As the New Year gets underway, and especially starting a new decade, I want to discuss resolutions with you and why so many people fall off track with no motivation to continue after just a few months. I'll give you one hint... accountability!
I have a friend who owns a popular gym franchise and he tells me his holiday season comes around every January/February… not November/December.
Why does he say that? In his words “it’s the influx of clients I get in January and February because of New Year’s resolutions”. According to him this is when he gets most of his membership sign ups and that translates to a big inflow of cash.
It’s true, the most common New Year’s resolution is to “exercise more." 38% of resolutions fall under this category according to a ComRes poll, with “lose weight” being a close second at 33%. These are the 2 main reasons to sign up for a gym membership!
The irony is most people don’t keep their New Year’s resolution, and this is where my friend comes out ahead. He tells me by April, 90% of his the new memberships have stopped coming and he is back to just his regulars. However, he signed them up for that membership which is normally an upfront payment and monthly fee, and depending on how much they paid up front he has them locked in for 1 year to 5 years! This is a great thing for him, since they will trail off, his gym only sees busy times Jan thru March, which means in terms of expansion he doesn’t have to worry too much about more space or equipment, but the money keeps flowing!
So WHY do so many of us make New Year’s resolutions and then not keep them? A big problem is unrealistic goals. A resolution IS a goal, but more often than not that goal is set by some ideal that we have been sold on, for instance we are constantly bombarded with images of slinky fit models in the media, which hardly helps our own self images. Therefore, we resolve to set unrealistic goals that beat us in the end.
Another problem is going at it alone. We think that if we say it, we can do it. However, it is much harder to “walk the walk” than to “talk the talk." It’s self accountability that gets us every time! Stubbornly we tell ourselves we can do it when the better option would be to find someone who can help you like a coach or mentor. They can keep you accountable, ensure your goals are achievable and give you perspective.
This all relates very well to business owners. We have lofty dreams, ideals that we fail to meet because we are working “IN” our businesses not “ON” them. Having a coach can help us with the problems of unrealistic goals, going at it alone, giving up too easily, not planning and bad time management.
A coach will keep you on track and direct you to avoid these pitfalls that more often than not, lead to our resolutions dissolving for another year.
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A worksheet that will help you identify and achieve your goals by holding you accountable for completing your tasks.
If you're ready to stop working IN your business and start working ON your business, download this step-by-step worksheet to walk you through developing your own Goals and Actions plan.