Tag: PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

With 2015 nearly upon us, New Years’ Resolutions swim in our heads as we prepare to have a “better” year than the last. Often times though, many individuals do not take the time to do a critical analysis of the past, present, and future goals in order to properly set themselves on a path of change and growth. This can be felt both in their personal development and professional development.

Studies show that people who put pen to paper and write down their specific goals tend to be more successful at accomplishing whatever they set out to achieve versus those who do not write them down and are not detailed in their goal setting.

Our personal goals tend to be things like gaining a promotion, losing weight, getting into shape, getting finances under control, meeting someone, and so on. While these are great goals, they need to be quantified and put into manageable perspective. This often cannot happen unless you take stock of where you are and where you want to be. This is doubly true for professional goals. Critical analysis is an important aspect of getting your professional goals in line for growth and improvement.

Goal setting is not a set-it-and-forget-it type of activity. Look at goal setting as an ongoing process of improvement and change. Ask yourself hard questions like “Where do I want to be in a year, or in five years. How does my life look to me now and what steps do I need to make in order to achieve these goals?” These same questions can be applied to professional goals – it is important to ask yourself the difficult questions in order to identify and quantify your goals.

From a business standpoint, here are a few questions that will help you take stock of your current job performance and formulating goals.

As a leader, how do you assess your own performance and make changes?
As a leader it is important to provide tools and programs to assess not only your own skills and performance, but also those of the rest of your team. When you use assessments like EQ360 and EQ-i 2.0 to assess emotional intelligence and consult with an expert to put together an interactive program to improve professional performance and growth, you are setting up not only yourself, but your entire team for success in the coming year.

Do you take the time to review your personal and professional performance goals?
Improving goal setting skills and putting together a consistent review process whereby you are constantly reevaluating goals and readjusting them to fit your reality is paramount to successful progressive growth, both with personal development and professional development. Implementing a goal setting skills training program in the workplace will set each and every team member up for success. Goals cannot be static. Goals are a constant compass that need referencing throughout the year in order to stay on the correct path.

How do you garner honest feedback on your performance as a leader or manager?
Opening the lines of communication between all members of an organization is key to individual professional growth and the growth of a team. How can you set goals if you do not have a reference point on how you are doing? There are many different ways to ask for feedback from your peers, managers, and employees. Take a walk and talk, send an office survey, “feed forward”, or schedule regular one-on-one meetings – these are just a few ways to receive honest feedback. Here are some great ideas from SmartBlogs.

What do you do with that feedback?
Once you receive feedback, decide how you are going to incorporate this into a program to improve your performance and grow in your role within the organization. Use feedback to help map out your own goals.

Goal setting is an important part of personal and professional growth. It is essential to be able to assess where you are to see where you are going. Let us know if we can help you improve your performance and fulfill your goals in 2015.