Wednesday, February 23, 2011

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

36 comments:

  1. great post !!!My goal is to become a billionaire
    following and $upporting

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  2. alright so now i'm just missing audacious!

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  3. nice post it reaks with positivity i love it thanks

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  4. Chinese are good in making equipments,Indians are pretty good in maths, Russians are good in spacetravels, but Americans are the best in marketing.
    Never understood this, russias made the spacetravel first and moon travel was followed by Americans but yet that is marked in history as "Columbus eggstory" - hmm never understood the world

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  5. I prefer to take things at a slower pace, but yeah, for the truly ambitious, this is great.

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  6. nice message in there, aim high.

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  7. Another excellent post. Keep it up G

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  8. My goal is pretty hairy :D

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  9. we need to see more BHAG policies today

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  10. most success business people is the one who achieved their long term goal. patient and determination is the key point

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  11. I don't have a BHAG yet, but it's given me something to think about, cheers G!

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  12. nice post, i will make my goal better.Well done :D

    +followed:)

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  13. Goals are the most important thing!

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  14. really nice post! could not believe what to do without goals..

    http://all-around-toto.blogspot.com

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  15. gotta keep the goals high, or the rewards will be low

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  16. I love this post. I'm always making goals etc. but now I will have fun with reaching for my hearts desire. Make it big, make it clear :0)

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  17. nice blog bro! Following my blog

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  18. i you dont have goals you have nothing!

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  19. Goals are very important! Everyone should set goals.

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  20. Did Kennedy's one line really motivate that many people? cool beans haha.

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  21. Hello lovely :)!

    thanks so much for your comment :)!

    nice postttttttttt

    Wish you a great start in the new week :)

    with love
    Mariza
    http://mar-iza.blogspot.com

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  22. now we have Obama inspiring people to be dependant on government

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  23. Followed, I really need inspiration in this kind of stuff lol..

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  24. i have something like this in mind, although it doesnt compare to kennedy's putting a man on the moon haha

    randomramblingggg.blogspot.com

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