

Ask HN: What techniques do you use for personal goal setting? - wacheena

I've had a laundry list of goals for a few years now that I review every month.  I don't think it's working for me because I don't seem to be achieving them.<p>What methods, techniques and strategies do HNers use to set goals and achieve them?
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eengstrom
Goal setting and achieving requires one of two things in my mind; internal
driving forces or external driving forces.

A long time ago I was both hired and fired by a pair of brilliant Hollywood
producers. The mid-sized video game company I worked for had just been
acquired by a major player; we killed ourselves for a year on a totally mind-
blowing franchise game, yet the title was sh*tcanned near release (Oh, 3DO)
and then they dumped the entire team off a ledge, myself included.

In the hiring interview the producer asked me "What is your six month goal,
year, three and five year plans?" Oddly the hiring meeting helped me prepare
for the layoff meeting and the next 18 years in my career. She referred to my
near-term goals, which had changed, obviously but I was able to take the
firing calmly because I saw it was a twist and event in part of a broader,
longer-term plan.

The vast majority of people I know are nearly headless when it comes to goals.
You don't have to define a 3,000 point plan, but if you can learn to set a
horizon and a few steps towards the point you want to reach, you can in turn
focus on the immediate and near-term and actually become much more flexible in
your approach to the outcome. You learn from practice whether something takes
you closer or further away from that 1, 3, or 5 year plan and make better
personal decisions.

If you simply can't seem to meet any goals, there are tons of books and audio
sources for basic goal and discipline building. Your goals may be unreasonable
or you may lack the underlying strong habits to push for a better outcome.

I would suspect that you are lacking discipline. If you're undisciplined you
may need to find other sources of drive to meet your goals. If you're an
entrepreneur, you need to get some mentoring and find someone willing to help
keep you focused and on track.

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nudge
Goals don't work for me. Habits do. See if you can transform your goals into
things you can actually do, rather than things you want to reach.

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dmc
An interesting post on habit-setting is on the front page right now.

[http://lifehacker.com/#!281626/jerry-seinfelds-
productivity-...](http://lifehacker.com/#!281626/jerry-seinfelds-productivity-
secret)

& the comment thread

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2262437>

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petervandijck
Visualize the future (ie. dream), but don't worry about the short term too
much. It tends to work for me. (ie. the big stuff that I imagined 10 years ago
has come true, but all the little steps in between were quite unpredictable).

The hardest thing seems to be to dream big/bold enough.

