I receive this question from many students even from staffs, whenever I visit to educational institutions for any seminars or workshops. It is a classic question too.

“How do I set and track my goals personally and professionally…”

I suggest them the white paper technique. It always works.! Let me share it here, and I am sure this will help many readers.

Whenever you feel, you have to do something for the improvement in your professional and personal life… and don’t know where to start and what to do - follow these steps. I suggest do this exercise in early morning time, because your thinking level will be high.

1. Take a white sheet, just add your name and current date, and space for target date at the left corner of the sheet

2. Divide the sheet into 4 sections and name them as Strengths, Weakness, Goal Statement, constraints. Write “To Do” in the backside of the sheet.

3. Now add your strengths

a. It should be your professional and personal strengths – for example: good in visual basic programming, certified graphic designer, public speaker, confident enough to talk to new people suddenly, good knowledge in latest mobile devices, read books, having good contacts in social networks etc.

4. Add your weakness

a. Again, this should be covering professional and personal things – for example: Average English communication knowledge, poor email writing skills, No idea about what is going on other side of office, Less knowledge in current technical updates around you, lazy, Health limitations, hesitations to take new opportunities etc.

5. Now – Just write one clear statement about what you want to become in specific duration

a. For example: I want to become a Tech Lead, with good knowledge in Windows Mobile Programming, at a reputed organization in 1 year. (Add the after one year date as target date in the top of the sheet.)

6. It’s time to add our steps to reach the goal. Before that we should know our constraints – so that we can make plans to cross it.

a. Add your constraints – this can be taken from your weakness list

b. For example: if you have English communication knowledge in weakness, add it. Logically, every weakness will have an impact while you plan for your feature. So we have to cross almost everything.

7. Turn the sheet. Now you have “To Do” section.

a. For every constraint you have on the other side – write a crossing procedure.

b. For example: If you have “no idea about what is going on other side of office” – write “Get new friends” – you can choose the supporting activities from your strengths.

c. For example: if you have “poor email writing skills” – write “Get information about how to write efficient emails - Write more test emails in blog – and ask your friends to verify them”.

d. For example: If you have “Less knowledge in current technical updates around you” – write “Visit online technical news websites 15 mins every day and discuss with friends”

8. Fill as much as you can – but I suggest try to add 10 ‘To Do’ Items.

9. Stick this sheet in your personal desk – read ‘To Do’ section at least once in a day – I suggest morning times, before you start any work.

10. Follow it, add marks for every day in your specified duration. If you don’t do it any day, minus marks.

11. Review your Track sheet every weekend, know your progress. If it is less than expected, speed up – it’s your life. If you are in good marks, present some small gift to yourself J

12. You can see the improvement in 2 weeks. J .

It is very simple to do, but very efficient in results. There are different names in management field for this technique (for example: SWAT), but this is simplified for anyone – student, professional, business guys.

I am attaching simple templates for this exercise. I hope it can give you a basic idea. Visit here for template:

http://sites.google.com/site/gvmuthusite/

All the best.

For more details: gv_muthu@msn.com