And this doing versus being, this is going to give us two categories to really work on, to really build towards so that we don't get to the end of the year and we've accomplished all this stuff, but we're burned out. But we feel like, ah, what was the point of this? I'm not happy. I don't want to do any of this.
Welcome to the managing mid simple podcast. I'm Lia Garvin, your host and team operations consultant through this show and my signature ops playbook. I condense a decade of experience driving team operations and some of the most influential companies in tech to save you time, money, and stress. It doesn't matter if you're a business owner who realized that running a team isn't as easy as you thought it would be, or a new manager looking to learn the ropes or a seasoned manager ready to up their game.
Everyone is welcome to hang out with Managing Made Simple. From conflicts, to feedback, to delegating and more, we leave no stone unturned when it comes to what makes us love managing, kind of hate it, and everything in between. Let's go. Welcome back to the show. We are literally days away from 2024. And today I wanted to talk about a simple framework for goal setting.
Now goal setting is something we talk about all the time, right? Especially when we're starting a new year, maybe a new quarter. But it can feel pretty abstract, I think for ourselves, maybe we feel like we, we set goals, but they're not always anchored to anything, or maybe our team members are saying to us, I want to have goals, but I don't really know where to start.
And so that's why I want to introduce this simple framework today. And now when we talk about goal setting, we want to make sure that we are using a kind of framework around it so that it doesn't feel too abstract. And I love the SMART goals framework, which means goals are S specific. M, measurable, A, attainable, R, relevant, and T, timely.
This framework allows us to ground our goals around something that we can come back to. We know if we've achieved it. We know that yes, okay, timely is we can get it done this year or this quarter, whatever is important to us. Attainable doesn't mean it's not a stretch goal, but it's not like something that's wildly out of this realm of universe, you know what I'm saying?
And then specific obviously gets us to. To something that we can kind of come back to relevant as it has to do with us and our bigger vision, whatever, right? So smart goals is a framework I love to use when, when setting goals. Now, the framework that I wanted to share with you, the simple way to look at this is to look at what goals do we have centered around what we want to do, what we want to achieve, and what goals do we have centered around how we want to show up, how we want to be.
And this doing versus being, this is going to give us two categories to really work on, to really build towards, so that we don't get to the end of the year and we've accomplished all this stuff, but we're burned out, but we feel like, ah, what was the point of this? I'm not happy. I don't want to do any of this.
And a lot of times that's what can happen. We only focus on the doing goals. We want to hit this revenue target. We want to achieve this financial milestone. We want to grow to this certain user base. We want to, if there's many customers, we want to achieve this thing. And we get into a rat race and we go, go, go, go, go.
Especially if you're like me, like an Enneagram three or someone that's just like type a, like go, go, go, see a goal, hit a goal. If you get in that rat race, you can get to the end and see any sort of feeling and, and kind of connection to your body and your inner self and your kind of greater, you know, more intrinsic things.
Those things can get forgotten about and that's where we start to feel like out of touch with ourselves that, well, I accomplished all this stuff, but I don't feel fulfilled. I don't feel happy. I don't feel like this isn't how it was supposed to feel. And so that's why pairing those achievement goals with a being goal, something about the feeling, you know, the essence, how do you want to just like kind of exist in the world?
If we don't pair it with that, we can feel incomplete. So as you think about what this next year is going to look like. Think about these two things. What do you want to do? What do you want to achieve? And how do you want to feel? Because sometimes those things can feel like they're in conflict, but they don't have to be because you can serve as many clients as you want to.
You can grow as you want to in your career. And you can also do that while feeling like I'm really anchored in my values. I'm spending time with my family. I'm feeling really happy and in my zone and in my flow. I'm having time for exercise. I'm having time for, for myself. It's just that we got to think about what those two things are so that we can prioritize it.
And now, when I said, you know, this is something that you can use with yourself and your teams, I encourage you to use this framework and share with your team members, Hey, to set goals around both of these things, because this allows us to support our teams and some of those feeling goals that maybe they don't even lean into enough.
Right? So if they're saying, Hey, I really want to, um, find, you know, I really want to grow professionally and feel like I'm, I'm learning every day. Okay, if that's one of our team members being goals, now we can help them find opportunities to learn. Maybe there is a class they can take or a conference they can be a part of or a new, a new kind of responsibility they can take on in the company.
Right. But when we don't know that we're just looking towards the doing and the achieving, we might leave something out and someone might decide, well, I'm getting a lot done in this company, but I don't really feel fulfilled. I'm going to find another job. So helping our team members really tune into the doing and the being is another way to drive higher retention, right?
Which saves you time and money because when you show your team members, I believe in you, I care about you as the whole person that you are. Then they want to stick around. Now, one more thing on the being, you know, the being goals are really centered on, you know, a lot of times they're really anchored to our values.
And that's why it's really important as a company to know, well, what are your values as a business owner, as a team leader, what are your team values? Because our values drive how we make decisions. And this is really how in essence we want to be. If we have strong values around collaboration and teamwork and service, then our being goals are not going to be met if they're not aligned to those.
And sometimes that's where our doing goals feel out of alignment when we say, well, we really want to be spending a lot of time giving back. And that's one of our being goals, really being in service. And then we have a doing goal that feels like, which just like drive, drive, drive, don't look back. Don't turn.
We have to figure out a way to rationalize that. But again, like I said, these two things can coexist as long as we've thought about it in advance. So how would I tackle this? Well, I would take literally take a piece of paper and write a line down the middle. And right. Doing on one side and being on the other and start to list out what are three things at most.
Okay. We don't want to get crazy with it. We don't want to go over the top. What are three things that you want to accomplish this year for yourself or your business? Is it a revenue target? Is it a number of users or customers you can serve? Is it a certain seniority in the company you're at? Why are those three things that are really, really important to you?
And on the other side and the being, how do you want to feel? What are those intrinsic things that you need to have accomplished in order to feel good about the doing and get really honest with yourself? Maybe you close your eyes. Maybe you meditate on it. Maybe you think about those moments in your life where you felt like you were in a state of flow.
We really felt like you were in your zone, really, really living in your, in your integrity and your authenticity. What are those things? And pick three things that you really want to feel over the next year and then look at the two lists and see what do I need to do with each of these lists to help achieve the one on the other side.
And again, you're going to see all of it can come together. All of it is doable. All of it is achievable when you've thought about an advance and you've gotten specific again and you use that framework specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, timely. So we want to take those three we have for each and really think through that.
You know, have I gotten specific? Is this too abstract? Do I even know what success looks like? And we run through that and we look at how these goals on either side of this list compare with each other. Now we have a plan that's exciting because we know we're not going to get to end of the year and think like, ah, was it even worth it?
Because we have that being list. And we know we're not going to get the year and be like, did I accomplish anything? Because we have that doing list. And that's why I think this is such a fun thing to walk through with our team members. And maybe we share our own lists with them to kind of get them started and say, Hey, This is an example of what I mean of the doing and the being and how I see them being symbiotic instead of in conflict with each other.
And when we do this again, we can start the year really knowing that we're not going to let our, our year become a runaway train. We're not looking out for ourselves and our wellbeing and we really need to feel fulfilled. And again, with our teams, it shows them that we are looking out for the very same thing for them.
Okay. So that is a simple, super simple goal setting framework. Again, we use something like the SMART goals, sort of overarching thing, specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, timely, to be able to figure out what are these three goals that we have across doing and being. And then we can support our team members in setting goals and with the very same framework.
And we show them, we want you to have both. We're not just looking for accomplishments without that feeling of fulfillment and success and inner achievement. We want you to be seen. We want you, we want you to know that we care about you, that we're going to help show up for you. And we got a lot of stuff to get done.
So we got to have goals on both sides of the list. All right. If you have any questions, reach out. As always, if you want me to help you walk through this framework, go ahead and schedule an SOS call at liagarvin.com/SOS. This is a one hour call where we dive into this or any place that you're feeling stuck in your business.
And we want, and we make sure that you come away with concrete and specific things you can try on your team right away to get unstuck. So these are really booking up quickly. People are loving them because you can, you can come away with anything. Literally, if it's a hard feedback conversation, if it's goal setting, let me talk about today.
If it's how do I figure out these priorities, whatever it is, we make sure we don't leave that call until you have an action plan. Do you want to schedule that today? It is a liagarvin.com/SOS. All right. See you next time. That's all I have for today. Thank you so much for tuning in to the Managing Made Simple podcast, where my goal is to demystify the job of people management so that together we can make the workplace somewhere everyone can thrive.
With that said, let's spread the word. If you love this episode, please pass it along to someone who might benefit from it. See you next time.
