How to achieve your big, hairy audacious goals

How to achieve your big, hairy audacious goals

The 3 critical things you need to do to set and achieve your goals

by Hunter Leonard – CEO, Consigli8

The term BIG HAIRY AUDACIOUS GOAL was originally coined by Jim Collins and Jerry Porras in their book Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies which was first published in 1994. 

Collins is quoted as saying, “The power of the BHAG is that it gets you out of thinking too small.”

I love this quirky and slightly weird term, however, in my experience it isn’t that people have a problem with thinking small. 

More often than not, people have big dreams, but they don’t know how to achieve them. Or they don’t want to do the work involved in working towards a big goal. 

The media has a lot to answer for when it comes to pushing the idea of a magic bullet, or instant riches. 

The truth is that many more people achieve their goals in life and business through blood, sweat and tears. The key question is where and when should you sweat, when is it ok to spill some blood and is it ok to cry or not?

That is the mystery I’d like to help you solve in this article. 

The setting and achieving of goals is in fact going to be the topic for a semi-regular webinar run by the Finwell Group, and I’m delighted to have the opportunity to help YOU with your goals.

By way of background, I’m a business owner and best selling published author of 10 books – the most recent being Red Giraffe, which is all about the art and science of setting and achieving your goals. 

I’ve collected a series of tools, tips and advice together in this book. The same tools and tips I’ve used myself to write 10 books, to learn how to play the guitar, and to help five hundred clients in our business achieve a combined revenue growth of more than $2billion dollars over the last two decades.

There really is no mystery to setting and achieving goals, and there are three key things I’d like to share with you today:

1. Frame the goal in detail – I find it very useful to write down my goal with all the detail you’d see if you were standing in the middle of the celebration of achieving it. What the environment looks like, what your bank balance looks like, and what sounds can you hear? and what does it smell like? – the trick here is to make the goal as real as possible so that you can recognise it when you see it. For example, don’t just say we want more clients and to double our revenue. Say – ‘our office is full of activity, we have a full warehouse, and orders are being packed every few minutes. I can hear champagne corks popping, the team is happy and productive, the phones are ringing and on our milestone board is the figure of $2 million dollars in revenue with stars written all around it.’ I think you can see the different in these two statements where one has a lot more descriptive detail about the environment.
2. Honestly assess your current situation  – once you set your goal, you’ll be in a position to honestly assess where you are at now. In the picture described above, there are certain elements that you can compare to today. No champagne corks, no noise and buzz, a half-full warehouse, angry clients, quiet staff and $500,000 written on the board in red with no stars. It is important to frame both the current situation and what you want your environment to look like when the goal is achieved. I like to say to clients that you can now play ‘spot the difference’ and if you’ve written the goal right, then the elements you’ve described can also become measures of your progress towards your goal.
3. Journey of 1000 steps – the final tip of the three I’d like to share today is the journey. This is where many people get unstuck on their journey towards their goals. They are busy and have a long to do list, but they don’t know how to align the priorities to their overall goal. The trick here is to break down all the elements of your goal into 1000 pieces(or whatever number makes sense to you). For example if $1million in revenue means 1000 clients at $1000 each in your business, then you had better break this down to say 20 clients a week, and track progress in small increments. If for each new client, you need 10 leads, then 200 leads a week is the tracking measure for you. If delivering fifty of your service needs four staff and you have only two, then the number of well-recruited, trained and productive staff is another measure. Done right, you should be able to break down every single activity you need to do in order to achieve your goal, and then only put the important stuff on your daily and weekly and monthly activity plan. 

If you can’t work out what activities contribute and where to focus, then you will never reach your goal or you will waste time and money achieving it.

In my upcoming book Red Giraffe, I share dozens of other tips, tools and advice on the topic of setting and achieving goals. 

Anyone can achieve their goals if they are willing to frame the goal, be honest with their current situation, and then do the exact things that contribute to the goal on a daily, weekly and monthly basis. 

I wish you the best on your journey to the summit and to your dreams and goals. 

For more information on our business consulting and Consigli8 – please visit https://www.consigli8.com/ or email info@consigli8.com and ask about our Introductory Diagnostic Service that will save you hundred’s of hours and thousands of dollars working out what to do next in your business.