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A Passion For Results Blog

We are also now writing regular articles via our blog. Please check the blog for our latest ideas. more>>

Lag Goals vs Lead Actions and SMART

We all have Goals right? And for most of us we know what those Goals are, and we will have even made them SMART – right? (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timely).
So why in a lot of cases do our Goals fail to get achieved?
I think the reason is that we are focusing on setting SMART Goals instead of SMART Actions to achieve the Goal. Our focus is on what I would call ‘Lag Goals’.
So what do I mean by ‘Lag Goals’?
These are Goals that happen after the actions have been done to bring them about, let me give you some examples: more>>

Narrow The Focus To Increase Productivity

Only by narrowing the volume of deliverables on the horizon can we ensure that what we focus on gets done. It’s like having a laser focus to cut through our workload and achieve our meaningful goals.
Recently I was working with a mid-level manager and she was frustrated by the number of deadlines that she was missing or, if she delivered on time, the quality was not what she wanted. As we delved deeper we found that she had very little or no focus on what she worked on, she was busy but not productive, she was constantly being driven by the reactive deadlines. The problem she had was that she was trying to deliver on too much and as a result her attention was spread too thin. more>>

When We Send Our Email In Haste!!!

Welcome to 2016....it is hard to believe that we are already a month into the year it seems that the older I get the quicker time flies by....in this month's e@rticle I would like to look at an issue that has bugged me in the past. I don't know about you but have you ever hit that send button only to realise with that horrible sinking feeling that you should not have done
that? The "OH MY GOD" moment!!! The "BUGGER IT" moment!!! I'm sure you know what I mean, if only we could call the email back some way. You could try and recall it but that doesn't stop it from being sent and only requests that it be recalled, so not much use I'm afraid. more>>

Urgency vs Importance - How Do You Prioritise?

When I ask people how important is it to prioritise our work most will say -
“Very Important”
Yet when I ask how do they prioritise most will say that it is based on urgency, who is yelling the loudest, who is applying the most pressure or which deadline is looming the largest. When we prioritise like this the work is telling us what to do and we are responding to the demands of others and their priorities and deadlines.
How did we learn to prioritise
Most of us learnt to prioritise at a young age back at school. more>>

Hints for the organisationaly challenged

After years of teaching and coaching in personal effectiveness & time management and feeling guilty when my home office got into a mess, the penny suddenly dropped. All the personal effectiveness and time management courses, including the one I ran, assumed that I wanted to be organised, control my time, plan out my day or week ahead of time and stick to lists and schedules. One day I admitted to myself that I was more interested in “looking organised” than being organised, because of the nature of what I taught. The courses were teaching “how to” presuming that I “wanted to”. I didn’t – it was a real insight. more>>

Don't shoot the staff

A few years ago, Karen Pryor, an animal trainer turned learning consultant, wrote an
intriguing book titled “Don’t Shoot the Dog!” Karen recommends eight methods for getting rid
of unwanted behaviour in pets and people. Shooting the dog is the most drastic and it’s
permanent.
Sometimes it’s a bit the same with our staff when they just don’t seem to care about
performance the way we want them to. If, as managers, we are tired and overworked, our
thoughts may turn briefly to the possibility of firing them. Until we remember those unfair
dismissal laws. We’re caught between a rock and a hard place - too much effort to fire them
and a lot of effort to “retrain” them. more>>

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Lesequip sustrud et dio con hent iliquis ad dolesequat.Is augue conulput wis endrem do digniam commolute diam, susci blandre conse tissim dolutet, core modiat. Duisim dio et lut luptatie et dunt nosto odolorper alis eu facipit, consequissis et iure magna feuisit, more>>