We love setting goals. We even love dreaming and talking about accomplishing big things in our lives and in our business. But how do we track them and ensure that they aren’t just talk?We asked members of the Young Entrepreneur Council to share their best tips, hacks and strategies to set and achieve their goals.
The Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC) is an invite-only organization comprised of the world’s most promising young entrepreneurs. In partnership with Citi, YEC recently launched BusinessCollective, a free virtual mentorship program that helps millions of entrepreneurs start and grow businesses.
1. Use Align
This application is incredibly useful for companies to track goals and steps taken in order to reach those goals. You can assign specific people to smaller daily, weekly or monthly tasks that all work towards achieving one overall goal. At Cyberclick’s weekly meeting, we pull up the application and highlight all of the progress and remaining work.
– David Tomas, Cyberclick
2. Create a Dashboard
At AquaMobile, we have a dashboard that gets updated on a weekly basis. We created this dashboard ourselves using a Google Sheets file so that we could customize and continually update our most important metrics. It allows us to have all of our key metrics in one place and compare them to past periods or to any goals we may have set.
– Diana Goodwin, AquaMobile Swim School
3. Have a Slack Channel
We created an internal Slack channel called “Checkpoints.” Our team updates the channel with what they have done the previous day. While our management team doesn’t review this daily, when we do our weekly Monday meeting it’s a great way to weigh whether the person accomplished their goals the previous week. It’s amazing how much daily accountability helps to drive people forward.
– Aaron Schwartz, Modify
4. Set Recurring Calendar Events
In my calendar, there are time blocks associated with my goal tracking, so that goal tracking and analysis is blocked off. Since I use a calendar tool, no one can take that time. I also put my actual goals at the top of my to-do list in Asana (our project management tool), so that they are in a place I access every day. I can’t avoid them this way, even if I wanted to.
– Anshey Bhatia, Verbal+Visual
5. Use Trello Lists
Trello lists are a quick and easy way to manage your immediate, short and midrange goals. The fact that they cascade next to each other also helps you see the connection and progression of these goals. You can see how a daily goal serves a weekly goal, and how that weekly goal serves a monthly goal. Trello helps you write your goals down and helps you see how your vision will unfold.
– Andrew Thomas, SkyBell Video Doorbell
6. Practice Weekly Sprints
At the beginning of the week, each member of our team writes out their goals or projects they have to complete for the week. At the end of every day, they dedicate some time to review what they accomplished and if anything unexpected came up. Finally at the end of the week, they are able to track what was accomplished and what needs more time. It’s a simple and effective way of staying on track.
–Christopher Swenor, East Coast Product
7. Use Nozbe
Nozbe has been around for a few years, helping with goal tracking and progress. But it has enhanced its features with greater productivity, mobility, and collaborative features to improve the goal-tracking process. It also allows our team to share our goals with each other to see where we can help or just assist with encouragement.
– Murray Newlands, Due.com
8. Look at the Big Picture
Mindful, big-picture goal setting is the foundation of any successful venture. In order for me to track my daily, weekly, and monthly goals efficiently, I always take a step back and reflect on the big-picture goal to understand what exactly it is we are trying to achieve. If my short-term goals align with my big picture goal, then I know I’m on the path to success.
– Anthony Pezzotti, Knowzo.com
9. Keep an Old School Notebook
Before my work day starts, I list in my left-hand column the one-to-three important things I need to do, and on the right-hand column, my meetings. Throughout the day, I’ll cross them out as I complete them and make small annotations if there’s anything I need to follow up on. I personally find the act of writing helps me think, and crossing things off keeps me going.
– Fan Bi, Blank Label
10. Leave It to JIRA
We’ve used JIRA for years for software and business development, but have recently started using personal boards to track goals and tasks for critical team members. This has led to more accountability, a more tangible way to track team successes, and a way for all of us to see what each individual has on their plate so we don’t inadvertently inundate our team with more tasks.
– Nathan Hale, First American Merchant
11. Use a Pass/Fail Scoreboard
Each quarter, my partner and I meet to define our big-picture goals for the three months ahead. Then, we set up a Google Doc “scoreboard” spreadsheet based around the weekly must-dos that drive toward those goals. Each week, we can either “pass” by completing all the weekly must-dos or “fail” when we don’t complete them. It totally keeps us on track.
– Alyssa Conrardy, Prosper Strategies
Originally posted April 26, 2016 on Ambitious.
