better business blog

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Welcome to 2013

6 January 2013

Yes, yes I know that this year is now firmly under sail and pulling out of the harbour and into the clear waters of January. However, it’s never too late to take a quick check of the sails and the ropes and the hatches and other saily-boaty-nautical terms (of which I am ignorant) and make sure we have the right charts and a nice sharp pencil to draw a line on them indicating our direction of travel.

January is one of those months that always seems to float past at a surprising rate of knots and then before you know it, it’s mid-Feb and the first quarter is halfway done.

Therefore, it makes good sense to take a time-out from the back-to-work and back-to-school rush and pause and sit and think. Think about where you wish to end up by the end of December 2013.

And then write it all down and keep your goals in sight. Simply sharing them with a friend is not good enough. You need to make a pencil mark on your chart of life and keep it in sight.

If you don’t, you run the risk of simply sailing round the Isle of Wight for a year and where would that take you?

I have a tiny sticky-note on my desk with the 7 goals I have for 2013. I’ve even put them in order of completion so I can tick them off as I go. The first one is to submit the manuscript for Riding the Rocket on 1st March. R-t-R will be a great little book about modern career management. A must for all of us! I have 6 weeks to write it and 1 to edit it. No pressure. It’s only 40,000 words…

So, my question is this: What’s your first goal for this year and where have you placed the list of all your 2013 goals?

Sticky-notes ahoy! Happy sailing!