Step 7 – Choose action steps, take action, and have accountability for
honoring commitments.
Choose Your Focus
First, you’ll want to pick four or five areas that will make the most positive change in your
life. These are the areas you will focus on. Focusing on a few items at a time allows you to
achieve more. If you try to do everything at once you’ll get overwhelmed and scattered,
and it will be difficult to accomplish anything well. [Download this worksheet here.]
You might choose areas from the Life Wheel or from your Values Action Log.
Mine are:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Business Building: Activities to generate leads
Work: Private and agency coaching, coaching community contribution
Relationships: Family and close friends
Health & Wellness: Maintaining energetic vitality and fitness
Professional Development: Continuous Improvement
What are your major focuses in life? (for now)
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Plan to Attain Your Vision
What are the goals and milestones that will take you forward to your vision?
After defining a vision, the next step is to convert it into measurable and specific long-term
goals. Quite often, you do not have enough clarity and these goals go unmet, resulting in a
series of disappointments. An alternative is choosing milestones, or which of the steps to
take along the way to realizing your vision.
If you think about climbing a mountain, you cannot see all the twists and turns, canyons
and creeks along the way until you get closer to them. Choosing milestones, like resting
spots, are where we celebrate success and get clarity about the next leg of the journey, and
set the next appropriate milestone. We then establish short-term goals to keep us focused
and accountable for reaching the next milestone.
“Whatever the mind can conceive and believe it can achieve.” Napoleon Hill
Use the following chart to list your goals and milestones for each focus area. (If you have
more than one goal or milestone in any section and need more space, create a chart like
this for yourself.) [Download a copy of this worksheet here.]
1. Focus:
Annual
Goal
Quarterly
Goal
Monthly
Goal
Monthly
Milestone
2. Focus:
What I want to achieve
By when
Progress
What I want to achieve
By when
Progress
What I want to achieve
By when
Progress
What I want to achieve
By when
Progress
What I want to achieve
By when
Progress
Annual
Goal
Quarterly
Goal
Monthly
Goal
Monthly
Milestone
3. Focus:
Annual
Goal
Quarterly
Goal
Monthly
Goal
Monthly
Milestone
4. Focus:
Annual
Goal
Quarterly
Goal
Monthly
Goal
Monthly
Milestone
5. Focus:
Annual
Goal
Quarterly
Goal
Monthly
Goal
Monthly
Milestone
Use the next chart to generate a weekly milestone task list to achieve each of your monthly
milestones, and step toward reaching your goals and vision. Update it each week when you
do your weekly review. Make sure that you keep the number of action items manageable
so you experience a sense of accomplishment rather than feeling perpetually overwhelmed
and stressed.
The Weekly Focus
Weekly milestones for _________________________
day, month, year
What I want to achieve
Progress
If you have a preferred method to track your tasks, please use it. There are many different
ways to track your tasks and the best is the one you will use consistently. One of my
favorites is the Personal Kanban, by Jim Benson, others swear by Getting Things Done, by
David Allan. Whatever you use, make sure it’s a system you are comfortable with and that
you will stick to.
Take Action
Complete the tasks you have set out to do.
Weekly Review
This is the final step. Check in to assess how your week went. Did you reach your
milestones? Were you being who you wanted to be? What did you learn this week and how
might you like to adjust your plan for next week or the coming weeks?
At the end of the Weekly Review, celebrate and reward yourself for achieving your
milestones, and then set your plan for next week. How will you reward yourself? Choose
something you enjoy or that is fun for you.
“Planning is bringing the future into the present so that you can do something about it now”
Alan Lakein, Time Management Author