We get it. Setting short and long-term professional goals is both a motivating and daunting process. While critical in successful career development and key to reaching new heights, knowing how to achieve professional goals can be challenging without the right tools, tactics and guidance. It requires dedication, organization, ambition, and a dash of advice from leaders who have stood where you stand.
Providing one-to-one executive coaching to accelerate our members’ ability to grow strategically and overcome hurdles faster, TEC Canada Chairs have the lived experience and acquired expertise to help with those professional goals.
So we asked Vancouver, BC TEC Chair, Chris Hardwick, to reveal his tried-and-true steps to achieving career goals. As an accomplished and respected business leader, you won’t want to skip his advice.
HOW TO ACHIEVE PROFESSIONAL GOALS
1. SET SMART GOALS
Hardwick suggests that you can help focus your efforts and achieve your professional goals—even the most ambitious— if you follow the SMART goals framework. This means each career goal must be:
Specific: Detailed and unambiguous goals are your friend. Take the time and effort to define your goal clearly and be particular about your expectations.
Measurable: Find a way to measure your progress and results so you know exactly where you are on your path.
Achievable: While we’re big fans of the Big Hair Audacious Goals as they are known for stretching you beyond your comfort zone, it is critical that your goals are also realistic.
Relevant: Does this goal relate to your larger objective or purpose? Will achieving it play a role in your greater aspirations?
Timely: Give yourself a time frame. A defined target date creates a sense of urgency and fuels momentum.
2. UNDERSTAND URGENT VS. IMPORTANT
Chris Hardwick uses US President Dwight Eisenhower’s important vs. urgent matrix to efficiently stay on track in achieving professional goals and aspirations. According to Eisenhower, “what’s important is seldom urgent and what’s urgent is seldom important.”
Dr. Stephen Covey then popularized this concept in his book “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People,” categorizing day-to-day tasks in a simple grid:
Hardwick suggests that to propel you to achieve your professional goals, you should spend at least 80% of your time in the “non-urgent & important” quadrant. This is where the magic happens.
3. FIND AN ACCOUNTABILITY PARTNER
When it comes to achieving these larger-than-life career goals, a friend or family member simply won’t cut it as an accountability partner.
Throughout Hardwick’s experience as a successful business owner, entrepreneur, and executive leadership coach, he has helped many people on their adventure towards their Vision and held them accountable to their goals to achieve their dream life. Working together to develop an achievable plan, Hardwick has mastered his technique to help leaders succeed, overcome all obstacles and live a life with no regrets.
Hardwick has a few tips to work with your accountability partner to maximize results:
- Resonate with and respect them
- Schedule regular (bi-weekly or monthly) check-ins with them
- Ensure they will help measure your progress and define success
- Let them hold you accountable for missed milestones and get back on track
- Be consistent and keep moving forward
Thank you, Chris Hardwick, for your proven advice on how to achieve professional goals.
Could you benefit from Chris helping your company grow, together? There is limited availability in his upcoming TEC Inside for Emerging Leaders group – strategically designed for organizations that want to promote accelerated growth as a team and develop their key department executives.
Click HERE to connect with Chris and begin to leverage your organization’s core strengths and individual talents to get from where you are now to where you want to be as a company.
