Katie Iwanin 2012 Goals
Zeus Jones is all about sharing. Wether it’s during the creation of an idea or a good drink recipe, we’ve found social collaboration helps us to achieve our best work.
In the spirit of this we’re making ZJ performance reviews more of a social activity. Fellow strategist Nien was the first to give you a peek into his plans for 2012, now it’s my turn.
My 3 goals for 2012.
Goal 1: Do more good.
As a company we are setting our course for goodness. We want our work to be more in the service of helping people than even before. Personally, I’m also seeking a way to feel good about my impact. Next year, I’d love to say by working away from my family I was able to enrich others’ families lives. To get there, I want to lead or instigate at least 1 project that positively impacts the community in a big way. I plan to do this by organizing/connecting with others who are compelled to join me in “making their mother proud”.
Goal 2: Push projects to be their best.
At Zeus Jones we are good at being busy. We’re always busy. As a strategist, sometimes it’s tempting to sit back and enjoy a bit of calm when production kicks in. This year, instead of just focusing on keeping our work on strategy, I will actively push projects to be their best. Wether that’s by digging into new research or recruiting people to add perspective, I want to inspire the team to keep thinking. If I succeed, at the end of a project people should have a hard time saying “what we should have done…”.
Goal 3: Learn something new.
Since October people have been actively trying to decode why Steve Jobs was so successful. One of his thoughts that stuck with me was how he defined creativity. He summed it up as ‘connecting’. Simply, when a person is able to connect their experiences in new ways, creativity is the output. To spark my creativity I want to learn more new things. Once I amass enough knowledge to be shared I will do just that, pass it along in the hopes of inspiring others to make new connections.
To kick-start my goals above I will introduce some new thinking into this post. According to Derek Sivers in his brief Ted Talk goals should be kept private. The theory is once you announce your goals the goodness you feel by sharing them with others will make you feel like you’ve progressed. Therefore you are less likely to work hard to achieve them.
What’s your take, do you think goals should be made public? Either way don’t make me feel too good about what I’ve just done or I may have nothing to report next year.