Is Your Work Aligned With Your Mission?
June 5, 2018
The internet is full of information. Here’s a short list of things that are in no short supply online:
- Pictures of cats
- Videos of cats
- Memes of cats
- News about celebrities
- The secret formula to running your business successfully and making eleventy billion dollars!
Sound about right?
You can’t log onto a site nowadays without someone trying to tell you that they have THE SECRET TO SUCCESS FOR YOUR BUSINESS (and everyone’s business).
Therein lies the problem; they don’t really know your business. They don’t know exactly what you need.
And the real question is DO YOU?
I can’t promise you a foolproof method to being successful; to sharing your work, your purpose, and your message to engage your community. But I can tell you this: If your mission is not aligned with the work you are doing, your shot at success is slim to none.
Here’s an example: Let’s say you wanted to be a pro golfer. You wanted to play in the Masters, win that green jacket, and break gold records. But every single day, you went out and practiced your three-point shots on the basketball court. You are working super hard, but all that effort is not going to get you any closer to the mission that you have set for yourself.
So before you put your nose to the grindstone, ask yourself some really important questions to ensure that the work you are doing is supporting your goals and your mission.
What am I trying to accomplish?
Mission statements are awesome, and they should totally be a part of your work. But they don’t always describe the concrete actions you need to take to be successful. So make a personal work mission. Write it down in clear, concrete language, and commit to memory. Think of it as a goal-setting exercise! You can say things like “build a community of xxx people who want to learn about (your topic),” or even “create xxx number courses in a span of 30/60/90 days to educate people about (your topic).” Make it clear, and make it measurable. Which leads us to question two…..
How can I tell if I’m hitting my goals and supporting my mission?
When you create your personal work mission, you’ll also need to create a way to measure your progress. If you want your community to grow to a certain size, track its growth. Track the best avenues for bringing in new group members, so you can focus on the ones that work best. If you want to put out a certain amount of content, make a schedule for yourself and stick to it. If you want to collaborate with a certain amount of people, hold yourself to that and work to support that goal. Whatever actionable items you create to support your personal work mission, set up systems for measuring their success.
I know I’m working hard, but am I working smart?
Remember the golf/basketball example I used above? That is a perfect example of working hard, but not smart. Check in with yourself and your work to see if you are making progress or spinning your wheels. If you’ve been using the same methods, but your progress has gotten stagnant, seek out new ideas. Find fresh perspective, ask for help, or turn to your community for a push. The work you do should never feel fruitless, and working hard with no progress is a great way to burn out. So conserve your brain power and don’t just work hard; work smart.
Is your hard work aligned with your mission? If it is, how did you get there? If it isn’t, what can you do to realign? We want to hear from you!
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