How to plan and focus on tasks
Introduction
The most important resource is time, it is important to allocate time accordingly to the most important tasks that is going to help you achieve your goal. Companies which succeed are those which know exactly what they need to do, when they need to do it and how to do it. Cutting out the noise and being clear on what needs to be done is super important and this essay is my way of planning for the future.
Figuring out your aim
Before you start your plan you need to know what it is a plan for. Being exactly clear on what you want to achieve and by when. This enables you to see the purpose of your tasks and to see if they are aligned with your big aim. For this essay my aim is to become a successful soccer player, and the steps outlined below will be aligned with this aim.
Figuring out different ways of achieving that aim and the different paths you can take to achieve that goal
With any goal it is best to consider all the different ways that you can achieve that goal. For becoming the best soccer player, I can do several things
Dedicate lots of time for physical training
Get on the radars of top teams
Focus on communication skills
Eat healthily
Get a good night’s sleep every day
Have a good mentor/ manager
Play for lower tiered teams
Have a strong social media presence
Watch and study different game scenarios
Build up my mental resilience
Have significant amount of rest
etc…
This exercise is supposed to be free flowing with no bad ideas, allowing you to think outside the box and consider every possible idea that comes your way. We can decide which steps are actually the most important later on in the exercise.
Categorisation and ranking
I usually then ask myself the question of what characteristics and traits do the best soccer players have? I would argue that they all,
Play in the best teams
Are in the best shape
Are well known and sought after
Have a strong understanding of the game
Have a strong mental and psychological approach to their career/ life
After deciding what the key characteristics of the most successful people in your space is, I would consider what is the most difficult to achieve for yourself. This is far more circumstantial and changes from person to person, where understanding the game might be easy for some, it might be difficult for others. What is important is that you rank them for your own circumstance.
Play in the best teams
Have a strong understanding of the game
Are in the best shape
Are well known and sought after
Have a strong mental and psychological approach
The most difficult is at the top and the easiest is at the bottom for this situation.
Merging the two lists together
The next step is to assess the key results
Play in the best teams — how? in each instance, what do they want / what is required?
Get on the radars for the top teams - Which teams, how?
Have a good Agent/ manager - who? how are they going to help you out?
Have a strong understanding of the game — how? in each instance, what do they want / what is required?
Watch and study different game scenarios - which games? which scenarios?
Play for semi-professional clubs - which clubs? who do you want to learn from
Are in the best shape physically — how? in each instance, what do they want / what is required?
Dedicate lots of time in the gym - what will you train? How much will you train?
Eat healthily - how much will you eat? what will you eat?
Prioritise sleep more than anything else - how much will you sleep? when will you sleep?
Well known and sought after — how? in each instance, what do they want / what is required?
Strong social media presence - what will you post? how often do you engage?
Frequent press conferences - who will you talk to? about what?
Have a strong mental and psychological approach ****— how? in each instance, what do they want / what is required?
Build up your mental resilience - how? with who?
Get enough rest - what sort of rest? how much rest?
Continuous evaluation of your list
This task list is not final, it can be changed and it can be evaluated to be made better and more relevant to your goals. These tasks can be broken down into many sub-tasks and indeed they should be, they allow a goal which is on a 10 year time horizon to be broken down into a shorter time frame, and buckets which are more manageable than the big aim that you are trying to achieve.
Constant planning increases your chances of achieving it, now that I have planned how to become the best soccer player does not necessitate that I do indeed become the best soccer player in the world, but if I really wanted that, I know the steps and the things I need to do in order to achieve it. Every goal and every aim should have a plan backing it up, it creates focus and clarity on the paths ahead!