meantime, you also need to try and find an alternative accommodation for your tenants as they now have rooms that they cannot use.

2. Form your Team

The second step is to form your team, this can be one person or a team of people depending on the complexity of the problem. Each problem is assigned a leader and the responsibilities of the leader are:

  • To control the actions.
  • To clarify the problem description (in consultation with the originator).
  • Confirm the need for the Root Cause Analysis (RCA) to be carried out.
  • To track the investigation through all stages to a conclusion and ensure that the RCA process is followed.
  • Determine the problem-solving team considering the nature and complexity of the problem.
  • To escalate any obstacles and blockages through the management hierarchy, which could be just you
  • To report on progress on the RCA activity.
  • Present the RCA for closure upon completion.

3. Containment

Containment action is the next stage it is the initial actions taken to protect the customer from further occurrences of the stated problem.
The scope of the problem should be determined, and appropriate action was taken on all items suspected or found to be non-conforming. For example, leaflets with the wrong contact number are ready for distribution, how many do you have in stock, how many have been delivered to houses. Upon the completion of containment activity, no further defects should reach the customer.
Typical types of containment actions are as follows:

  • Identifying and locating all suspect material through in-house process check.
  • Check material to requirements, quarantine all defect material.
  • Review any material that may have been generated with the same process.
  • Obtain all escaped suspect material, or quarantine and notify customers.
  • Implement temporary fix and take appropriate action to ensure no further defects of the same nature reach the customer.
  • Upon completion of the containment activity, the problem leader must confirm that the problem has been contained via all appropriate actions having been completed and enforced.

4. Root Cause of the Escape

It should be determined at which stage of the process the defect or problem should have been detected, and the reasons why the issue was undetected. This activity may identify more than one process stage where the defect was not detected, and each should be considered.
Review of working practices, procedural documents and instructions should be supplemented by the use of appropriate tools, e.g. brainstorming, 5 whys, Ishikawa diagrams, process mapping, etc.

5. Prevent Further Escapes

Action should be taken to ensure that future occurrences of the problem are detected at the correct process stages. These may be permanent or temporary activities for example:

  • Use of mistake-proofing methods e.g. smoke detectors are designed so they cannot be mounted until a battery is installed.
  • Additional inspection instructions
  • Updates to procedures/work instructions/process plans

6. Root Cause of the Issue

Where possible this analysis should involve individuals with knowledge of the processes and should also involve a review of the process as it occurs in reality Use of the approach of “go, look, see and understand” is recommended.
Appropriate tools should be used to support the analysis and investigation e.g. process mapping and 5 whys, Ishikawa diagrams etc. It may be the case that a number of contributory causes are identified and any that cannot be dismissed need to be included for correction. When defining the root cause the following type should be avoided:

  • Repeating the original problem description.
  • “People error”
  • “Lack of resource”
  • ” Issues beyond physical control”

These are not root causes and show the process has not been applied effectively/ rigorously.

7. Permanent Corrective Action

Actions must be taken to permanently eliminate the cause(s) of the problem. As a general rule, to correct a problem requires a change, for example, process changes, procedural changes. Changes should be implemented following the appropriate change process.
When introducing a change, the following should be considered:

  • The impact of changes on training
  • The impact of changes to work in progress
  • Risks associated with the change
  • Procedural requirements for making a change e.g. is a joint venture approval required?

8. Preventive Action

Preventive actions are those actions taken to prevent a similar problem occurring in other areas of the business. At this stage, it is important to consider if any other areas of the business could benefit from the changes made as a result of the problem resolution. If there are other areas of application, the corrective actions should be applied in those areas too.

9. Verify

Each problem or issue subjected to the root cause analysis process should be subject to final verification activity to ensure that the issue has been satisfactorily resolved. This should be carried out by the problem owners/manager.

Topics to be considered are:

  • Has sufficient containment action been taken?
  • Do the identified root causes relate to the original problem?
  • Are the root causes identified true root causes and not symptoms of a deeper cause?
  • Have all identified corrective actions been implemented?
  • Have corrective actions been effective in eliminating the original problem?
  • Have corrective actions been applied to appropriate processes?
  • Have any temporary containment and protection actions now been removed?
  • Are the preventive actions robust e.g. is mistake proofing used?

Good practice in verification should, as a minimum, involve a “go, look, see” activity where physical inspection of the corrective action etc. takes place.

The One Thing

Introduction

My mentor/coach Mark Dalton told me to read a book called ‘The One Thing’ by Gary Keller with Jay Papasan. If Mark tells me to read it I know it is for a reason, so I obtained a copy and having read it I know why he wanted me to read it. This book explains how and why you need to focus on the one thing that can make a difference to your business, life, relationship etc. This is about the focus and not the subject matter of what you want to apply that focus to.

Background

The authors explain that a tiny bit of focus can make a big difference; this is basically explained by the use of domino effect. ‘In 1983. Lorne Whitehead wrote in the American Journal of Physics that he’d discovered that domino falls could not only topple many things, they could also topple bigger things. He described how a single domino is capable of bringing down another domino that is actually 50 percent larger. This is an interesting concept and it was taken up by another physicist who created ‘eight dominoes out of plywood, each of which was 50 percent larger than the one before. The first was a mere two inches, the last almost three feet tall. The resulting domino fall began with a gentle tick and quickly ended ‘with a loud SLAM.’’

A demonstration of this can be seen Here.

What this is trying to convey is that by understanding and focusing on your one thing then you can make a big difference. The book looks at things that get in the way and comes up with a list called ‘The Six Lies Between you and Success’ the list is as follows:

  1. Everything matters equally
  2. Multitasking
  3. A disciplined life
  4. Willpower is always on will-call
  5. A balanced life
  6. Big is bad

The authors then go through each of these six lies and explains why they are lies.

Being a Chartered Quality Professional myself I was delighted to see the Quality Guru Joseph M. Juran mentioned with regard to the 80/20 rule as ‘GM executives invited him to review research on management compensation that followed a formula described by a little known Italian economist, Vilfredo Pareto. In the 19th century, Pareto had written a mathematical model for income distribution in Italy that stated 80 percent of the land was owned by 20 percent of the people. Wealth was not evenly distributed. In fact, according to Pareto, it was actually concentrated in a highly predictable way. A pioneer of quality-control management, Juran had noticed that a handful of flaws would usually produce the majority of defects. This imbalance not only rang true to his experience, but he suspected it might be a universal law – and bigger than what Pareto had observed might be bigger than even Pareto had imagined.’ The Pareto principle or the 80/20 rule as it is known by people outside of manufacturing can be applied to your business by using the smallest amount of focused effort or input (20%) to create the biggest return or output (80%). What the book conveys is take your 20% and keep reducing it until you get to the single most important thing, so in effect, you are now looking at a 1/99 rule.

The authors explains that you need a ‘Focusing Question’ to help you to identify your one thing. It does this by the use of a model that gives you four options to frame your question.

 

An example is given on how the model is used to obtain a great question

From this example you have found a great question ‘What can I do to double sales in six months?’ This now needs to be converted into the ‘Focusing Question: “What’s the ONE Thing I can do to double sales in six months such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary?”’

There are three possible categories that answers can come in:

  • Doable
  • Stretch
  • Possibility

The authors suggest that you should ignore the first two and concentrate on the third answer as this is what high achievers will look for, so you should too.

The authors have several more models that are useful to help you find and focus on your One Thing which looks at Purpose, Priority, Productivity and Profit. They also suggest three commitments ‘First, you must adopt the mindset of someone seeking mastery. Mastery is a commitment to becoming the best, so to achieve extraordinary results you must embrace the extraordinary effort it represents. Second, you must continually seek the very best ways of doing things. Nothing is more futile than doing your best using an approach that can’t deliver results equal to your effort. And last, you must be willing to be held accountable to do everything you can to achieve your ONE Thing.’

Conclusion

The authors of this book certainly make it clear that you need to find your One Thing to be able to obtain great results. They give you the theory and the tools so that you can understand it and apply it to your business, life etc. It is a clear and easy read that is aimed at practicality rather than academic theory, so it is up to you to take action and apply it to find your One Thing.