Earlier this week, Michael Hyatt joined me on the podcast to talk about goal setting and I wanted to continue on that theme and lay out the importance of setting milestones in your business.
Many times, we only think of milestones as big or important events from the past. Milestones should also be pre-meditated events that occur on our way to hitting goals, finishing projects and building our businesses. They provide a frame of reference for how far we’ve come and what’s ahead.
As entrepreneurs, we have no problem finding what’s wrong in our business. It’s a lot harder to recognize what’s great and take time to recognize the people who are doing great things! Developing milestones for your business allows you to celebrate with your team. You can cast a vision and track the progress by rewarding team members for what’s accomplished along the way.
Next time you start a project, decide what the milestones will be and how you will celebrate each one. If you’re not celebrating achievements with your team, they don’t know what they’ve accomplished and are probably pretty unmotivated. Milestones will give them goals to hit and when they do, you celebrate!
Question: What’s your next big milestone and how are you going to celebrate it?
Just read this quote: “The all-or-nothing virw of life if common among perfectionists who procrastinate. A person who believes that he or she must do everything usually has difficulty accepting any progress made toward a goal: as long as the project is incomplete, it seems that nothing at all has been accomplished.”
This from the book, “Procrastination: Why You Do It, What to Do About It NOW” by Jane Burka and Lenora Yuen
I’ve been “dormant” on my business for a little while, and I’ve been working on revamoing my site and portfolio, so my next big milestone would be getting my next paying client.
We’ve not done a good job at this over the years. We recently have instituted some changes to be better about recognizing our team and the business as a whole. Our next milestone is a baby step to our future larger growth goal. We are adding in more lesson studios at our current location. We’ll be setting some goals and celebration based on the project deadline as well as filling those studios once completed.
Great advice Chris. We are celebrating our 15 year milestone this year and we are celebrating as a team. Thanks for the mentoring you give me every week.
CLo, you’ve done it again! Challenged us to step into action, not just “wannas”. My next goal is to finish setting up my Blog for professional mechanics: tips, tools, and content that will help the Extrodinary Tech to grow. Btw, one of my favorite tools for goal management is Nozby:
http://www.nozbe.com/a-jasonfancy1
( not free, but CLo’s tribe is willing to make smart investments, not just free ones!)
It helps you make sure you and your team are working SMART, not just hard. It’s worth checking out… Michael Hyatt first turned me onto it (thx Michael!) and after a few passes, I am glad I tried it.
Anyway, thx for the killer content and challenge CLo! I will update in my goal progress later.
I hear LoCurto’s has good pizza. I wonder if they’ll take a reservation for 8…
You know where I came to fully realize and appreciate her work….StratOp!!!! :) Fond memories.
Where are we going for lunch Lil?
Ahhhh the writer’s task. Always tough, but rewarding.
HAHAHA…that’s me Dan.
Thank you brother. I think you did a great one just the other day with your precious mom!
My pleasure!
I have two. One at my day job, concluding a project that has posed some challenges. I’m taking the team out to lunch. One at my business, finishing the writing on my ebook at the end of the month and moving into media design for it. I will give myself a pat on the back… ha!
A milestone is a stone that marks a mile. I LOVE simplicity!
Next big milestone is landing a long-term agreement with a big client. Celebration will be a great Mexican dinner with my awesome wife!
P.S. Where was the outtake?
John Kotter talks about one of the key steps to making change happen in an organization, is recognizing “early wins.” It is so important to be able to identify a milestone to build & keep momentum when trying to do somthing new or difficult (like keep a new years’ resolution).
My next milestone? finish writing 10 posts for my upcoming project launch: ClassicallyTrained.net – a blog & podcast about Life & Leadership Lessons learned from classic Video games.
Good word man, I need to do better at this.
Great advice, Chris. Thank you!