Finishing 2007 With A Bang, Prepping For 2008

navigating 2008At the risk of diverging too much information about my business, and making it look smaller (or bigger) than what you might think it is, I wanted to share some stuff from my last coaching session.

I’ve been concerned about making sure that I tie up all my 2007 loose ends, and am prepared to hit it hard in 2008. We spent our last coaching session figuring out what all of this meant, and I left with an action plan so I’m pointed in the right direction.

It’s interesting to note that as we were ending the call I told Kent that I didn’t really like the fact that I got so much value out of our coaching sessions. You see, I’m quite self-directed, and independent. A lot of the stuff that we go through weekly is either “seeing the forest” or “seeing the trees” … stuff that’s pretty obvious if I would just steal some quiet time and think about it on my own.

Executive Coach, Kent BlumbergKent replied that he finds a lot of his clients get value, like I do, from these sessions. It’s not like we are going over anything as profound as physics, but having someone to walk you through the logic, helping you come up with an action plan, eliminate the noise, and hold you accountable later is quite valuable. Kent, by the way, is offering a free coaching session so you can see what it’s like… if you are in need of a job, career or interview coach you can check out my list of partners here.

Let’s get on to my list, though, as I think this might be helpful for some of you. In order to finish 2007 well I’m going to:

  1. Finish the I’m on Facebook — Now What??? book. I wanted to get it do the editor last week but missed that. I need to get it there this weekend, and so this is the main priority for this week. Man, it will be great to have this writing done and not bleed into next year!
  2. Wrap up all of my outstanding contacts for prospective partners. If you are a coach or resume writer you *might* hear from me next week (ah, that cat is out of the bag :p). Since early last year I’ve made over one thousands contacts with people that might want to partner, but I was rather disorganized in the early days and I know there are many who haven’t heard back from me after the initial contact. Plus, I have new, cool stuff to offer. I’d like to get this figured out and mostly wrapped up this year.
  3. Get all my finances in order. I purchased Quickbooks a few weeks ago and have been putting in my expenses, and some revenue items. But I really want to get this all done by year end so that (a) I can know where I’m at, (b) have a system so I will be on top of this monthly, and (c) not have to worry about cramming this into next quarter.
  4. Understand JibberJobber growth, trends, etc. so that I can plan accordingly on my marketing. Did you know that January is a huge month for people to reevaluate their career and job plans? It was a huge month for us this year, but in going over the numbers, I found that February was about 20% bigger. I want to have a better grasp on these numbers and not just fly by the seat of my pants (who comes up with these sayings??).
  5. Spend time on my 2008 goals, strategies, needs, and figure out specific actions/tasks for the first quarter of 2008. I think the most important thing I can do for 2008 is to plan now. I have a lot in place (like my visualization), but having a concrete plan should help a lot.

What do YOU need to do this year to wrap it up? What about your 2008 – what are your goals for yourself and your career, and what are you going to do? You don’t have to leave a comment here, but I found that going through this exercise is extremely helpful!

8 thoughts on “Finishing 2007 With A Bang, Prepping For 2008”

  1. Jason, you are so right — and you have found a great synergy with Kent — that’s a big part of coaching is finding the right “strategic partner.” My business has almost totally transformed since I started with my business coach, Pat Schuler, three years ago. Most of my “big audacious goals” or “Champagne Goals” as Pat calls them, have been achieved, and I’m closing in on the others.

    I’ve realized over the years that I am a creative type, and I freely admit that organization and focus on the big picture are challenges for me — Pat helps with that tremendously. And she’s a great cheerleader, which, as a solopreneur, is a nice thing to have 🙂

    As a senior exec coach myself, I’ve never had a client that didn’t benefit from coaching, no matter how accomplished he or she was. Coaching is the catalyst many people need to help bring out, work toward, and achieve their very best (even dreams they thought were unattainable) in a way that they may not have been able to identify, or work toward, on their own. It’s very cool.

    Deb Dib, the CEO Coach
    “Unabashedly passionate about helping visionary, gutsy, fun leaders with a conscience build great careers, mold great companies, and even change the world a bit.”

  2. Wow – 1000 contacts, just with one category of people? That’s pretty impressive!

    It’s also incredible that you have a manuscript for a second book. I’m curious how much time you spend writing. Publishing a book is a goal of mine, but even getting my thesis completed is a major, time-consuming task. What are your writing secrets?

  3. Louise did exactly what I wanted with this post – she internalized it as if she were a job seeker – go see her job seeker goals!

    Deb Dib, great comments. I wonder how many of us self-motivated people think that coaching is, perhaps, a sign of weakness? That we even need someone else’s help? Funny thing is, when I tell people I have a coach they relate their own experiences with their coach, and it’s always beneficial.

    Tiffany, I have no secrets :p To get 1,000 contacts in this category it was kind of easy, there are lots of online directories of coaches and resume writers, and of course Google is pretty helpful 🙂

    I’m not sure about this second book thing, I do think I’m a nut for trying it. I can’t believe that it’s so close to the first book. But I vow (don’t hold me to it) to NOT write a book in 2008!

    How much time do I spend writing – good question – right now, probably 6 – 8 hours a day. I think it’s a way to dispel nervous energy, though, since there are times when I’m waiting for others on various other projects, and I have the time (kind of).

    The only secret I have was given to me by Thom Singer over dinner this January. He said “write something for your book every day, for 45 minutes.” I wish I took his advice when he told it to me. That is the #1 bit of advice that I spread. But I have noticed, this time, that I have a system down, so I’m not reinventing the process. I’m no expert though, Louise has written over 20 books (I think).

  4. Great idea – 45 minutes a day seems manageable. It seems like you’d have to spend some mega time planning and strategizing content for that to work most effectively. That way you knew what there was to be written. . . but there are some people who seem to successfully approach publishing they way they do blogging, and by that I mean just writing collections of post-like essays that form the chapters in their book and then putting it all together afterwards, sort of like a quilt, I guess. Do you plan content and then write, or just do what comes to you and make sense of it afterward? I guess it probably depends mostly on your habits and personality which approach would work best for you. . . or perhaps the demands of your publisher!

  5. I know that publishers will definitely have an impact on how you work, with their different demands for deliverables. I really like my publisher, and have heard that others are much more strict and structured (that goes to my personality!)… pros and cons of both.

    The way that I start is, after I have the idea, figure out the table of contents, do a quick brainstorm/braindump, start putting peices of that into appropriate chapters, hold on to the rest for future reference, and then flesh out each chapter. We just finished that TODAY, and now we will go back and put in the polishing things, the tips boxes, quotes from others, and some kind of actionable list (something missing from my first book).

    I wouldn’t claim to be a pro at it though. Maybe one day I’ll do a webinar on it.

  6. Deepak, here’s a follow-up post that talks about my goals for 2008.

    Coaching developing… JibberJobber is a tool for the end user, but over the last year we’ve been putting in coaching tools to enhance a coach/client relationship and help with accountability. Some coaches love it, other coaches find it too much (there is a wide spectrum of coaches and styles, as you know :p). Shoot me an e-mail if you want more info on it.

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