2021 is here. The time of year where we pledge to take the lessons from the past twelve months to make ourselves better has officially arrived. Even though, between us, making ourselves better is every friggin’ day for types like us.
2020 and the COVID-19 pandemic shit show has changed absolutely everything about our lives forever. From the way we work, to the way we celebrate our holidays, and, most of all our lens for purpose-based behavior. So, looking for ways to reinvent your relevance, to pump up your career or business, and to create the impact and success you were meant to have in 2020? Let’s go….
Focus on developing your skills with these 6 Simple Ways to Crush It in 2021. Know them, understand them, internalize them, and reach out to us for help implementing. We’ve got your back!
1. Create Good Habits
Good habits for you are foundational. You can’t make a difference or impact anyone else if you don’t take care of yourself first.
Good habits can slide, however, so it’s time to bring them back in the New Year! If your habits were a little lacking in 2020, now is the time to really commit and change your life.
Good habits look different for every person. Do what works for you.
At a minimum, they should include some daily commitment in each of these key areas: health, fitness, relationships, reflection, and growth. Want examples? Here are some keystone habits you might consider adding to your daily routine this year:
–Exercise for 30-60 minutes every day. Or just move for a set period daily!!!!
– Eat With Awareness: Be cognizant of what you eat and how it makes you feel.
–Meditate Daily.
–Focus on Gratitude.
–Connect With Others Who Lift You Up Daily: face-to-face or on the phone/Zoom with one person every day.
–Learn and Grow: Spend fifteen minutes each day reading or listening to a podcast for self-development.
The list goes on from there. Need more ideas? Reach out to us anytime and we can suggest some micro changes you can make to your daily habits.
2. Know and Understand the Power of Relationships
Good and healthy relationships matter! They are the single most important life/work skill. So, work on them. Follow your ABC’s: Always Be Connecting. The most successful people in the world know, understand, and practice this. However, we generally suck at cultivating new relationships and strengthening our existing ones. COVID-19 and social distancing definitely has not made this any easier.
Great communication is one of the critical components of relationship-building. You can probably think of a few examples from your own life where poor or miscommunication contributed to hurt feelings, anger, and even relationship damage. This is why it’s so important we learn to communicate at a high level. We published a recent blog all about communication – click here to check it out and learn some new tools for success.
If we want to succeed in 2021, we have to put aside our excuses and commit to learning this critical skill. Don’t forget – one of the most important relationships is the one you have with yourself. This year, go deep with others AND yourself to create impact.
3. Understand and Leverage Your Strengths
If you’ve been through our Strengths & Story workshop or coached with us, you know we start by helping you identify your strengths. One of our favorite tools is StrengthsFinder, though that isn’t the only way to get a handle on what you bring to the table. Your friends, family, peers, and bosses can all help you identify the areas where you naturally shine.
Come up with a list of your 3-5 top strengths and then audit your life by asking a series of questions:
– How are you already using your strengths to your advantage?
– What areas of your job or career are a mismatch for your strengths?
– How can you do more of what you’re good at in the future?
To be successful in 2021, lean in to your strengths, what makes you uniquely great, and be able to articulate them. Knowing, understanding and explaining how to really leverage your strengths will help you help others. In turn, this will help get you exactly where you want to go, whether it’s a promotion, new job, or new business.
4.Know Your Values, Passions, and Skills
In our book, Chasing Relevance, we presented a simple equation:
Strengths + (Skills + Passions + Values) = Your Value to Others
Once you’ve identified your strengths, it’s time to focus in on identifying your values, passions, and skills. These four things together constitute the value you can bring to others. When you know and can communicate that value, you can create more impact, more success, and play a bigger game.
Start right here and now by learning the difference between values, passions, and skills and brainstorming a short list for each.
-A Skill is something we have that others would value or that gives value to others. A Skill is something learned, developed, or honed, rather than a natural predisposition.
-Passions are those things that make your heart sing, that light you the hell up. These are usually easier to identify and often found by considering the answer to this question: what would you do if money didn’t matter?
-Values are your real deal principles or standards of behavior. These are NOT the things you value like family, friends, and security. Your Values are your personal code or way of being.
5. Develop a Personal Brand
You might not think of it this way, but you have a personal brand and story. Just like a corporate brand, your personal brand says something about you. When people work with you, speak with you, interact with you, they have certain expectations of what that experience will be like. Just like how we look at the Apple logo and think quality, sophistication, and leading-edge technology, people look at us and form opinions of our brand.
The good news is, just like a corporate brand, you have control over your personal brand and story. You get to choose who you want to be and how you want to be perceived by the world. You just need to then deliver on that promise every single time.
After the rough year we had in 2020, you might be ready to reinvent and refresh your personal brand and image for 2021. We can help! Reach out to us to learn more about our on-demand coaching product, Hooga. It includes a great module all about finding and living your personal brand.
6. Learn How to Tell a Connective Story
In this hard and scary year that disconnected us from our teams, peers, clients, friends, and family, we learned the value of connection. Being able to form connection with others quickly, no matter the medium, is one of the most critical skills for our success in 2021.
At launchbox, we teach our clients how to tell their or their company’s connective story. A connective story is one that communicates your own value to others in a way that demonstrates the impact you can make for them. Think of it as an answer to the age-old interview question, “Why should I hire you?” While we might not be job hunting and going on interviews, every single conversation we have with others is built around versions of that same question. “Why should I listen to you?” “Why should I trust you?” “Why should I continue working with you?” Connective stories answer these unspoken questions. They also allow space for the other person to feel heard. Being able to listen and absorb feedback is as important, if not more important, than what you actually say.
After reading through this list, you might find that you’re doing okay in a few areas while lagging behind in others. Or maybe you’re struggling in all six areas. That’s fine. Just start!!!! Start from where you are and make a commitment right now to doing something about it. If you want tomorrow to be different than today, then you need to be different.
We want to help get you there. It is what we do. From personalized coaching, team training, leadership development, to on-demand training with Hooga, we can help you make this your best year yet.
Go ahead, test us. We’ve got your back with these 6 Simple Rules to Coach Yourself to Success.
