If one wants to achieve success, it is necessary to plan and to be organized. This is true no matter what you are hoping to do. There are basic questions and steps that need to be taken as you embark on a new endeavour and from time to time as you are on the pathway towards success.
Often we take on new challenges without a clear plan of action in place, just a lot of excitement about this “new idea.” We just start and trust everything will fall into place. Unfortunately, it can be another kind of falling into place – you falling into failure and discouragement! Organization leads to success! This article will focus on bringing success to something you have already been doing. However, the questions you ask yourself are also important when launching a new project or dream as you organize for success.
1. Assess what you have been using and doing to fulfil your goals. Is it working? If not, is it the resources you are using. Is it you? Perhaps you have been just too busy with a new baby or family crises and your dreams have been on hold for a while. Or, it might be that you have had no clearly defined goal or goals.
2. An important step in the principle of “organization leads to success,” is to take the time to lay out your goals and objectives for the short term (a few weeks or months), in the medium range (perhaps a year), and in the distant future. I recommend writing these goals down so you can have a defined target and as a tool to measure your progress. Sometimes you have actually accomplished a lot more or a lot less than your memory realizes.
3. Keep it simple. It is so easy to end up with boxes and filing cabinet drawers and a full computer hard-drive of “stuff” you never use. Choose resources that will aid you in achieving your goals. For getting started or adding something new ask:
a) do really I need it?
b) do I have time to use it?
c) does it fit my style and personality?
d) will it help me reach my goal?
Don’t ask, “can I afford it,” because if God leads you to pursue a goal, or to use something in particular, somehow you will come up with the money for it. What appears expensive is often cheaper in the long run. Much of what I use is actually very inexpensive and plainly packaged but wow – it’s dynamite for ease of use and quality of results! Look at the contents, not just the packaging. Also, beware of emotional marketing hype. Do some research and determine if the success being promised is actually being realized by someone else and not just the seller who might be lining his/her pockets on your desperation!!
Choose tools and approaches that reflect your needs, personality and schedule. For instance, I am presently engaged in studies to become an ordained minister and have been encouraged to take my training through classes involving lectures and class discussion. Excellent for some students – just not for me. I am very hard of hearing and even with hearing aids I miss a lot. I run a business, am a pastor’s wife, and have significant health issues so my schedule does not allow me to attend classes at conventional class times a couple of hours drive away. So, I enrolled in an online program where I can download to paper or read off the screen my assignments, have “class discussion” on a bulletin board, and can do my work between midnight and any hour of the night if it is most convenient for me – which it often is. Do what you need to do!
4. Add only one new resource at a time, or make one change at a time. This allows you the time to learn how to use the resource you have purchased or to make adjustments to your schedule or mind set. Start small and add as you go along or as your circumstances change.
Next week I will give you the next six points in organizing for success. Until then, take the time to ask yourself those questions given in the points given above. Write yourself some notes so that you will be ready to implement the next steps. For those of you who can’t think of any goals – If not, why not? Think about it!!
This is Maxine here, signing off until next week when Part 2 will be given.
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By: ©February 2008, updated and expanded April 2010, Maxine McLellan, author, motivational speaker, owner of JOY Center of Learning in Ontario, Canada.
Recommended Resources available from JOY Center of Learning, http://www.joycenter.on.ca
• Family Buried Alive. . .Help on the Way! – a practical and humorous guide to getting your home, schedule and family organized.
• Organizing for Success Charts – charts for organizing your home maintenance, schedule, homeschooling, packing lists for trips – all reproducible and can be personalized
Tags: file box, filing cabinets, goals, organization, organizing, plan of action, success