Do you know where you’re headed?

If you don’t have a good idea of where you’re headed – for example, the financial goals you’re aiming for, the customer outreach strategies you want to employ, the demos or products you’d like to create, or the new skills you want to acquire – you’ll just coast along without much chance for growth or prosperity.

Having a plan and knowing where you’re going is vital to your business success.

That’s a given.

Not having a plan and just drifting along and “hoping” things will work out okay spells disaster.

That’s also a given.

So, let me ask you: How’s your business goal-setting coming along?

Do you have short, medium, and long-term goals firmly in place?

And that can include a time frame of the next seven days, the next six months, the next two years, or the next twenty years!

Okay, feel a bit daunted now, just thinking about all that goal setting?

Yeah, me too! Don’t get me wrong, I’m a HUGE fan of goal setting and I know that the more specific you can get about what you’re aiming for, the more likely it is to come about.

But if you’re anything like me (which I’m guessing you are, at least a bit, because we’re both creative entrepreneurs), don’t you get tired of setting such specific goals sometimes?

It can be overwhelming, thinking of all those details and fine tuning each and every goal.

Even though you KNOW it’s important, sometimes you just want a break!

Well, I’d like to suggest a different approach to you…

…a creative way to continue moving forward and upward in your business, but one which will allow you to “relax” a little, especially if you’re in “goal-setting, list-making overwhelm.”

Now, in presenting this new strategy to you, I’m not suggesting that you stop goal setting. Far from it!

But I am suggesting that by including this new idea into your planning techniques, you can keep moving forward in key areas without having to be so…well…vigilant.

So here’s a different approach which you might find helpful:

First, choose ONE area of your business or personal development that you’d like to improve upon.

Then just focus on that ONE area with greater frequency. And you can plan on doing this for two months, six months, or even a whole year.

Pick ONE area of focus and put consistent, extra energy into that ONE area.

Whether it’s:

• increasing your voice-over skills,
• learning about new technology,
• writing your memoir,
• public speaking,
• stepping into the spotlight with a blog, or
• getting your health and wellness back to a good, strong place…

…decide on something to put frequent and focused time and energy into and then stick with it.

And you don’t even need to write out extensive lists or a detailed “goal sheet” for this strategy!

And that’s the sheer beauty of this simple strategy!
No giant list making, or endless affirmations.

Just drill it down to FOCUS.

Just get clear in your mind on your ONE chosen focus and, then as often as you can, within reason, do everything you can to move forward in that area.

Since you might be, or want to be, a voice actor, let’s start there.

Let’s start with that FOCUS: “Quitting my day job and becoming a full-time voice actor.”

If your chosen focus is to become a full-time voice actor within the next three months, six months, or the next year, here are some ideas you can start focusing on with some regularity.

• Take half an hour before lunch each day to practice reading out loud. Read books, magazines, technical text, cereal boxes. ANYTHING you can get your hands on to become an expert at reading out loud.

• Sign up for a 6-week Teleclass series with a voice-over coach. Even during the pandemic there are amazing coaches offering live Zoom classes and webinars to help build your skill sets.

• Practice recording in your home studio regularly. Work on correcting your plosives and improving your microphone technique. Learn audio editing to the best of your ability, even if you’re just working on it for 30 minutes each evening after dinner.

• Start creating a spreadsheet of clients that you’d like to work for – who you think would use a voice like yours. Really home in on what you WANT from your voice-over career and create an avatar of your “ideal client.” Start to imagine, and write down, an ideal “day-in-the-life” of your voice-over career. Create your future in advance.

• If you’re working at a job right now, and want to transition to voice-overs, full-time, get clear on your finances. (Yes, that requires focus!) Find out what your living expenses are, what it will take to launch your VO biz, what money you’ll need in the bank to fall back on if things take a while to get profitable… Turn your focus on what it will actually take to transition from a job with a paycheck, to being an entrepreneur. Include things like annual expenses, health and auto insurance, equipment costs, etc.

This, going back to my original point, doesn’t necessarily require a goal-setting list, but it DOES require FOCUS!

So… see what I mean?

Instead of writing out a detailed “voice-over goal-setting to-do list,” just wake up each morning and think to yourself “Hhmmm… How could I put some positive focus on my voice-over business today or this week?”

Sure, keep track of your progress if that’s helpful.

But the whole point here is to release you from your lists, and just give you a consistent, daily, important, passionate, FOCUS.