Goal Defining and Setting

When setting goals, people can get so caught up in all of the problems with various aspects of the business, that they get lost in the problem explanations and never get to the solution.  Discussing problems as a preamble to setting goals is great.  Get the issues out on the table but understand, that venting problems leads to other problems which leads to other problems and the problem bunny trails can literally consume a five day goal setting session.  There comes a time when the team has to shift gears into solution mode, pick specific goals, get them defined, and add the necessary action items.  Understand that business has problems, and at the end of the day there are always always always problems that will go unsolved.

Reid and Shay decided to go fishing one day, so in a matter of moments, they threw a quick few supplies in the car and headed for the lake at the end of County Road 50.  They parked in their normal spot, got out, and noticed that the lake was down quite a bit from the last time they were there.   As they walked towards the lake, they began to sink up to their knees in mud.  Reid looked at Shay and said “”forget this”, lets go fish the river, and off to the river they went.   An hour later, they pulled off the side of the road, got out of the car, walked to the edge and looked over.  The river was a long way down with a 30′ drop off right from the start.  Reid said forget this, lets hit Parker Lake on the other side of the pass.  It’s a bit of a walk but he had always wanted to try it.  Shay said no, “I’m going to go buy a rope and a back pack to get me down to the river.  So in separate directions they went.  Some time had passed, and Reid was slowly making his way up the trail going over the pass to Parker Lake.  Shay had returned with his supplies, made it to the river, and had two nice rainbow trout in the bag.  Reid went on walking for another four hours and realized that he had better turn around and get home before it got dark.  He thought of fishing the community lake in town on his way back but it was so crowded most of the time that nobody had caught a decent fish out of there in years.

The boys met up at the grille that evening, and dove into sharing stories.  Reid could explain all of the problems in detail with getting to the various fishing holes.  He talked about the river and how he doesn’t like walking on loose rock, and how steep the trail was leading over the pass, and how you can never find elbow room at the lake in town.  He knew it all.  Shay however just handed Reid two of his six fish and said “enjoy”.

The goal of the day was to catch a fish. Don’t let discussions around all of the unsolved problems stop you from catching at least one fish that day.  So what are your goals today?