Big Hairy Audacious Goal

So how was the meditation? Yeah me neither lol

Following on the goal setting theme of recent posts I thought I'd start out big

…big and hairy

…big, hairy and audacious to be exact.

Why settle for anything else…

Many people in life when looking at what they want to achieve will look to the coming days, months or maybe years.
This is very similar to businesses that set goals and targets for different areas of their organisation for each appraisal or financial year. People tend to focus on the relatively short term tactical goals that can easily be measured and monitored over a few months/years.

That's good... isn't it?
An end point that you know is achievable and that you can see yourself achieving? 

Well yes and no

Let me introduce you to the concept of BHAG the Big, Hairy Audacious Goal!
The term BHAG was proposed by James Collins and Jerry Porras in their 1996 article entitled Building Your Company's Vision. They defined it as….

A true BHAG is clear and compelling, serves as unifying focal point of effort, and acts as a clear catalyst for team spirit. It has a clear finish line, so the organization can know when it has achieved the goal; people like to shoot for finish lines.

—Collins and Porras, 1996

A BHAG encourages companies to define visionary goals that are more strategic, emotionally compelling and truly inspiring.
The theory being that truly great goals pull people together, inspire and motivate them to go above and beyond in order to achieve the BHAG.

A great example of a BHAG would have been in the 60's in the US when Kennedy stood up and said "We're going to put a man on the moon!". It was a vision that inspired people to innovate, push boundaries and literally go further than anyone before them.

Inspiration is a powerful thing and we can apply the principals of corporate goal setting to our personal lives.
Yes we need small achievable steps that can be focussed on in the short term - but you need a truly great eventual destination to keep yourself plodding along.

To achieve great things you need to set yourself great goals!
So shoot for the moon, what ever area of your life you want to change make that goal big, make it hairy, make it Audacious

Peace

G