How to avoid the distraction of someone else's goals

Do people interrupt your work on your own goals because they want you to work on theirs?

How do you get back on track? How to you keep your focus on your own goals?

People mean well. It's a good thing that their goals are important to them. And, in many cases we find the time to help them with their goals and sometimes they reciprocate. That's healthy. What's a problem is getting so pulled into someone else's situation that your own goals go untended. That does not lead to success or happiness.

Here are some ways to keep your focus on your own goals:

1. Schedule time to work on them. Keep that time inviolate. When people interrupt, let them know when you will be available and not until then.

2. Post your goals so that others can see what you're working on. If you've written them skillfully enough, other people may interrupt so that they can work on YOUR goals.

3. Find an isolated placed to work on your goals (I'm doing that right now to avoid interruption!). Someone people like a busy place like a coffee shop -- others like a quiet room or nature spot. Find out what works best for you and choose it at least once this week.

4. When someone does interrupt, take the time to understand their reason. It may be valid. It may be worth your attention. In any case, they won't be ready to leave you alone until you've taken the time to understand them -- to validate either what they want or who they are. This can feel like it takes extra time, but in the long run will save you lots of time.

5. Align your goals with the goals of your organization. This keeps your focus on things that matter to the people who pay you. Why would anyone in your organization want to stop that from happening? The closer the alignment and more clear how your efforts advance the organization, the more freedom you will have to work on those goals.

What other ways have you discovered to avoid the distraction of someone else's goals? I'd love to know what also works for you...

--Douglas Brent Smith

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Comments

At the Root

Why would a happy person ever harm anyone? I don't think that they would. When we are happy, content, and at peace any effort to disturb or harm anyone else will just disturb or harm ourselves as well. When we experience someone trying to disturb or harm us we can be sure that they are already in pain. Fighting back might seem valid, but will it help? What if we helped heal the pain at the root? Difficult people did not become difficult randomly. Something, in need of healing, caused it. -- doug smith

Learn Beyond The Point Of Discomfort

Do you always learn things the first time you try them? If you do, please teach me how you do that! Learning takes the right attitude, the right tools, and the right repetition of trials. We fall off that bike the first time we get on it. We hit a sour note the first time we pick up a horn. We learn by degrees, even when we earn a degree. We seldom learn anything perfectly the first time we try it. Or the second, or the third... Yet we so often stop at the point of competency. That's when the learning has just begun! There is a huge range of learning ahead of and beyond competency. It's the road to mastery. We do not need to master everything. But imagine the joy of mastering what matters to you most. Wouldn't that be great? Wouldn't that be life-enhancing? And (most important) won't that take more learning than you've already done? -- Doug Smith

Thriving Teams

Thriving leaders thrive as their teams thrive. It's a partnership. It's a deal. It takes constant support and service to sustain a high performance team. Thriving leaders recruit with the enthusiasm they show for their team. People can tell when your team is cohesive, cooperative, and collaborative and people crave that for themselves. Create and support a team that supports each other and others will rally to the cause. You have no weak links. You have no poor performers. You have no superstars. You do have team members who need your guidance and support. That's the role of a leader. -- doug smith

Not Everything Is Possible

If what you want is impossible, want something else. -- doug smith

It's About The Cause

The art of leadership is keeping the ego out of the play. It's not about you. It's never about you. As a leader, it's about the cause. -- doug smith

Work Your Way There

Big goals need little goals to build momentum. -- doug smith

Of Course It's Not Easy

It's not the problem that upsets you, it's not getting what you want. Get clarity about what you REALLY want, and then work relentlessly to get it. If it was easy, how much fun would it REALLY be? -- doug smith

Money Isn't Everything

The profit motive is a poor substitute for genuine value. Money isn't everything. It's not even the most important thing. Oh, sure it's incredibly important. As a person who has many times wondered if there would be enough cash to pay the bills, I have come to respect mightily the value of money. But money is transactional. People are more than transactions. What we value most is more than money can buy, is more than a transaction, is a character of depth and peacefulness, and yes, love that is earned, not bought. Think about that for a minute. -- doug smith

Enjoy AND Improve

Do you enjoy success? If that seems like a silly question (Of COURSE I enjoy success!) think about it from another perspective. Sometimes we can taper down our enjoyment and appreciation of something because we know it's not perfect yet, and how can we be happy if it's not perfect? I do that somethings. It's not helpful. OF COURSE it's not perfect: nothing else and nothing ever will be. There are no perfect people, processes, performances, or plan. If we wait for perfection, we'll just keep waiting (and probably without gaining ground...) Let's do both. Let's enjoy our current level of success and achievement while also working to improve it. Performance must constantly improve, AND we can enjoy our exiting improvements. -- doug smith

Love Leadership

Can you be a high performance leader without loving your gig? I've know some great leaders in my life. Some were happy. Some were not. The ones who seemed to live the happiest of lives not only worked harder than anyone else around them (the price of leadership) they also loved what they did. They loved their field of play, their work, their calling, with an unrelenting passion. When a leader can give all there is to give out of love, it makes the hard work and service of leadership more than worth it -- it makes it a joy. Leaders do need more than love. They do need ambition, hard work, discipline, education, and sometimes a little luck comes in hand. But they do need love. Love isn't always enough, but it always belongs in the mix. -- doug smith

High Performance Leadership

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