Focus on Key Result Areas
What is your purpose at your job? What have you been “hired” to do, and what are the results you are trying to accomplish? If you don’t have answer to this, then the chances are good that your ability to perform will be lessened, and eventually failure to perform will lead to the end of that career.
It is important to identify the key strengths in your job that you are solely responsible for. What are the things in your job that determine your pay and or advancement opportunities? I want you to make a key list of 5 to 7 things that you are responsible for. Then I want you to grade yourself on a scale of 1 to 10 on how effective you are in that area. In chapter 7, Tracy made a great point: “You can be excellent in 6 out of the 7, but that one area has great potential to drag you down and make you less productive.”
Most people tend to avoid their weaknesses. More than likely we are afraid of failing or disappointing others or ourselves. But the better you become at your weaknesses, the more likely you are to be more successful, to feel more confident, and to have more control of your success. If you had one skill that you could develop that would make the greatest impact on your career, what would it be? As soon as I read this I knew mine–follow through. I love to create ideas, to get motivated, to motivate others, but once that is in place, I have the hardest time following through. Ask the people closest to you what they think would be a skill you could work on that would greatly impact your career. Tracy also made the great point that all business skills are learnable. Each one of us have the capability to learn, grow, and out-do our weaknesses if we have the drive to do it.
Take a few minutes and identify the key result areas of your business. mine would look like this:
- Training
- Recruiting
- Selling
- Booking
- Follow through
- Training Others
- Communicating
- Delegating
What does your list look like? In order to be more successful, you have to know what you need to work on. It is easy to focus on the things we love and do well. Can you imagine your potential once you start focusing on the things you might not be as good at? this is not about just focusing on weaknesses, it is about focusing on the top things that impact your business most! Focusing on your strengths is smart and can help you feel motivated to be more successful, but inevitably there will be responsibilities in your job that need improvement. It is not about transferring your focus of your strengths toward your weaknesses. It’s about being aware of them and making an effort to improve them! Make your list and start focusing!
Happy Tuesday!