Monday, March 15, 2010

Stay Focused on Your Game Plan

To win any game including the game of business and life a game plan is vital. This article takes you through a process to set you up to win on a consistent basis.

The Game Plan was compiled by my colleague Jacque Small of Catalyst Business Coaching and we're sharing it with you because we believe that everyone can work easier

Download samples of the Playbook and Game Plan to follow along and create your own.

Master Your Game
It all starts with making a declaration what you are really committed to. I am committed to the game of being an internationally recognized coach and teacher. What’s your game?

In addition to a declaration, the Playbook for your game also includes:
Intention: knowing how you want feel and the experiences you want to have.
Vision: knowing where you want to go.
• Mission: what is most important to you about playing this game? What is the biggest reason that you want to achieve it?

Read on for the remaining components of an effective Playbook and for verbal insturctions and tips listen to  the March 3 Catalyst LIVE! radio show. Watch for the Focus on Your Game Plan archive to be posted on the  Catalyst Business Coaching site.

Choose which Games you are playing.
Experience has shown it’s really important to know which Games you want to be playing. Playing too many games results in being overwhelmed or not achieving desired results, and this increases stress. Being stressed is contrary to the objective of Working Easy 4 Life Balance, otherwise known as working with flow. This means have developing clarity and limiting the number of games you participate in.

Having a Game Plan
Your Goals, specific metrics for achievement and Milestones, are places along the way to check to see if you are on target. Establishing a plan for each Game is recommended. This includes a combination of specific goals and milestones used to measure progress and achievements along the way throughout the year. Each week a Milestone is set for each game you are playing. Choose what to focus on to support this game in moving forward.

Clear weekly objectives or Milestones. While checking progress against milestones each week assess whether or not the plan is working. If they’re getting completed, then carry on playing all your games. If there are consistent No’s then you need to determine what the barriers are.

Are you playing games that aren’t on the plan? Do you want add these games to the plan, or do you need to say NO more often? Do you need to cancel one of the games you are playing? Or perhaps, adjust your game to have less aggressive milestones to will allow for an experience of success on a weekly basis. If you are currently playing 4 games, you could perhaps choose to play only 3 per week. Or maybe you could do a better job by leveraging your games and play two at once.

Build energy with weekly practices.
Without energy life feels hard and the whole sense of balance seems to disappear. Like any athlete you need to practice building energy. Components of energy practice include: spiritual (quiet mind – no thinking), sleep, exercise, food and hydration. All of these components are vital to having an energetic body and focused mind that works at its optimum level of creativity.

Play the Game.
The Game for the Week lists all the actions you commit to taking in the week to achieve milestones. The key is to make actions small discrete activities that when put together accomplish milestones. Milestones without activities have no game in mind for achievement. Success for this milestone could occur through pure intention. Just don’t beat yourself up if it doesn’t come to fruition.

Post Game Review.
This is the final step. How did the week go? Were you being who you wanted to be? Did you reach your milestones? What did you learn from playing this week’s game and where might you like to adjust your game for next week or the coming weeks?
At the end of the Post Game Review, celebrate and allocate rewards for achieving my milestones and then set your plan for next week. Jacque’s reward is setting aside money to buy new golf clubs to improve her golf game. I go outside to play on my bike, skis or motorcycle! How would you like to reward yourself?

Wishing you a Masterful Game,

Quote: Planning is bringing the future into the present so that you can do something about it now. Alan Lakein, Author on Time Management