Superplanning

It’s taken me years and years to achieve the work/life balance I want, and I am still making adjustments now to ensure that work doesn’t dominate my other priorities. So, as part of my personal commitment to flourish in more areas of my life, I am embarking upon an annual review for the year ahead and I want to share this with you.

My aim is to enhance different areas of my life that are important to me. I have categorised below the 10 areas which are most important.

1. Marriage

2. Family

3. Work

4. Friends

5. Health

6. Finance

7. Creativity

8. Leadership

9. Home

10. Contribution

Today I’ve given myself time to reflect on these key areas of my life and write down my goals for the forthcoming year in relation to them. To give you an example; “Marriage” – a goal is to celebrate the ten years with my husband Chris in March. Specifically, to go to London and see a West End show. Some areas have more than one goal. For instance, “Home” – one goal is to remove and replace all the internal doors in our house and another goal is to transform our daughter’s bedroom as a surprise.

Once I’ve identified my goals, I give them deadlines by which, ideally, they need to be completed. Working backwards, I work out whether they require daily action, monthly action or a one-off action. You can do this in any which way you want; colour coding might be fun if you are that way inclined, but I tend to keep mine as simple as possible, so I stay focused. SMART goals are a useful technique to use at this point; check it out:

SMART goals

S – Specific: is your goal direct and meaningful?

M – Measurable: is your goal trackable?

A - Achievable: is your goal realistic?

R – Relevant: is your goal suitable for you?

T - Time bound: do you have a deadline for your goal?

I like to ask all these questions when setting a goal to ensure I am setting the right one (and not one that someone else has influenced me to think I want to set). Sometimes we can make quick decisions without really considering enough, so this keeps my goal setting personal to me.

Now I have all my goals set for the year ahead. Every week, I look at my goals and decide what daily or monthly action I need to take. Or whether a one-off goal is coming up and therefore I need to set out time for it. I write my goals onto my weekly task list so every day I can see them and update my master goal document where relevant. This document is simply a list of my goals and their deadlines with room to make comments on my progress.

Finally, I’ve put a diary note for every quarter to spend some time reflecting on how this journey is going. I have diarised four times in the year to do this: in March, June, September and finally in December. I have named those quarter periods with something that resonates with me personally (show references as I work in drama, but you can name them anything that resonates with you)

March – “The Read Through” (do I know the whole document like I would know the whole show?)

June – “The Technical Rehearsal” (have I put everything in place behind the scenes to achieve my goals?)

September – “The Dress Rehearsal” (by this point there should only be a few things left to figure out)

December – “Opening Night” (the show is ready to perform, and I can celebrate at the after-show party)

Obviously, some goals may be one off goals and I may have been achieved before December but there are plenty which need to be achieved over the course of the year. It’s just a matter of ensuring you have all your deadlines in place prior to starting.

And that’s it. Feel free to use it this year and see what happens in the most important areas of your life. We all prioritise certain areas above others, but I don’t want to. I want to flourish in all of the most important areas of life. I love a journey of development; it gives me purpose and meaning. I never want to take my life for granted. I want goals and I want to knock them out of the park. So, I will end today on a quote that resonated me “A goal without a plan is just a wish”. Let’s not just wish, let’s achieve.