#41 - Research Indicates that Annual Resolutions Don't Work on Their Own. There's A Better Way...
I've now embraced GIFs. Also, an ode to reasonable goals.
Two letters in two days, whatttttt (this isn’t normal). Hope you enjoy today’s read, hopefully in time for your 2023 goal setting processes. Also, if you find the GIFs annoying, please tell me. I promise I do GIF a damn. ….
Letter Flow:
I think annual resolutions on their own are not effective for most people (with research)
Embrace quarterly goals
You don’t have unlimited bandwidth
Be reasonable about the number of goals you set (the better way)
What you achieve today lays the foundation for what you can achieve tomorrow
1. I think annual resolutions on their own are not effective for most people
We’re heading into 2023 soon, and I want to share something I think is bullshit for most human beings: annual resolutions.
I have long had an antagonistic relationship to the annual resolution, because I don’t think most people are actually wired to pursue most 1-year goal. It can be both near-term enough to allow procrastination and far-away enough to not inspire bold action.
…Counterargument: you can say this about anything…but moving on, what does the research say?
Study #1: 44% of participants have been likely or very likely to make a New Year’s resolution for the coming year (University of Stockholm)
Study #1: Out of 1066 randomized participants, 55% considered themselves successful in “sustaining” their goal
Study #2: 80% of New Years Resolutioners fail by the end of February (Forbes)
Context here is people going to the gym, and I should also note that Forbes was very vague on sources / research, so I would say take this one with a grain of salt
Study (Poll) #3: 49% of people who made resolutions actually stuck to them (across categories, which include exercise, finances, career, etc.)
OK, so generally speaking people do not achieve the annual goals they set. Research outcomes vary by category (fitness goals vs career goals, for example), but the fact is that many people set annual resolutions, and then proceed to not achieve them. So what do we do here?
2. Embrace quarterly-goals
Above, I made the assertion that most people aren’t wired to pursue annual goals, and I think I could probably be a bit more clear and say that: most people have a limit to the number of goals they can reasonably expect to achieve.
You’re a busy person! You’ve got a lot going on. You’re doing (that is, accomplishing) a lot every day. A.k.a doin’ the damned thang.
So, when you set more goals, you’re just adding to the list of things you have to do. And if you don’t also remove when you add, you’ll probably find yourself burning out (See: “#28: Funnel Like It’s Hot, and Why Saying No…”).
And thus, a logical next-step statement:
We should embrace setting goals on a shorter time horizon than a year. These quarterly goals should build up to an annual goal or goals, however.
This is how most organizations function, and it’s for a reason. If you were a major shareholder in a publicly-traded company, how would you feel if you only got a status report once a year? Probably not great (at least I wouldn’t), and who is a bigger shareholder in your life than you?
Embracing quarterly goals allows you to understand if you are veering of track faster, and to make corrections / adjustments to your goals earlier.
But there’s still one more thing you need to be wary of with annual goal setting…
3. You don’t have unlimited bandwidth
I’ve come across many people who ascribe to this whole notion of hustle culture. I have a bit of a problem with the underlying idea of hustle culture. My issue is not that some people want to go the extra mile (or ten) in an endeavor, it’s that it’s too narrow in scope (mainly, work/career) and not sustainable (over years) for most.
AND if you’re hustling in one area of your life, you’re probably not also hustling in other areas. That is to say, there are tradeoffs we have to make. You can’t “burn the candle at both ends” for too long, or else you’ll start to face other issues (family life falling apart, health issues, “workism (see Atlantic article). I can’t remember which CEO I heard say that, in startups particularly, you can pick two of: Family, Friends, or Your Startup, but not all three. There’s probably some wisdom here.
Counterargument: sometimes you need to burn the candle at both ends to achieve great things.
My counterpoint to the counterargument: be honest about what you can actually handle, and you should also place a time limit on how long you’ll dial up or dial down your degree of hustle. You must manage your bandwidth to be effective in your life, whether it’s at home or at work
(Damn, I still need to write that post on Energy Management. Been talking about it for a year. Maybe will do that next week)
4. Be reasonable about the number of goals you set
If you’re one of the founders that I have the privilege of working with in some capacity, my reminder to you is: you are more than your company and that the price of building something great shouldn’t be the destruction of your family / health.
If you’re a non-founder human like most of us, then you should also take stock of all that you need to do in your life before you commit to something ridiculous like the below…
Bad Goal-Setting Example: Michael’s Resolutions from 2015 (the last year I did annual resolutions on their own):
Make senior consultant in one year (context: this was extremely aggressive) (did not achieve)
Complete a triathlon (Ha. definitely did not achieve)
Build MVP of new technology platform (do wireframes count? did not achieve)
Nurture new / budding relationships in NYC (achieved - some of my closest friends in the world come from this time)
Critique: WHAT A JOKE. I mean…these goals are all very time/energy intensive. When you set goals, you should consider the LOE (level of effort) required to achieve them. Let me dig into how ridiculous this set of goals was:
Making Senior Consultant in one year would’ve required near-complete obsession about client work, and the politics around work too
Triathlon training requires an obscene amount of training, sleep, nutrition, etc. — all things that get sacrificed wen you’re going for a rapid promo at work in a consulting firm
MVP for a new tech platform… This all takes a long time. Even IF you were like I was and very very fast at UI design and concept creation, you’d still need to have the time and/or resources to build software, oversee others coding things you couldn’t etc.
Making friends is freaking hard, and nurturing means seeing / communicating regularly, which itself takes energy!
Ultimately, I chose to prioritize this because I realized that my friendships were providing the most joy and growth. I learned and grew in incredible ways thanks to my friendships. Over the year, I realized that the other goals just weren’t feasible or that important for me, so I dropped them and prioritized ONE.
Better goal setting looks like: setting two to three annual goals, and also take the time (hell, just 5 to 10 minutes per goal even) to map out the milestones you want to achieve throughout each period of time (whether they’re monthly milestones or every 2 or 3 months). Here are my goals from two years ago:
First, behavioral reminders
Prioritize rest. You have a default “on” state. Practice slowing your brain down, and achieving rejuvenation
Set strong limits at work to avoid time creep; embrace brutal prioritization
Accept that you will not be able to please everyone. Let some relationships dial down to less frequent or no communication
Be in the moment more. Multi-task less. Embrace your calendar as a way to stay focused.
Now, Goals:
Personal: Win At Home by ensuring quality 1-1 time with my wife and our dog every single week.
Method: save one day every weekend for only-us activities
Three-month milestone: count the number of exploration days you’ve had at the end of March, share with your wife, show gratitude, and keep it up
Work: Continue to find balance as measured by NOT working past x time more than one time every two weeks.
Method: schedule “DNS” (do not schedule) hours on your calendar, and always decline meetings after a certain time + offer up alternative times. If required, be vocal about your core working hours. Do not condone people not respecting your time.
Three-month milestone: no more than 4 days where I’ve worked past x time
Reach: Brute force find your way into Venture Capital, through: (1) angel investing in 2 companies, and (2) building deep relationships with at least four different investment professionals.
Method: Be smarter about outreaches — cold outreaches suck. Embrace warm introductions. Be concise in all early communications. Lean into how you are different than traditional candidates for roles, and lean into your operator experience at a high-growth startup.
Method: In three months when you’ve failed and you want to give up, don’t…Push harder and smarter.
Method: Get really brutal/critical feedback from your friends in VC about how to approach more intelligently
Three-month milestone: 15 outreaches, 1 conversation, and three feedback points to experiment with in months 4-12
What do you see here?
There is one “Reach” goal; not five
The other two goals are largely things that are “in the flow” of what’s already happening
There’s at least some thinking around HOW to achieve the goals. They’re building on what has not worked in the past too
The “Reach” goal assumes that I won’t make progress, and gets ahead of what I need to do when I invariably want to give up
I have a three-month milestones for every goal to help me check-in before it’s December again haha
These goals were all achieved, and then some :-). And the achievements of then play a really important role for Today and Tomorrow…
5. Laying foundations for your future
When you are reasonable about the goals you set, you’re more likely to make sustainable progress.
When you make sustainable progress, you’re giving yourself a metaphorical step on the ladder towards whatever place you want to go in your life.
I would rather take one quality step, and one quality step, and one quality step than try to jump three rungs and fall off the ladder all together.
What you achieve today lays the foundation for both what you can achieve tomorrow *and* the fulfillment you might find on the journey to “tomorrow.” And for all the time we spend thinking about tomorrow, we owe it to ourselves to find regular joy in today, too.
(also, falling off ladders is f*cking painful. Not something I enjoy doing, and YES I have fallen off of a ladder before — hurt my confidence, and my bottom)
P.S. Goals come up throughout time obviously. One of ours has been re-discovering Tennis! I got my Dad and I some lessons sometime mid-last year, and we’re now playing on a fairly regular basis. We aren’t winning Wimbeldon anytime soon, but you know you’re improving when MOST of your shots are staying on your court :). I have a soft goal to start playing on a team in the Atlanta area in 2023, but still deciding if that’s worth prioritizing or not :). My wife didn’t require lessons; she’s just…already good at tennis, and hit a ball so hard the other week that I nearly dropped my racket. What a badass.