Ep 19 Values based goals

Goals are important...but they're only useful if they take you somewhere you actually want to go.

Whose goals are you working towards in your business? What are they in aid of? Do they support your version of success? And are they taking you where you want to go?

In today's episode I'm offering an invitation and space to figure out the answers and support you to move towards values based goal setting.

Let's dive in.

Links, resources & mentions

Redefining success - Dietitian Values podcast Ep 11

Schedule you first - Dietitian Values podcast Ep 18

Values based planning, goals & pricing - on demand webinar

Episode Transcript

Laura Jean 0:04

Hello Hello and welcome back to another episode of The dietitian values Podcast. Today let's talk goals. Let's talk about values based goals and how you can shift, potentially shift your goal setting, or look at it through, I suppose a different from a different angle. So, if you think about the goals that you set for your business, and even if you just think about the concept of goal setting. Now, if you're trained as a dietitian or another sort of health or helping professional, or even just, I think it's pretty like almost common vernacular now that you've probably heard of things called SMART goals you know Specific, Measurable, Actionable, realistic, and time, like you know time based, you know SMART goals. This is very formulaic quantitative way to look at goals. It's a very sort of step by step thing. And it's often the, the sort of tool held up you know as like this be all and end all of goal setting. And look, to be honest, I've never liked them. I've never liked them when I was a dietitian, or well I'm still a dietitian, when using them as a tool around behaviour change for people around goals for humans. And I've never liked them for myself, I've always found them a bit. Kind of like just so I know some of the steps of them anyway, they've never really resonated for me personally or professionally, and probably one of the reasons as I've started digging, over the years into values based living running a values based business having a values based practice is that they, so I find them very external very, very like quantitative very much about all these measures and external things and look there's absolutely benefits, and, you know, there's a lot to be said for goals that you can measure. I think how we measure and what we measure our goals against is something worth, assessing, and assessing based on you and your values, because a lot of the time, tools for goal setting, tools for quantifying goals measuring success they're all often created outside of us, and I have talked on the podcast before, and I'll link to that episode in the show notes about defining your own version of success because I think that's really important. But I think we could go a bit deeper around a bit more into this around goals because goals, and I've talked about this over on IG a lot on the dietitian values account is that goals are only helpful or useful if they take you somewhere you want to go.

So when we're looking at values based goal setting, there's a couple of things I'd like to chat about today. So one is thinking about where your are goals taking you, whose goals do you have for your business? then I'd like to think about or introduce the idea of building value based goals, your values based goals, and think about how, what are the what are the opportunities or what are the ways that goals can be developed, if we're not thinking, quantitative numbers external measures if we're not thinking you know similarly to how in the non diet, space we try and encourage our clients to move away from using the scale as an external measure of success and progress. The same can be said for our own goals in our business, and in our own progress with our life and with things that are important to us. So let's dive in shall we.

So the first, I think, important thing about goals or looking at your goals is getting really, really super clear on whose goals that you have for yourself, your life and your business. So if you currently have business goals. I'd love to invite you to have a look at those goals, to think about where they've come from, to think about what kind of words are wrapped up in those goals. Where are those goals like are those goals that you think you should have? are those goals that you see other people having? Where have those goals come from? And have they come from your values, or can you see those goals really been represented by cultural values social values your family's values potentially family of origin values, even our profession's values as dietitians. you know what sort of, whose, whose values are evident in your goals, if you already have goals. If you don't have goals, then it's a really great opportunity to start getting clear on your values and what values you want to move towards. And so, if your goals are moving you towards some values. Whose are they? And so that's a really good opportunity to get clear on whose values are present in your goals. So let's use an example so in the business world in the business coaching space and look it's a bit bit vom-worthy really but one of the goals that the goals that is often bandied around is things like you know eleventy billion figure months or, you know make X figures a year and again as a non diet dietitian, it just makes me think of diet culture and the way they wield numbers, and you know numbers on the scale, as the, almost like a carrot. You know, but also as the basically the holy grail of success and the only way to measure success is through these numbers and changing these numbers and reaching these numbers and particularly these numbers you know like drop X kilos, you know make X dollars in a month or in a year, you know, X figures, it's, yeah, I don't know about you and I don't know if you've ever thought of it that way or seen that kind of connection. But I suppose what I would encourage you to think about is whose values are wrapped up in that? who's whose goals, who, who, who is directing that, and there's nothing wrong with having goals around revenue in your business. Absolutely not. The thing with a values based business though, I think, is that often the revenue is in aid of something else, it's in aid of you moving towards your values. I'm gonna hazard a guess that if you're listening here, you're not in business, to just make giant wads of cash, you're in business to absolutely to make money, because otherwise you'd be volunteering or building a nonprofit. However, I'm guessing that that money is in aid of something, it's to support you to pay your bills to feed your family, maybe it's in aid of having flexibility in your work. Maybe you're, you want a certain revenue goal so that you can take time off for your kids over school holidays, also that you can take a certain amount of time off in your business so that you can take care of yourself and still thrive and still show up in your business. And so creating goals based on external measures similar to diet culture stuff, or creating goals based on what other people think. Other measures of success around like numbers, and these external measures will potentially inadvertently maybe move you towards your values, but because they're not explicitly values based often they can feel a bit icky, like, often I find some of those monetary ones particularly the ones that are very money centred can feel a bit icky, maybe a bit extractive. they don't have to be, absolutely not, having goals around revenue there's so nothing wrong with having goals around revenue and I don't want to give that idea or opinion or any kind of insinuation that a values based business is not one that creates enough revenue for the human running it to thrive and flourish because Absolutely. That is exactly what a values based business does, because it extends your values back to you as we talked about in episode 18 we were talking about scheduling you first the basis of that is extending your values towards yourself. So creating a value space business is about you flourishing just as much about the humans you work with, and part of that is money. We live in a capitalist consumer based society, culture, and so we need a certain amount of money and that's not a bad thing. And I don't want to give the impression that that is what I think. What I tend to find myself personally. And what I found working with other dietitians, is that the revenue goals are usually a tool to take you somewhere you want to go, so there may be a tool to like I said, allow you to just work part time to hit a certain revenue goal. And so the goal is similarly to, you know the goal not being a number on the scale for clients really a goal, the goal is more about how they feel in their body. The goal for you might be more about how you're living into your values versus hitting that number. And so let's be more explicit let's create values based goals. So the first step is getting super clear on whose values. Yours, or the cultures, or our professions or your family of origins or the business coach that you were working with, or the dietitian that you see, you know, on, on social media that you are comparing yourself to whose goals, whose goals are in your business or whose goals do you keep in mind when you're creating your own goals, whose values are there, so that's really the first step and then of course what we want to do is move towards your values being the basis of your goals.

So how do we set values based goals so again let's use that revenue example. So if you think about your values and you think about what is earning a certain amount of money in aid or for you in your business, what value are you aiming to move towards through that, and creating a values based goal around that versus something that's an external based goal around a number. So for example, maybe it is something like having a month off every year. And that is moving you towards your value of taking care of you, conserving you as a resource, that's in part of your values. Or around recognising the humanity, you know, that the humaneness in us all which recognises rests i important. maybe it's around your value of self compassion and kindness and whatever, you know, think about your values of course and so maybe the, the values based goal is around having a month off. Do you need to hit certain revenue numbers to support that. Yeah, absolutely, because you need to be making enough money to pay your bills and to support your, you know any staff or to cover costs in your business for that month so there is a revenue based thing but the goal is not to make X dollars. The goal is to have a certain amount of time off and there's things that you have to put in place to move you towards that goal. Or maybe the goal is to donate X amount of money, or you know to to certain charities, maybe that's a goal that you have for your business to get to a point where there's certain percentage can go towards donations, because that's a value that's a values based got for you. And does that have a revenue number underneath it, absolutely you need to be making a certain percentage of money, above covering your costs so that you had that money to donate. So goals, absolutely can be around revenue can be around, earning a certain amount of money. I think by having the money as the focus of the goal that quantitative, then it actually moves, you know, it doesn't necessarily show you where you're going, it's not necessarily taking you where you want to go, and it's like I said it's a little bit like clients having a number on a scale or a number of kilos to lose or number of calories to hit as being the goal like what is that in aid of? it doesn't necessarily change anything, and it's not necessarily a behaviour. So I think having those goals that are more around your values that shows you where you want to go, it shows you what's important, and yes revenue supports that. However, the thing that's important to you is having the time or the thing that's important to you is donating the money to something you know having enough revenue to donate money to certain cause, or maybe it's around having enough, you know, having a certain around a revenue so that you can say no to things that don't, maybe a goal could be around saying no to projects that don't, that don't light you up, that don't, Don't, don't allow you to use your passions. So, say, you know, being able to feel like you can stay in your no's like that you can find your no and you can stick by it, and it's not because, again, part of that can be around having a certain revenue goal so that you are covering your expenses so you can say no.

Maybe it's around maybe a goal in your businesses around creating like a values based goal could be around creating scholarships for for people to access your services or to give away, you know, one pro bono package a quarter. And again, These are all goals that can be supported by revenue and be supported by money in your business. However, I think, well I hope that you can see how those kind of words that kind of wording and shifting the value, the goal to be embedded in your values is so much more explicit so much clearer around what you're actually wanting to achieve rather than just, you know, six figure months. And it can be supported by a revenue goal, it can mean, might mean that you need to hit a six figure month. I don't know. That's a lot of money in a month, but, you know, it may mean that you have to be supported by, You know, a certain amount of money. And so, it's not that money based goals that there's anything wrong with that but just that creating a values based goal, moving away from quantitative stuff, and moving into the relational aspect of value of goals and your values based business has so much more power, and what feels. I mean, you know, let's just put it out there, what feels more motivating what, what kind of drives passion and drives your work more, is it, earning a certain amount of money or is it creating a certain values based outcome like offering you know pro bono packages or donating to charity or having a month off or taking all of the school holidays off with kids or only having to work two days a week because you know, you've hit a certain revenue goal, you know, hitting a certain amount of revenue which supports that goal.

So, I personally and I don't know about you, but I find that much more motivating, rather than just a number, you know a number so abstract and quantitative like goals and so outside of myself versus the goal of being able to take, you know, being able to have enough flexibility to have school holidays off with my kids. So, your goals are going to be different because they're going to be based on your goals in your values so they're just a few examples of, and I've used ones that are around revenue money because often business goals are around that, but another place that business goals might be around might be around, you know, certain, certain like you know, so a traditional business goal might be increasing followers on your account, or might be increasing number of clients or increasing, things like that so they can be goals around that, again, those kind of quantitative goals. The opportunity there for the values based perspective is to think about what does that look like if it's creating a relational goal. What if it is looking at how you can build more connections to humans, and the more connections you build will naturally increase all of those things, because if you're connecting to humans, you're building connections because where do followers come from where do clients come from. They come from connections, and so having those connections as the goal versus just increasing things from a numbers you know those quantitative goals. It can be - one more I find more motivating, I'm much more motivated much more want to go out and build connections with humans, real, you know, with humans than I do with wanting to get a certain number of followers, yeah, of course, like you know, there's that dopamine hit, vanity metric aspect to it of course that's how social media is designed because that's sort of, you know, it links into our human things that kind of appeal to us as humans, but when we stop and pause and think about our values what's actually aligned with your values more is probably going to be something different than just, you know, hitting X number of followers, it's what that represents to you in your business so going a bit deeper than that around what does that represent for you and your values and building the goal around that versus around hitting a certain number is that goal supported by a number, potentially, does working towards that goal mean that you might increase your follower count that you will increase your client number, probably. having that goal reoriented into your values, away from quantitative external measures and into your values into your business relationships into building that relationship and relational aspect of your business in building connections, there's so much more power in that. As humans, as human centred business owners, and there's also much more, you know connection to your own values, through doing that.

So hopefully that makes sense and hopefully there's a few examples in there. If you'd love to chat about a few examples or if you'd like support on settings and values based goals or shifting your goals in your business towards your values, then I'm always here to help out with that you can flick me a DM always happy to chat in the DMs, or if you want to go deeper and really specific in your own business, then of course I offer one to one coaching around that sort of thing. And I also have an, I'll pop it in the show notes, an on demand webinar that I ran around values based planning goals and pricing which you can check out. So that is there as well. There is a cost involved with that, check that one out. If you want to go a little bit deeper on values based goals. So, that is what I wanted to share with you today. So really, oh and the last point I suppose is how do you know you're successful around goals and things and that I think comes back to that, having your own definition of success. so having that values based definitions, definitions, success and I'll link to that episode in the show notes so check that one out. But they all kind of intertwine, knowing your values, of course, getting clear on whose values, you know differentiating between your values and other people's values, and I'll link to the episode on whose values as well, and then there's having your own definition or version of success. And then there's building goals that are embedded in all of that that recognise that are embedded in your values where you've weeded out other people's values, you've gotten really clear on whose values are in there, your values, and also goals that move you towards your values based vision of success, your values based dream for the world versus somebody else's idea of what a business should be somebody else's idea of what success looks like for a dietitian in business, you be your kind of dietitian, you know, you run your kind of business, and you build it around the measures of success, and the goals that actually support you to show up in your values and to live your own values based life, to create meaning and connection and relationships in your life and in your business versus potentially those more external things those cultural social measures or professional measures of success and the goals that we think we should have, the goals that you know the business coach on Instagram tells us we should have, the goals that we see other dietitians having, the goals that as a culture are shoved down our throat to be the most important thing that we should be aiming for, if we're not doing that, you know, we're not succeeding and so it's all intertwined. Getting clear on who's, getting clear on your values, differentiating that from other peoples and the culture values, having your own version of success, and underneath that setting goals for your business, that are based in your values that turn away from that external quantitative based goal setting and look inwards, look at you look at connect your connection look at your values and look at the relation relational aspect of running a values based business the human centred aspect of running a values based business. So I'll leave you with that. I'm always open for chat comments, questions, concerns, and slide into my DMs if you've got questions or reach out if you want some more specific support for you, and the goals that you have for your business. Okay, until next time, Bye for now.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai