By Jim Hargis

What are the specific plans you have set for yourself-at work, with your family, for personal growth in particular areas? How clearly have you defined the goals you intend to pursue today, next week, this month, during the remainder of the year?

Planning and goal-setting. We would all agree that they are valuable steps in our quest for success in any area of life. But how many of us can assert with confidence that our plans and goals are well-conceived, carefully stated, and now are being pursued with vigor?

As one business writer stated. “The reason most people in business flounder is that they are goal-less. They have no personal goals at all, or their goals are undefined, too easy, or not worth the effort.” Someone else has said, “People don’t plan to fail - they just fail to plan.” Does this describe you - or someone you know?

For the Christian in business, understanding that God is central to the long-term success of any endeavor makes a great difference in what goals and objectives we set - and how we carry them out. Proverbs 19:21 tells us, “Many are the plans in a man’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.” It is foolishness to try circumventing the sovereign intent of God. He maintains a vital interest in the outcome of all our plans, regardless of how insignificant they may seem.

Unfortunately, not everyone understands how to formulate worthwhile goals and carry them to completion. During the course of my years in business, it has been my observation that an effective goals program has six parts:

1. Put it in writing. First, to be an effective goal it needs to be in writing. If it’s not in writing it tends to merely be a wish - or something one would like to achieve but really never spends much time focusing on.
2. Make it measurable. The goal needs to be stated in terms of what will be present when it is reached. For instance, if you simply say that you have a goal to loose weight, you will not have a good chance of reaching it because it is neither specific nor measurable. But if you indicate that you will go from 175 pounds to 165 pounds , by a certain date, you will have lived up to the definition of a good goal.
3. Specify a target date. For a goal to be focused, it needs to have a target date as to when achievement is anticipated. Without a target date its difficult to stay focused and time conscious as one works toward achievement. You either do achieve it by the target date or you don’t; you’re either moving toward it or you’re not.
4. Make it a priority. Once the goal has been written and can be seen clearly, we come to the matter of priorities. How important is the goal? One writer says that as business-people, we spend approximately 80 percent of our time doing the wrong things because we don’t have the right priorities. The problem is: goals never equal outcome. Priorities always do. I know of a young man who had dreamed of having a close-knit, happy family. Finally he got that family, but instead of going to his family, his priorities went to his personal finances, his job and his hobbies. The result was that he lost his family to divorce. He had a goal of a happy family, but it never became a priority for him.
5. Schedule it. Once we know what we want and feel certain it’s a priority in our life, it becomes a matter of how to get it into action. The schedule is the only way-an annual, monthly weekly, daily hourly schedule - that we can turn dreams into reality, because that propels our action.
6. Follow through. Once the schedule is decided, it’s a matter of discipline. By this I mean maintaining commitment to our goals and priorities during times of pressure. There are always stresses on the job, in the home, and in our communities that can pull us away from our well - intended goals and priorities. Only through discipline - determining that our goals and priorities are worth keeping and striving to attain, no matter what - can we successfully follow through on them.

The Scriptures assure us that as we seek to formulate our plans in concert with the Lord, He has our best interests at heart; “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future” (Jeremiah 29:11).

May we, like the Apostle Paul, be able to affirm, “Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:13, 14).