Unconscious Goals Could Be Ruining Your Success

If you’re serious about making positive changes in your life, learn about the concept of unconscious goal setting.  The idea is not complex. It is simply that if you don’t set and work towards conscious goals you’re working towards meeting your unconscious goals.   

Unconscious goals are undefined with no specific direction.  Here are reasons why goals must move from unconscious to conscious to bring success to your life.

1. Unconscious goals are not specific. Everything you do in life is a forward motion. That is it takes you from where you are currently to another place.  If you don’t set specific goals for that movement you won’t have control over the outcome of that forward movement.  You’ll go somewhere but without consciously setting where you want to go; however, you’ll still get somewhere. 

2. Unconscious thoughts blame outside forces. Many people go through life just taking things as they come along.  If the day goes well, it’s one for joy.  If the day goes bad, it’s normally attributed to an external source such as  “bad luck” or to the activities of others people such as those that “don’t like you.” When you leave yourself open to whatever comes it’s a conscious unconscious decision.  No one is to blame except you as the opportunity to take control of your thoughts is your own.

3. Unconscious thoughts control the day. The brain doesn’t turn off simply because you haven’t consciously used it during your day.  Thoughts continue to take place. In fact, you’re thinking at all times about something.  Like other muscles of the body, a brain that doesn’t get exercised gets flabby.  Flabby brain, flabby thoughts.  Flabby thoughts don’t have the muscle tone for a firm foundation. That means your thoughts and ideas can be shifted and turned at the whim of outside forces or the attitudes of those that surround you.

4. Unconscious goals have no pattern.  Because you haven’t stopped to think specifically about what you want to do and how you intend to achieve, your life tends to go up and down with no pattern.  Because you don’t’ know what you want to achieve each day, anything you do is good enough.  Sometimes, you might have to stop to think if you got anything of importance done for the day since you didn’t plan to achieve anything.

5. Unconscious goals are vague. Goals you’re not conscious of are vague.  When you think in vague terms about what you want such as that you’d prefer to live a better life or have more money for instance, but without setting a specific goal your mind can’t create the ideas needed to guide you toward your goals.  Instead, “more money” can be a few pennies more than what you had yesterday.  A better life might mean getting through one more green light driving home than you got driving to work in the morning. Vague has no substance on which to build success.  

6. Unconscious goals waste time.  Having no pattern to your achievements or not knowing where you want to go or why creates the consistent frustration of having a starting and stopping motion in life. First you want where you’re going then you change your mind.  It’s like trying something on then deciding to change your clothes three times before being able to walk out of the house.  You don’t know exactly why you take specific actions so nothing seems to work.  This starting and stopping wastes time and lets you feel you’re taking two steps forward and five steps back with every action.

7. Unconscious goals are costly.  What are your income goals.  Unconscious goals will say “I want to be wealthy” or “ we really need to bring in some money today.”  These type of goals cost you the possibilities of actually reaching income goals. What is wealthy in your definition?  Unless you are specific about this, wealthy might be having an extra $20.00 bill in your pocket.  Now you are wealthy because you have that much more money.  Bringing in more money today could result in getting one sale but if it is the first and only sale for the month, you’ve reached your unconscious goals but could still face bankruptcy in another two months or less.  There is no reason for the mind to create ways to bring in more funds since you haven’t determined what you really need.

Hopefully these examples illustrate the power of unconscious goals for the detriment of your success.  It also gives you reasons to take the time to think through your goals and create goals that are specific, measurable, attainable, reasonable, and time oriented.  

How to Build Employee Confidence

As a leader in business you always need to know how to build the levels of confidence in your employees. The good news is that staying confident is something that you can help employees do. These tips give you specific ways that you can develop employee abilities and increase their self awareness for the benefit of the company.   

Listening is one of the most important skills for any leader to develop. It is more important than speaking skills. Listening forms the foundation for good interaction between leaders and employees and even gives you resources for making presentations to your people. Learn to listen to the people who work for you. Then let them know you were listening as you appropriate communicate using their words, ideas, and suggestions.

A confident employee is prepared for the tasks assigned. Preparation means having the right training and support in order to complete what’s expected with confidence.  Provide your employees with opportunities to upgrade their skills so they stay on the cutting edge in their field.

Employees become more confident when they have a mentor. A mentor is a person who has wisdom to share in personal and professional levels. Employees won’t learn everything just by doing it.  It’s the nuances of company life that have to be learned from a mentor that are so important.  Research shows that women and minorities seldom get adequate mentoring in organizations. Be aware of where you can serve as a mentor to those who are building the firm.

A confident leader will network with people in the organization.  That doesn’t mean spending a lot of time with any one person or group. But it does mean taking time to shake hands with some workers, go to various departments for personal updates or writing a note of encouragement for a job well done to an individual or group or team.

Take time to assess the personal and professional background of your employees and realize how many skills and abilities they bring to the company. It’s easy to overlook skilled people when there are important tasks to be done. Instead of going outside of the company to find professionals, know who is already in the company and assign challenging tasks that highlight their capabilities. This will greatly enhance confidence and let others know you recognize the value of your employees.

Let employees stay on top of the latest technology and continue to increase the company positioning in pertinent areas. Expose them to courses that increase skills using the benefits of both Internet based and offline classes in almost any topic. Don’t allow your employees to fall behind in their professional knowledge base when it’s simple to stay ahead of the learning curve by getting them needed training and education.  

These brief tips provide important ideas that you can use to increase the levels of confidence in your employees. You can help your people become stronger workers and more loyal to the company by doing simple, yet powerful things that let them know you care.

The Basics of Organizational Culture

Organization leaders need to know a very important factor about companies; that is the organization culture. Organization culture exists in every business if you recognize it or not.  The culture of the organization is the normal way things happen. It shows the business values, habits, behaviors and expected activities. An effective leader will recognize the organization culture and know how it affects each of the company operations. These 7 tips will help you recognize and understand organization culture.

1. Basic Language. People in companies have a particular way of talking. They use certain words or acronyms to describe operations or activities. This way of talking will differ according to your business and industry, as well as the norms and behaviors in the company.

2. Dress. Clothing styles will be different in different businesses. Observe how new people look when they first enter the company and how they start to change their dress as they stay longer to get an understanding of the spoken or unspoken dress code.

3. Meetings. Does your company conduct long or short meetings or do the people meet at all? Each organization will have its own way of gathering people to meet or not.

4. Communication. Is it common for everyone in the organization to know what’s going on at all times or does the communication stay at the top levels? Some companies freely share information while other workers always feel left out when it comes to communications.

5. Chain of Command. Culture lets you know how to address senior level people in a company and also tells you whom you can address directly or not. For some, you can go straight to the President’s office while other companies are very stick about who talks to whom.

6. Office. What you see in office spaces can tell if a company is casual or formal. There might be closed doors or no doors to close which makes the atmosphere different in either case. This also controls communication patterns and interactions.

7. Groups. Are there groups that form strong cliques in that only allow certain members into the inner circle? Are you a member of those cliques? Those on the inside often overlook the many people on the outside. This can have an effect on the trust levels in the business. 

These 7 quick tips can help you look for the patterns in your business that form a part of the organization culture. When you can recognize the culture, you will be able to better interact with more people and understand how to form organization change and growth strategies.

Create a Marketing Strategy that Influences the Bottom Line

Every organization that’s alive and thriving needs an effective written marketing strategy.  A marketing strategy consists of a series of ongoing activities you plan to implement over a period of time to achieve a particular goal in your business.

Planning your marketing strategy lets you know the actions you will take on a regular basis to keep your business growing. Most people think of marketing as something that is done on an occasional basis without a real plan, usually when it seems convenient. For example, you might have a Twitter or Facebook account. When you feel like it, you make a tweet or put a post on Facebook. But with a marketing strategy, you pre-plan when you’ll do these activities on a regular and consistent basis if it feels convenient or not.

By designing a marketing strategy you take your business to a whole new level of preparation. Here are 7 top tips to help you design a marketing strategy to build your business.

1. Overall Goal. Start by determining the overall goal you want to reach through a marketing program. Do you intend to increase visitors to your website or storefront? Do you want to increase the amount of programs or services you promote? Do you want to increase the income for your business? Do you want to do all of these things?

2. Select the time period. Over what period of time will you pursue these goals? Designing a year-long marketing strategy gives you a good period of time to create a plan of action. It gives you time to develop consistency in placing your business name in front of the public which will only build your business.

3. The Target Market. A specific target market is needed to effectively design a message that speaks directly to the heart and mind of your consumer base. If you don’t know who you’re marketing to you waste time, money and effort trying to promote to everybody which is an impossible task in business.

4. The Message. With the target market identified you can create a marketing message that makes them pay attention to your business. Design an overarching slogan or theme for your marketing program that enhances your brand and places you in a positive position in the mind of the target consumer.

5. Chart Your Path. Get a calendar for the year and chart out the important marketing activities that you will do on a regular basis each day, each week and each month. Be consistent with these regular activities. This can include writing and publishing a weekly web article or posting to your blog and social networking sites on a daily basis.

6. List Periodic Activities. Next identify the activities you will do periodically such as once each quarter, twice a year or annually. These could include a special live or Internet based event, getting published in a newsletter or online ezine of a joint venture partner or writing an article for a magazine.

7. Chart Special Opportunities. Find opportunities that offer special opportunities to promote your business. For example, will you purchase a booth at a women’s conference, be a speaker at a networking group, or offer a door-prize for a school fundraiser? These opportunities might come up only on special occasions or be annual events you decide to participate in during this marketing year. Chart these on your marketing strategy plan.

This is a simplistic way to get started on a marketing strategy. You can see that it gives you more than one way to do your marketing. It also means you have to sit down, think things through ahead of time, and plan a whole year’s worth of activities. You won’t be caught off guard about marketing activities. You’ll also start to develop an ongoing presence with your target group which helps to build trust while building your business.

The Focused Mind of the Innovative Organization Leader

Why is focusing on one project at time so hard to do? I am thoroughly convinced that business and organization professionals have some of the most highly creative minds around and highly creative minds just can’t help having ideas pop into their heads. Invited or not, you’re going to get wonderful exciting ideas that just won’t go away.

Ideas jump in your head as you walk down the street or drive to the store. That’s because the process of creativity happens when you see something mundane and combine that with something else. It can be combining two mundane things or something you do everything with a new twist.

That’s what business innovators do – they create new potential income generating ideas. But to get anything completed and to the target market you have to be focused. Focus on one idea and take it to fruition. That’s how to reach goals and be prosperous.

A major reason why so many small, independent service operations fail is because of a lack of completion in product and service development. You have to have something to offer clients. Jumping from one idea to the next leaves everything half done.

Remember your other ideas by filing them away in a safe place. That way they won’t distract you as you pursue your present course of action. Think of these ideas as something great whose time hasn’t come yet. As tough as it can be, learn to focus, set incremental steps to completion and finish what you start. Focus, focus, focus is the key to reaching goals.

Why Change can Be a Boomer's Best Friend

So, what do you want to do with your life?  Remember when you were asked that question as a youth?  You actually probably had something you really thought was a good idea but probably not the idea others envisioned for you.  So you stuffed it away and did the work that made others happy.

Now you’re facing life and professional changes.  Even if you’re still gainfully employed the idea of starting your own business or pursuing that long-lost idea still nags at you.  If you’re alive and breathing it’s never too late to try something new. Change can be your best friend when you take steps to make it work for you.  Here are a few ideas to start your thinking process.

1.  You have the experience to be a coach, consultant or mentor to others

You already have what you need to be a Coach, Consultant or Mentor. If you’ve been working for someone else all these years, you will need to restructure your way of thinking about business. Striking out on your own doesn’t have to be frightening, expensive, or the huge risk you often read about.  What you need is knowledge of what you have that others want and a system and method to get that information to them.

2. Understand the basics of running a business.

With that said you still have to understand how to get a business set up and operating.   If you have no job at this time, you will need to have enough money to get going for at least the first six months as you get started. You might have money saved up from years of working or you might not. You don’t want to run up a lot of new debt as you get started in your business.  So select a business model that doesn’t take a lot of start up money.

3. Inventory what you already have to get started

You can control start up costs by using what you already have to get started.  Something like a Coaching or Consulting business is not that expensive to start. Other businesses can be started on a shoe-string budget. Look around the house and see where you can clear some space for a home office.  Do you already have a computer, file storage, office supplies?  These are some of the basic items you need to do work in this modern age.

4. Inventory your skills and talents

Do a skills inventory by thinking of all of your previous work experiences. Recall what you’ve done and learned over the years to be a success in the workplace.  Consider all of the special assignments and training programs you’ve completed.  Make a list of these skills and start looking at these skills in new ways, combining different skills to deliver unique services.  For instance if you’re good at technology and love to write, work with developing writing skills and electronic information products.

5, Don’t stop dreaming with the obvious

Don’t stop with looking at what you’ve already done.  Think about what you’ve always dreamed about doing too.  It’s time to really go for your dreams.  Think of it as a “now or never” time in your life.   

Once you think about what you can do, which will be a long list when you know how to look at your skills and talents, you will be on your way to finding how to be a successful independent service provider to others. Facing change at this stage in life can be a Boomer’s best friend when you harness that change for your good.

Business Creativity: Keeping Change Fresh

The world always needs new ideas.  Nothing in the world is completed to a final state.  It can’t be, because the world is constantly changing.  People are active, quickly bored, restless, and eager for change. 

It’s no surprise that material objects are invented to become obsolete very quickly, forcing people to get new things.  Look at the video world.  People are being forced to update their home technology.  From video and VCR’s to DVD’s and more. Now you can download movies and watch them on pocket sized devices on in the back seat of a vehicle on long drive.

If you have the money readily available or not, it’s necessary to keep up with rapid creative changes because certain products will be taken off the market.  Items that are still useful and barely used become old fashioned or obsolete. This makes room for new and different things to be purchased. It happens all the time.  

A business that produces new ideas is the one that will potentially remain profitable over the years. Coming up with new ideas, new ways to present products or services, or just a new gadget, will keep you ahead of other businesses in the marketplace.    

Many business people seem to have lost their ability to be creative.  Instead of being innovative and creating something new, they find something being done and copy it.  With the Internet, it is not surprising to find a lot of the same information being spread around. 

Have you ever purchased something on the web based on the fabulous copy in the sales letter that promised that you would gain the latest and best information possible through that product?  After buying it, did you find it to be the same ebook or product you had already purchased, only with a new name on it?  

This happened to a client not long ago. He purchased a CD of a teleclass on a particular topic. One of the promised bonuses was an “exclusive eBook” with all of the secrets for getting this new business idea up and running. As soon as he started to print the eBook it looked familiar. In fact, it was the same eBook he had purchased before and found disappointing.

All that was changed was the title.  All the purchase did was change his mind about the integrity and expertise of the self-proclaimed guru that had sold it.   

No one wants to just get a poor imitation of something they’ve already experience because of a lack of creativity in business. It doesn’t take genius status to come up with new ideas and to be creative.  Ideas are everywhere.  Be creative and make your business stand out from the crowd. Creative requires using what is familiar in new and innovative ways as you think differently about what you already know.   

Creativity will always be needed and welcomed. Grow your business by developing a reputation of being on the cutting-edge of creativity in a world that can’t stop that changes and wouldn’t be as fun and exciting without them anyways.

How to Notice Emerging Changes

It’s always interesting to hear people discuss the question “How do we manage change?”  As an organizational specialist, change presents a constant concern. Even when I’m training organization executives and managers, the question of change brings up the idea that change is often something that suddenly is out of hand and uncontrollable.

Here’s the business and organization reality; change is a part of growth in organizations and in life.  In fact, change is happening on a constant basis.  You can find ways to measure this change so it doesn’t happen by surprise.  In fact, it seems that the lack of forecasting some rather obvious changes by leaders in major US corporations is what resulted in a lot of our current economic crisis – but I digress.

Here are a few basic concepts to know about change and change management.

• The first concept is that organizations are “open systems.”  That means they are a part of the world around them and they are open to the influences of the world around them. Recognizing changes for organizations means staying aware of what’s happening outside as well as inside of the organization.
• An open system is influenced by both internal and external forces.  Internal forces can be controlled from within the organization while external forces effect the organization but these can’t be controlled by the organization. 
• Internal forces that affect any organization include its products or service lines, leadership and management structures, policies and procedures, human resources, marketing strategies, and operations.  These are directly controlled by organization leadership and should be influenced by external changes.
• Some external forces include the political, economic, financial educational, societal changes that directly affect the organization’s industry, location, product, people and stakeholders.
• Both internal and external forces can be watched and monitored in order to predict to the best of the organization leaders ability, the impacts any changes in these forces will have on the organization.  For instance, if politicians change a law that directly affects how your industry exchanges goods and services, this will change internal operations of the organization.  If prices of gas and oil increase and the income levels of people who purchase cars remains relatively the same, the car industry would need to make adjustments to respond to the needs and economic situation of the buying market.
• All parts of a system must work in harmony for greatest effectiveness.  Change often goes array in organizations because the effects of that change on various departments is often overlooked.  In other words, change in one area of the organization has a ripple effect on other areas.  Say for instance, marketing decides that products need to be shipped faster in order to increase customer service. The marketing department creates marketing materials promising faster shipping. However, the shipping department is the ones that have to make the faster shipping happen. They need to inform the marketing department about whether or not faster shipping is possible. This means also looking at the production department to see if products are available faster on a regular basis. It also includes accounting and of course human resources. In other words, every part of the organization system must get involved in a change for it to be effective.
• Society influences changes in the desires of your target market. It is important to watch how society is influencing the buying habits of people in your target market group. While your company provides a particular type of product or service you have to be sure you’re relating in a contemporary manner to the rapidly changing ideas of what’s in or out for your target market group. For instance, if you target young people, you’ll have to constantly change your inventory to keep up with their changing interests.  Some companies fail to make change quickly enough at price points that fit the buying ability of their target group.
• Keep your finger on the pulse point of the consumer market.  In other words, keep looking outward in order to bring new ideas inward.  Hold focus group meetings of people in your target market or let consumers ‘touch” your products.  Companies that set up stations that allow people to try their products have a way to conduct real time research by watching reactions and seeing what keeps people coming back. Even in highly self service industries, company sales people can be trained to ask more questions about buying interests and what the consumer wants. Collect this data to recognize coming changes you need to meet.

Change is going to happen because the world will never stand still.  Setting up systems to collect information is an important and basically simple way to stay informed of coming changes. Awareness for change takes place at all levels of the organization. You can move from simple data collection and awareness systems to more complex forms of forecasting to be sure you are controlling change instead of it controlling you.

Signs You’re Facing Change in the New Year

Are you feeling in a rut lately?  Maybe you seem to be “going in circles” trying to reach goals that never seem to materialize? 

There are times in life when making a change is the only thing that can put you back on a path towards success.  The beginning of a New Year is the best time to do a quick assessment of what might be holding you back so you can determine if it’s time to make changes in your life or business.  

Go through this brief list and see how many areas you relate too.  Then see if working on change in your life or business should be on your “to-do” list for 2010? 

Check all that apply to you:  

__ Can’t seem to reach intended goals

__ Feel confused or stuck

__ Never seem to get out of a rut

__ Have the possibility of financial failure

__ Facing possible business failure

__ Have issues with bad habits

__ Difficulty managing stress

__ Stress is affecting your health, thought, abilities

__ Continue to try ideas that don’t succeed

__ Don’t feel good about personal issues

__ Dealing with professional issues you can’t overcome

__ Feel stifled in expressing your thoughts

__ Creativity has gotten bottled up

__ Can’t seem to finish what you start

__ Feel unhealthy, sluggish, depressed

__ Lack confidence in personal or professional abilities

__ Unable to identify, present and future potential

__ Live “in the past” and can’t move forward

__ Need to change business tactics but don’t know how

__ Need to hire different people but don’t know whom

__ Have problems with employees

__ Can’t seem to communicate effectively

__ Need to try something new but can’t figure out what that is

__ Keep doing the same things with the same results

__ Don’t know how to start a new project

__ Total Checked?

How did you do?  If you checked any of the points, you probably need to do something to get moving in your life or business.    

If you’ve been working on the same goals for years, perhaps these are not the correct ones for you?  Interests change as you become more aware of new ideas and possibilities.  If your business is lagging, could it be that the interests and needs of your target market have shifted and you haven’t changed the business to keep up?   

When you are too close to an issue it can be difficult to see where change is needed.  Step back for a while, take a rest and get a new perspective.  Try Change Success Coaching or have a long talk with a business partner you trust. 

Decide to to make Change Management a goal this year and make 2010 the year to embrace changes that move you forward and let go of old ideas that hold you behind.