Goals Do Not Guarantee Success

“Everybody wants to be somebody; nobody wants to grow.” - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

I think Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was talking about goal-setting when he came up with the quote above. I used to be a goal setting junkie for a very long, long time. I used to equate goal setting with success. Some would say I was addicted to setting goals. I lived under the impression that setting goals meant you have succeeded until I discovered this uncomfortable truth.

You Don't Control Your Outcomes, Learning and Growth Does

We have been told time and time again that goal setting is an essential tool for achieving success in our lives. That's true. But what we are not always told by goal setting experts is that goals themselves do not change anything.

The most important thing when it comes to getting the outcomes you want is not so much your goals, but the learning and growth process that happens after the goals are set. Unfortunately, many people are not willing to go through that learning and growth process, and as a result remain stuck in frustration and disappointment.

If you’re a small business owner, I'm sure you've a lot of desired outcomes for your business. Whether it's increased retention rates, improved acquisition rates, increased revenue, increased profitability, increased word of mouth, increased conversion, and more upsell and cross-sell opportunities. I can go on and on. But the questions I've for you are: Are you learning any new marketing methods to help you achieve these outcomes? Are you investing any resources into trying new ideas?

How much you learn as a business is much more important than how many goals you set for yourself. By learning and growth, I am referring to the daily rituals, habits, and activities that support your goals.

Goal setting in itself doesn’t give you success, it is a tool only. Goal setting should be used to support your learning journey, so you can create the right conditions for the outcomes you want.

I have discovered that having a system is far more important than setting goals. Because results are created through action, not goals. Successful people are system-oriented, not goal-oriented; they commit to the process, not goals.

A system can be as simple as waking up at 5 am every morning and setting aside 2 hours to work on your business before you check your emails and start your daily routines of running your business.

For example, setting a goal to write a book is great, but that goal does not change anything unless you create a system to ensure that you write a book. It is the process of writing that actually makes you a writer.

Maybe one of your outcomes is to have a bigger audience for your products or services. How much do you know about your audience and their needs? What are you doing everyday to meet those needs and empower your audience to succeed? Goals are just the beginning of a long process of answering these questions. If you are not learning, growing, changing, innovating, and adapting, you're in trouble.

In my own business, I've stopped trying to set goals for everything I need and I believe you should do the same too. For example, if you want to improve your customer service, you probably don’t need to set any customer service goals. Just be human and treat your customers well. Learn about what makes your customers happy and commit to doing it if you can. Improving customer service is something you just do. You don’t necessarily need to set goals to get it done. I know a lot businesses that have a long list of customer service goals, but their customer service sucks because they've never taken the time to learn about what really makes their customers happy. I don't care about your goals. I care about your actions.

So, in this coming year, I encourage you to go beyond just setting goals and start creating a system to move you closer to those goals. For example, if your goal is to increase your sales by 10% next year, your system could include cold calling 5 new clients every week, blogging twice a week or running a social media campaign every 3 months. Systems are not difficult to set up, they just require consistency, discipline, and clarity of purpose.

As for me, I no longer worry about big life changing goals, I now focus more on the daily process of learning and growing – the process of living. As a result, I am enjoying the present moment more and my productivity and performance has also improved significantly.

You have to go beyond goals and understand what you're really aiming for, the outcome that you're trying to achieve, and create the right conditions for its attainment. It's not enough to just pursue goals.

If you are ready for more in your career and in your life and want help finding out who you truly are, what you want and how you’ll get there, book a free consultation call with me. I promise, you’ll feel better after our call. You’ll know how it feels to build your career differently and pursue the right goals. You’ll stop wasting your time on people who don’t value you or people you can’t make a difference to.