by Dr. R. Kay Green | Featured Contributor
In the last few weeks of 2018, it is important to relax and celebrate. Take time to be with those close to you, and be proud of everything you achieved over the past year.
That said, there are still some things you can do to ensure that, when January 1 rolls around, you will be in the right frame of mind to “hit the ground running,” setting yourself up for success in 2019.
So set aside time in these last few weeks to look back on your year with a more critical eye, and look forward into the coming year with a planning mindset. Hopefully, you have already developed and written down your goals for 2019, and you have a clear plan for what you are going to do.
Now, as the year draws to a close, it is time to get in the right mindset to make 2019 a productive year of growth and achievement.
Focus.
What do you want your year to be?
Before 2019 even begins, make a decision. Have a primary objective that you can go back to when you are confused or unsure about your direction. Distill this down into a mantra. A phrase is acceptable, but maybe it is as simple as one word. Growth. Connection. Service. All of these things are worthy things to strive towards.
Write this simple word or phrase down somewhere where you can see it when you return to work. This way, you can be sure that you will start off your year with the right intentions.
And if you ever feel lost or unsure of what the next step you should take is, or if you are presented with a new opportunity, you will not have to consult a complicated list or process to figure out where it all fits. Instead, you will be able to take a look at your mantra, and evaluate accordingly.
But the evaluation does not have to wait until 2019. In fact, you should be evaluating the goals that you have already drafted, keeping to this simple mindset.
Evaluate.
You have your goals ready and laid out. But do you know why you have them?
Goals are not useful if they are not helping you to reach something. So look over the goals that you have drafted for this year. Are they really going to help you best live the mantra that you created? Or are they just fluff, there to make you feel good about checking something off of a list?
Not every goal that you have written down needs to be directly related to your mantra, necessarily. Even if your goal is as simple as “exercise every day,” this can be related to a number of goals, because we perform our best when we are healthy. But it should be at least tangentially related.
At the end of the day, you should be able to look at a goal and say, “I know why I am doing this.” If you cannot do that, then your energy would probably be better spent pursuing other goals, ones that have a better effect on the kind of entrepreneur that you want to be.
Organize.
Your 2018 might have been stressful. You might have let certain organizational tasks fall behind on particularly difficult weeks or months. And once you did that, they were probably difficult to pick back up.
But these last few weeks are a good time to step back and evaluate. Which organizational tactics were dropped because of stress, and which ones were dropped because they just did not work for you? How can you make it so that those essential ones are not dropped again, and how can you replace the ones that did not service you?
Use these last few weeks to clean up anything that you have been putting off. Take care of those non-essential, deadline-less tasks. Prepare your schedule for the next few weeks.
By doing all of this, you can ensure that you start off 2019 with a fresh slate, ready to be filled with accomplishments.
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Dr. R. Kay Green – Marketing Expert from RKG Marketing Solutions Inc. from Atlanta, GA.
Dr. R. Kay Green is the CEO/President of RKG Marketing Solutions Inc. With over 190,000+ Twitter followers, 35,000+ Facebook Likes, and the Top 1% LinkedIn profile designation, Dr. Kay, a self-motivated trailblazer, is the Quintessential “New-Age” Professional Woman, and PhD Marketing Pro. She earned a Doctorate of Business Administration in Marketing, and has completed PhD coursework in Leadership and Organization Change. She also holds a Master of Business Administration in Marketing and Management, a Bachelor of Business Administration in Marketing, and an Associate of Arts in Marketing Management.
She is affiliated with several prestigious universities and has instructed over 350 courses online. A popular speaker on Marketing and Business topics, Dr. Green is currently featured on Huffington Post, Black Enterprise, Black News, The Network Journal, Business Review USA, Digital Journal, College View, Business New Hampshire Magazine, Bay State Banner, Reader’s Circle, North Dallas Gazette, Harlem News, Top News Today, One News Page, NE Informer, Women in Business PR News, Consumer News Today, Women PR News, San Francisco Chronicle, Houston Chronicle, Chicago Daily Herald, The Miami Herald, and Book News Articles.
