The ‘make it happen’ list

Having a list is very satisfying – but it doesn’t make anything happen! You need to take each goal and break it down into things to do that will get you a step towards your goal:

Goal: holiday in Egypt

• To do – visit travel agents in town and get brochures
  • get family together and look at brochures
  • do an Internet search on Egypt
  • find out what family members want to do individually
  • talk to Fred and Barbara about their Nile Cruise (last year)
  • check (Internet? Travel agent?) climate, temperature, rainy season, etc.
  • check (doctor, Internet) jabs required
  • agree holiday choice with family
  • book and pay deposit
  • put away agreed amount from pay each month
  • pay balance
  • make a list of clothes, accessories, additional luggage needed
  • budget for purchases before leaving
  • get travellers cheques in appropriate currency
  • check passports are valid
  • arrange lift to airport and collection on return
  • create a packing list (check it as you pack)
  • check departure terminal (and return) and check-in time
  • go!

This sort of list has a couple of things missing – times/ dates and who will do what. If it’s on a piece of paper somewhere it’s easy to mislay it. It’s also likely that you might assume that one person would do one of the tasks, only to discover – too late – that the person thought someone else was doing it.

Assign deadlines and responsibilities. If several people are involved in getting a result, get them to put their own tasks into their diaries or personal organizers entered on the day they plan to do it.

If you are writing an action plan for your own goals, by all means make a master list of all the things to be done, but ensure you assign a date to complete and put this in your diary. You may have several small tasks to do over a period of time, but they are likely to take anything between a couple of minutes and an hour each – which is not overwhelming. This means there is much more chance of you arriving at your final achievement

deadline with a successful outcome – rather than crying, ‘But I just didn’t have the 30 hours it needed to do all this!’

This type of forward planning is essential for you as a manager – if you can get your staff doing it as well, your life will be so much easier.

This type of action planning is a habit – if you start doing this with all the things that you have to achieve, you’ll find it makes life much easier and gets you consistent results. Encourage your team to do it as well and they will surprise you with their increased success.