It’s that time when everyone starts to develop their goals and objectives for the next year. Reviews and appraisals are being completed. Company objectives are being set. Personal objectives are being setup to align. It’s a time for planning!
Personally, I’m not a huge fan of the corporate one-year objectives planning as I think it can force people to not adjust as the year goes on. However, planning, in general, is at the top of my list of things that everyone should be constantly doing.
My contention is that every single person should have a plan for their next two years at all times. That plan should be based on what you are looking for out of both your life and career to help ensure you are pushing yourself where you want to go. Mine is based on answering the following questions:
- Am I getting new, valuable experience from my current role? Do I see myself continuing to get new and valuable experience over the next two years?
- Am I balancing work and life? Where is my stress level currently?
- Am I working with people that both challenge me and are good to work with? Am I more happy than not day-to-day?
- Have I progressed in ways that make me a better person (work and life)? If not, what will I do to become better?
That’s it, only a few questions. No one can predict that they will be burned out next July or that they will suddenly get stuck in a role they don’t like in 18 months. What they can understand is whether they are in a position to continue growing and exceeding personal goals. If not, it’s time for a change.
One thing here: none of my personal goals are around money. It’s always hard to set monetary goals for yourself because so often they are out of your hand. Even in commission or contract roles, money is usually secondary to building a solid reputation and earning client trust. Do those and the money will follow.
Every plan should be different because no two people are the same. Even my questions change every few years. It was probably five years ago that I explicitly started to focus on new experiences. I imagine that in another 10 years I’ll be thinking more about leveraging my past experiences into a unique role of some sort (the best-laid plans and all that…).