Stef’s Recipe for Setting and Achieving Your Career Goals
Recently, a friend came to me with a challenge and a big question on their heart –
The challenge: “I’m not feeling very motivated right now”
The question: “Where is this all headed?”
Relatable, right?
I suggested that we spend an hour together and I would take them through an exercise that has been a game-changer for me, and others, in the hopes that it would be a game-changer for them. They graciously accepted and we set up time to work together. At our scheduled time, we sat down and I started with this:
You expressed a desire for support around “longer term goals” that go beyond chasing “the next big thing.” Seems like there’s an opportunity to get clear on “Where this is all headed.”
So for today, here’s what I am going to need from you – a commitment to feeling into this mindset: “I am open to anything that comes to me, and the WHAT is just as important as the HOW it will make me feel to do it.” With this upfront contract set, off we went into the territory of exploration together.
So, if you came to this article for a bit of support around goal setting in your life or career, you are in the right place.
For this article:
First, we will start with a brainstorming exercise designed to get some of your ideas and feelings out of your head and onto paper – we’ll do a Retro of the last ten years, an outlook of the next ten years ahead, spend some time doing an ‘About Me’ and also spend some time Eliminating potential Options for your future.
Next, we will spend some time breaking down one of your big goals into actionable next steps.
Finally, you will decide: Are you willing? If you are, great, you’ll have the plan in front of you to step onto the path of those big ambitious goals. If not, that’s okay too, you’ll have this goal exploration to come back to in the future should you ever want to.
The only thing you will need for this exercise is a pen and paper.
Alright, let’s get started.
Enjoying this? Make sure to subscribe for weekly recipes for success in life, business, and the kitchen.
Brainstorm
Retro
Set a timer for five minutes. Close your eyes. Imagine that it’s ten years ago (e.g. 2014). Play, like a movie in your head, the last 10 years from 2014 to present day. When your timer goes off, grab your journal and respond to the following prompts:
If you had told me 10 years ago that I was going to ____, I would have never believed you.
I was going to be…
I was going to do…
I was going to see…
I was going to live…
I was going to love…
I was going to have accomplished…
I was going to have experienced…
I was going to have acquired…
Next, on your piece of paper, I want you to draw a circle. Based on what you visualized while you were meditating for the last five minutes, inside the circle, write responses to the following prompts. Outside of the circle, write responses to the following prompts.
Isn’t it wild how much can change over a period of ten years? There is SO much the person you were ten years ago could have NEVER predicted about the person you would be today and the experiences you’ve had.
Outlook
Okay, now we’re going to do it again. Set a timer for five minutes. Close your eyes. THIS TIME, imagine that it’s ten years from now (e.g. 2034). Play, like a movie in your head, the last 10 years from 2024 to this future present day. When your timer goes off, grab your journal and respond to the following prompts:
How old are you?
How does your body look and feel when you wake up?
Where are you when you wake up?
Who is in your house with you?
What are you going to do today?
What are you most proud of having done since (2024)?
What are you most excited about in life right now?
If you had told me 10 years ago (in 2024) that I was going to ____, I would have never believed you.
I was going to be…
I was going to do…
I was going to see…
I was going to live…
I was going to love…
I was going to have accomplished…
I was going to have experienced…
I was going to have acquired…
Now, grab that piece of paper again and draw a circle. Based on what you visualized while you were meditating for the last five minutes, inside the circle, write responses to the following prompts. Outside of the circle, write responses to the following prompts.
Enjoying this? Make sure to subscribe for weekly recipes for success in life, business, and the kitchen.
About Me
Start by Creating Options
Next, we’re going to make a few lists. The goal of these lists is to help you better understand you. I always find that when I get my thoughts out of my head and onto paper, everything is a bit more clear to me. So using your piece of paper, make three columns.
Column 1 — “What I Enjoy” here I want you to make a list of literally everything you can think of that brings you joy, from as big as “traveling abroad” to as little as “getting a car wash” or “petting my dog”
Column 2 — “What I’m Good At” here I want you to make a list of everything you can think of that you feel like you do pretty well or have been told you do pretty well. This can be as big as “hitting quota consistently at work” to something as little as “knowing the exact right time to pull the cake out of the oven so it’s perfectly dense” or even “keeping counter tops clean”
Column 3 — “What I’ve Made Money Doing” here I want you to make a list of literally everything you can think of that brought money into your life, from as big as “being a leader for a division of a company” to “making hemp bracelets” and “selling my paddle-board on facebook marketplace”
Here’s an example of what this could look like when you are done (I expect your lists to be much longer though).
Now, what I want you to do is to start combining these things in fun ways — creating out of nowhere, careers you could have and make money at that are a combination of what you enjoy, what you’re good at, and what you could make money doing. Here’s an example of what this could look like when you are done (I expect you to have far more creative ideas).
I’ve written about the topics of figuring out your dream career a fair amount, but this is what I’ve always found to be true for me…
A dream career is only found at the intersection of these three things. If you only have two, you will be compromising somewhere unless you can expand into the missing component by adding a new skill, a new love, or making money.
Then, Eliminate Options
The brainstorm above, where you created a ton of options probably felt pretty good. And if I were to make a guess, I would think there’s probably a thread there that you’re pretty excited to pull.
That said, if you’re anything like me, you’re a fact-finder, and the opportunity cost of a wrong decision may be challenging to the point of even being paralyzing. When you could do anything, why do one of the things you generated above?
So, let’s address that. when your opportunities feel endless, how do you decide?
Your career possibilities aren’t actually endless, they are in fact the intersection of three finite lists of possibilities.
What are your industry options? Defined by the GICS (The Global Industry Classification System).
What types of goods and services does the company you want to work for/create provide to their customers? Defined by your company’s IC (International Class).
What role does your work play within the company you are operating? Defined by the SOC for your role (Standard Occupational Classification).
This tops-down look at all your options helps you to ensure that you was narrow the scope of your potential decisions from “If I can do anything, what do I want to do?” to “What can I eliminate from the list of anything so I can focus in on the industries I want to serve, with the products/services I want to be associated with, and the roles I want to play to make an impact?”
So again, grab your pen and paper and pull up the three lists linked above. If it helps, print them out, so you can literally cross things out that are an absolute “no-fucking-way” for you.
Similar to the last exercise, we’re going to make three lists:
A list of the INDUSTRIES you WOULD want to play in.
A list of the COMPANY TYPES you WOULD enjoy being in or building.
A list of the JOBS you WOULD enjoy doing.
These lists can be as long as you want them to be, the point here is to notice how much you cross out as you go through this exercise. For example, there’s no way in hell I am going into the Construction Materials or Chemicals industries. No thank you, not for me.
With so many options on the industry, company type and job type lists crossed off… you may be realizing that your career opportunities when overlayed to what you enjoy, what you’re good at and how you can make money are actually more finite than you’ve been giving yourself credit for! And this is truly a magnificent thing! Instead of being triggered by everyone and everything around you who seems to be happier and doing better than you/further along than you, now you get to choose who to be inspired by.
Enjoying this? Make sure to subscribe for weekly recipes for success in life, business, and the kitchen.
Goal Setting
So with this in mind, I want you to pull some of the threads you’re feeling most drawn to from these exercises and pull them onto a single page so you can see them all together at a glance.
And from here, as yourself the following questions:
What is this telling me? What are potential goals that might fall out of this from a career perspective?
Should I move forward with any of these ideas, what are the implications on the life that would be possible for me in 10 years (what is IN your circle)?
As an example, if I work in Sales and move up through the ranks, what is the potential? How is that different from if I start my own business?
Is there a clear goal that I want to pursue based on this?
You might find yourself in an instant moment of like… I have to do this thing immediately and with reckless abandon quit your job to do the damn thing. If that’s you, hell yes, go for it. If it’s not you, that’s okay too! I recently wrote about paying rent on your time and all of the reasons why I think it can be super-valuable to trade your time for money when you are unsure where you want to head.
Wherever you fall on this spectrum, one of the things you can do is take one of those career goals and pretend you have ten years to make the pivot to doing that full time. Map out how you get there.
I’ve always found that the result of this bears fruit — it shows me what I could do starting today to pursue something different. And here’s what I know for sure — we constantly underestimate what we think we are capable of getting done in a day, but we dramatically underestimate what we are capable of achieving over the course of ten years.
Maybe you broke down one of your big goals and you’re ready to take action — amazing!
Maybe you broke down one of your big goals and you’re not so sure — that’s okay too!
The point of these exercises is just that, to get yourself out of the feeling of stuckness and lacking motivation and INTO the feeling of creative-brainstorming and feeling like you can do anything you want in this life with goal-directed problem-solving.
So if you, like me, and the friend that I helped through these exercises, have been feeling stuck, I hope that this work made you feel a little bit better and at a minimum you have a better idea of what WON’T be for you, even if WHAT WILL BE FOR YOU is still a bit fuzzy.
What do you think? Was this helpful?
Xo!
Enjoying this? Make sure to subscribe for weekly recipes for success in life, business, and the kitchen.
