Raise your hand if you don't need clarity in some area of your life? Exactly! In this article, my goal is to share one of my client's favorite tools, the Clarity Tool.
If you participated in the Fearless Leaders Challenge a few months back or have coached with me, you already know about the value of this tool. I use it with my clients and personally to identify what I want, what's challenging, and how to move forward in making decisions in my career and business, from a place of purpose, not fears.
Ultimately, we want to maximize our time, energy, and financial resources, instead of wasting precious time working on activities that won't move the needle or make a dent in our lives.
Your Truth
The first question to answer is, what is your truth today? What is your situation? Think of the area that you want to address and answer these questions.
When I decided to start my own business, there was a lot of ambiguity around:
What do I do?
How do I do it?
Who do I serve?
After working in the corporate world for 30 years, and leading teams for more than 20, I got clear that I needed to reinvent my career. To avoid throwing away the baby with the bathwater, I focused on my purpose, what I loved, and areas of expertise. In other words, I got clear on my unique value proposition.
Working to develop leaders would help me leverage all my skills, and this track would be meaningful. I know from experience what a significant difference it makes to the employees when they have a great leader vs. working with someone who isn't.
Once I was clear on my direction, I honed-in on becoming a leadership and executive coach. I planned on coaching, mentoring, speaking, and writing books to get my message out there.
I realized that I wanted to help companies develop leaders and assist professionals who wanted to advance and grow in their careers or transition into a new phase.
What about for you? Your homework and challenge is to identify, "What is my truth? What are the facts of my situation?"
Your Challenges
The second part of the tool is getting clear on your challenges. What are the obstacles preventing you from pursuing or completing what you desire?
We all have challenges. When I started my business, one of my biggest challenges was that I had never owned or run a business from scratch, even though I had a Master in Business Administration and had been a leader for over 20 years.
I also had to figure out, "How can I sustain myself and create a new way of living and earning an income doing what I feel passionate about?"
To pursue my new career direction, I needed to retool and gain the capabilities to run my own business, create a professional website, learn about sales and marketing, branding, etc.
I needed to learn to build a sales funnel to attract the leaders I knew I could help. And to become an expert at facilitating empowering conversations with my potential clients to understand their needs and how I could best serve them as a leadership coach, career strategist, motivational speaker, and author.
Based on your current situation, for this section, your homework is to identify what are your most significant challenges right now? Focus on the top three to five challenges. These would be the most significant ones blocking you from achieving the results and the outcomes you want the most.
Your Goals and Whys
To gain more clarity, next, let's break down the outcomes you want to see in the next 12 months and why they are essential to you.
Let me share a quick story to demonstrate how powerful it is to answer this question. Recently, I was going through my drawers and discovered one of my old journals. As I was flipping through the journal, I began to read what I was going through four years ago before starting my own business.
I was astonished to find the list I had written outlining what I wanted to create and impressed with how many of them I had completed. For example, I wrote that I wanted to start my own business and work from home at least two or three days a week. I also noted that I wanted to write books. Since launching my business, I work from home full-time. I'm a #1 bestselling author, and I'm currently writing and planning to release my second book in the first quarter of '21.
Getting clear on your 12-month goals is not a joke. When I work with my clients to reach this level of precise clarity and apply it in my own life and business, my clients see results, and I see the results.
It all starts with clarifying what's important to you and how you want to spend your time and resources—and becoming aware of why those goals are meaningful.
In the example I gave you earlier, working from home was meaningful because I would spend more time with my son and be more accessible. Starting my own business would help me use all my skill sets and do work that mattered a great deal.
Every one of us has the same 24 hours in the day. And many of us feel stretched thin that there's nothing else that we could pack into our day.
The value of working with a leadership coach and career strategists like myself is that when we start coaching, we dissect what you want and the challenges you are facing. A challenge may be that you feel that you don't have time to do what you want to do.
What needs to change for you to create the time to do what is meaningful for you?
Time will move along regardless of what you do with it. The question is, when we're having this conversation one year from now, or five, what will be different for you--other than being older?
Unless you become intentional and decisive about what you want to achieve, a worthy ideal, I guarantee you that the dreams you have will remain so. And that's the critical difference between having goals and having dreams.
To identify the goals you want to attain 12 months from now, including who you want to become, you can use this perspective. Pretend it's one year from now, and you begin to share with me all that you achieved in the last 12 months and why that's important. What would that be?
Your Capabilities
The last part of the Clarity Tool is to identify the capabilities you're going to need to accomplish your goals.
When I launched the business back in 2017, I knew, based on my situation, that I wanted to work remotely and have the flexibility to be with my son.
The capabilities that I needed were to learn how to put together my coaching packages, articulate my offer to my ideal client, reach them consistently, and develop programs and training that would meet their needs to add the most value.
As a motivational speaker, I wanted to use my background as a professional woman in technology and financial services, a mother, and an immigrant to provide value to my audiences at Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) and conferences.
My capabilities continued to expand. Later on, I developed virtual leadership training and Mastermind groups such as my flagship program, The Fearless Leadership Mastermind.
What capabilities do you need to succeed in achieving your 12-month goals? Who can help you gain the skills to fill any gaps and move forward, given your current situation?
Bringing It All Together
For your situation and conditions to improve, use the clarity tool to identify:
What is your truth?
What are your most significant challenges?
What are your 12-month goals, and why are they significant?
What capabilities do you need to move forward?
That's what the clarity tool is all about.
Remember that every phase of our lives has a different purpose. When I came to this country in 1983, my purpose was to break the cycle of poverty. Once I learned English and graduated from college, my goal as a young professional woman in STEM was to become a leader. Twenty-five years into my career, my purpose is to populate the world with great leaders, reach my full potential, help my son, clients, and strategic partners reach theirs.
What is your purpose today? And how would getting clear on your desires, obstacles, and resources help you move toward that purpose?
Today, I desire to help you connect with what's most meaningful and significant in your life, personally and professionally.
I value life too much to waste a minute of it. If I am not doing what I love, if I'm not enjoying myself, if I'm not supporting my clients and spending time with my family and my loved ones, what am I doing?
These four questions are my gift to you, as a pay it forward on behalf of my teachers and mentors. To download the Clarity Tool and other valuable resources, visit www.ExecutiveBound.com/tool.
Be fearless. (act despite the fear!)
With love and appreciation,
Coach Ginny
We'd appreciate it if you share this article with your network by clicking on the "..." at the top.
If you want to explore how we can support you, let's connect over a complimentary strategy call. I will give you my undivided attention and help you identify your "Why" and most significant challenges quickly. We'll even begin to strategize on the right plan of action that will support you moving forward.
Whenever you're ready, we want to serve you with what you need support the most! Here are some ways in which we can do this together: #1 - Want to become our partner in populating the world with great leaders? Here is how! If you know someone in your trusted network of friends and colleagues who can use the support of a coach like me, I would like to invite you to check out my 10% referral program. Get the details from our Affiliates & Referral Partners page. #2 - Check out our virtual, proven career and leadership training: Learn the #1 success secret to becoming the highly impactful, influential leader you are meant to be without sacrificing your well-being. Spots are limited. Get the details here: www.fearlessledershipmastermind.com. #3 - Develop your Personal Brand with our two-week virtual program: We share the exact steps to stand out in a new job market, confidently, despite today's economy. Get the details here: www.personalbrandingmasterclass.com. #4 - Coach with us, virtually, privately, one-on-one: Join one of our private coaching programs, designed to address your specific challenges and goals, accommodating your busy schedule. Our clients earn promotions, higher pay, transition into new roles and industries they love, and enjoy a higher level of financial, emotional, and even spiritual well-being. They "do the work" and see the results! 100% virtual, join us for a complimentary session: www.executivebound.com/get-started. #5 - Introduce us to your company to deliver virtual and live motivational talks and leadership training: We partner with organizations and individuals over a wide range of industries, providing the support and structure to develop talent and grow your leadership teams. Please email us at info@executivebound.com, and let's connect.. #6 - Read our book: Fearless Women at Work: Five Powerful Strategies to Thrive in Your Career and Life! This book’s sole purpose is to ignite your personal power to pursue the life of your dreams by applying five practical strategies in a unique process named C.A.R.E.S. Get your copy and BONUS Book Club Guide companion today at www.executivebound.com/book. #7 - Read our blog & share it! Keep your mind fresh with ideas. Retool with strategies to navigate challenges at work and in life. And take action that will propel you forward. Knowledge and execution are power. Visit our blog, and if you enjoy the articles, please share them with your friends and colleagues.
About Dr. Ginny A. Baro
Dr. Ginny A. Baro is a sought-after international motivational speaker & leadership coach, a career strategist, and #1 bestselling author of Fearless Women at Work.
Ginny specializes in partnering with organization to develop leadership teams at all levels of management. And she supports individuals navigating a corporate hierarchy or moving into an entirely new phase of their career. She has successfully facilitated live and virtual leadership training and coaching programs for individuals and Fortune 500 companies with over 140,000 employees and delivered keynotes impacting international audiences larger than 7,000. To learn more, visit ExecutiveBound.
Join our community and receive valuable strategies delivered to your inbox (we don't spam). Read other articles in our blog, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Here's how we help!
Comentarios