Last week’s post seemed to be really well received (thanks for all the kind comments), so I thought I’d follow up with a part 2 focused on the implementation of your goals.
First a quick summary of week 3. Alongside wrapping up my own goal planning work, there was a big focus on optimising occupancy across our existing SA portfolio. As many of you know, January is never the kindest month in the SA industry so even more reason to dig deep. We took a 3 pronged approach:
1) Do what we can to optimise presence on OTA’s (from tweaking pricing, to adding any new through our kigo channel manager);
2) Go back through all past guests and companies that could potentially book again and make contact
3) Explore brand new avenues in our areas ie any sources that may attract people to our local area that we haven’t spoken to yet
Whilst we know some of these avenues will be slower burn opportunities I feel like we had a pretty successful week, securing a few longer stays, some extensions and a some short stays.
The other curveball this time of year can throw at you when managing multiple properties are potential boiler issues. We’ve had our fair share of boiler challenges but each of the team have learned/are learning how to repressurise boilers and restart them. Most importantly however is to have a reliable engineer who can respond when you need them. We’ve also learned it’s worth investing in some back up electric heaters to have at the ready, just in case.
So, onto the meat. In the last post I wrote about how to set psychologically optimised goals that are congruent ie your conscious and unconscious mind are aligned in relation to the goals you set. People can get pretty excited about setting big goals but when it comes down to the nitty gritty of the ‘doing’, this is where they can let themselves down, telling themselves they’ll come back to it later. DON’T BE THAT PERSON!
Instead, you need to take your Big Hairy Audacious Goal (BHAG) and translate it into a project plan. This part of the process is uncomfortable, which is why people skip it but having a plan will keep you aligned, in the zone and knowing what you have to do next. BHAGs don’t manifest on their own, it takes real intentional work to dream them up, plan the road map, and then of course execute. When you do invest in this however you can expect benefits like:
# get clarity by doing this planning
# can connect the dots between your seemingly unattainable BHAG and the day to day
# the promise of not sitting at your desk wondering what you should be working on to hit the goal
# knowing what you have to do acts as an antidote to feeling overwhelmed (sounds strange but it’s true)
# ultimately, all this good work now build the foundation for your year
Here’s a quick summary of the process for goal implementation I’ve been taught and use each year.
STEP #1: taking everything into account, list 5-20 projects that would have an immediate impact on your business. With this list you are thinking up all the various strategies and tactics you want to try that would/could result in a net positive to the business. So if the project has a cost, like a marketing/advertising cost, the net outcome is a degree of profit based on leads coming in and converting a proportion into paying customers.
STEP #2: Now eliminate all but 3, and ask yourself:
– are you able to complete each one in a 12 week period?
– can you complete these with your current resources ie time, people, money?
STEP #3: Now for each project, build the outline for your implementation plan by completing a handful of answers to these 4 key building block questions:
For project 1
#1 What specifically needs to happen…to get started? To continue? To finish?
#2 How can you measure progress? (ie no. of viewings/offers per week. Booking revenue, occupancy by month..) When answering these questions think about what can be ritualised/repeated.
#3 What deadlines need to happen within 12 weeks? Think it through and allocate deadlines you can put into your diary.
#4 How can you stack multiple layers of accountability onto this project. In other words, who all can you inform, involve, make a pledge to etc that will help you follow through on your promise. Think mentors, family, advisors, peers).
Do the same for Projects 2 and 3
STEP #4 12 WEEK PROJECT PLAN
The final stage to this is creating your 12 week project plan where you literally create a grid with 84 – 91 days and then populate it with dates, specifics and deadlines (as per your answers to the Q’s above) to work to each day and week. Schedule this stuff in using the mechanisms that work for you, phone, outlook calendar, a wall chart or whatever. Allocate sufficient time and protect it in your diary.
And there you have it.
Have a great start to next week.