Why Focused, Action Takers Fail

If 2009 was the “Year of Taking Action” then 2010 is shaping up to be the “Year of Focusing”.

Some people think lack of focus causes more business failure than anything else.

I’ve recently read numerous e-mails and blogs posts from people saying how important focus is and how they are really going to focus this year.

In fact, there have been a rash of Internet Marketers, big names and small, selling off existing, money making, Web sites to “focus”; nothing wrong with that and I applaud them but without explanation and understanding it just confuses us people.

I expect to see products released talking about focus and helping you focus and [fill-in-the-blank] focus.

In addition, one of the things I hear most frequently from people is they have trouble focusing on just one thing.

Now, I am not against focus.

In fact, I’m highly for focus; HIGHLY.

I understand how it can be hard to focus because entrepreneurs like us have lots and lots of “great ideas” and can have trouble picking one idea over the other or sticking to just one and seeing it through to completion.

Believe me, I understand.

So focus is the answer de jour and everyone is jumping on that bandwagon.

The problem is that focus just isn’t enough, just like taking action isn’t enough. Do you know why?
Lots of action takers fail miserably; I’d bet that most action takers are failing miserably and never succeed.

They are all taken in by the concept of “Ready, Fire, Aim” which, if you study it and truly understand it, works well but most don’t do that and so they do it wrong (and fail).

Lots of focused people fail miserably; I’d also bet most focused people are failing miserably and never succeed.

So you might ask, if everyone says how great being focused is (and above I even said it) why do people still fail?

They fail for the same reasons most Ready, Fire, Aim people fail; those people fail because you can’t just fire anywhere.

I know some 7 and 8 figure marketers who have lost hundreds of thousands of dollars each by just “firing”. I know this to be true because these people, all of whom I like and respect, have told me this directly and in private.

Now they practice “Ready, Point in the Right Direction, Fire, Aim”

The thing is, you need to have some idea of where to fire.

Sure, you don’t need to wait for that perfect, clear shot, and in marketing you shouldn’t, but you do need to have a general idea where firing might do some good because otherwise it is just a waste of good “ammunition”; ammunition to a marketer is time, money and reputation.

Being focused is the same thing.

Just being focused isn’t enough, no matter how focused you are, you need to be focused on things that are the “right things”, things that actually have a purpose and support your strategies for success.

Otherwise, it is another waste of time and money and you will continue to fail.

If you know anything about this topic you’re probably saying “duh!” if you even got this far.

None of this is new.

None of this is secret.

Heck, most, if not all, of it is even common sense.

Yet, most people don’t really know it and the many that do, don’t really do it.

Both of those things are equally harmful!

How to Focus?

So, what should you do? How should you focus on the right things?

It’s easy but it’s hard.

It’s easy because there are many, long proven ways of creating objectives to focus on, it’s hard because it does take some work and usually takes some changes by you.

The first thing you need to do is understand what to focus on and a good way to do that it to have strategies in place to give boundaries to your focus; in fact, creating strategic plans can be helpful is keeping focused.

But to make strategies you need to actually and honestly understand what is important.

Instead of explaining that, I’ll direct you to Paul Lemberg’s video on getting that understanding by answering for yourself 10 questions that will help you know what objectives you should be having.

The questions are about a third of the way through it but understanding the context (the first part) is important before you answer the questions.

If you can honestly answer those questions you should be prepared to develop a strategy to achieve your objectives.

Developing Your Strategy

This is where focus comes in.

You develop a strategic plan by deciding what to focus on; what will have the best chance of achieving your objectives, given the information you have now; DO NOT wait until you “know” everything because that will never happen and you will never succeed.

There are whole books written on how to strategize, how to develop a strategic plan, and focus for strategic success so I certainly can’t do that justice here but basically just find the areas where you can best apply focused action to achieve success.

Making Goals

Now, for many people all that is too nebulous to help them and they need something more concrete.

Fortunately, there is something you should do, whether or not you find the above clear enough or not.

That is, make goals.

But, like action and focus, they need to be the right goals.

Fortunately, since you know what objectives to focus on you can more easily define true success goals.

Those goals and goals planning should be solely focused on the objective and if they are not getting you closer to the objective you need to throw out the goal and if you have goals that do progress but too slowly then you need to replace them with other goals.

These goals are how you will be measuring success and successful completion of all goals should get you your objective.

If you’ve ever done any business strategy planning in big companies or with people who know what they’re doing, then you know that the finished goals are frequently called “the plan” and your will periodically be comparing results “to the plan”.

It sounds weird but it is a good thing because the goals are where you want to (eventually) be, you know where you are (or you should know!) and you should frequently be assessing your progress towards those goals (with an eye to changing them as needed as you gain more information).

How to Achieve Your Goals

The next question you probably have is “goals are nice but they are still just thoughts, how do I actually achieve my goals?”

You do this through what are called initiatives. You’ve heard the word in the political/government and business world; there are “this government initiative” or “that corporate initiative”.

Really what they are is defining what set of actions you will need to take to achieve the goal, that is, what you are going to actually do as opposed to goals which are what you want to achieve.

They are how you will get from “point A” (where you are right now) to “point B” (where you want to be; your goals and objectives).

This is where taking massive, focused action is where you will have massive success.

You decide what specific actions that are the highest priority, critical path actions to achieving your goals.

Any actions outside of that are wasted and harmful so this helps you make sure you are “firing in the right direction.”

Setting Time Limits

Of course, this is all well and good but if you don’t have a well defined timeframe for achieving your objectives then it’s very likely the initiative will drag on and on.

Objectives define the timeframe for goals which, in turn, define the timeframe for initiatives.

ALWAYS have a timeframe defined, preferably with firm, measureable milestones if the initiative will take longer than a week or two.

Otherwise, when you get close to the end and you’ll probably find out there are big problems which can create bigger problems and ultimately lead to failure of the objective; this is something milestones help fix.

Conclusion

What we looked at were not only the importance of focusing but how to properly focus to have a much better chance of success.

To be able to build a strategy for success you need to truly understand how you will define success.

After you know that you can decide what things to focus on that will bring about the greatest chance of success.

That focus will lead to specific goals and you can decide what initiatives (set of actions) you need to take to achieve the goal.

Everything else should be rejected.

Lastly, you should have timeframes for success, usually with interim milestones (like mini-goals with mini-initiatives).

Be sure to constantly measure your progress and look at your goals and make changes are necessary.

Remember, most people do NOT do this, even though most think they do, and it probably is one of the major reasons for business failures.

Look at yourself, what you are doing and how you are doing it and make changes, possibly drastic changes.

Do you have focused goals and initiatives?

How do you define them and how to you track and measure them?

Do you have any other questions or comments?

Leave me a comment below and let me know. Thanks.

Talk soon,

The Shameless (and Ethical) Marketer
http://Twitter.com/DavidHusnian

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Tags: business strategy planning, creating objectives, creating strategic plan, creating strategy, developing a strategic plan, focused strategies, goals planning, how to develop a strategic plan, strategic focus, strategic planning goals, strategic planning small business, strategic success, success strategy