Goals Keep us Going
It’s easy to lose your way without a focus
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After I left university, I toyed with several career choices. I took a writing course and made an attempt at a career as a writer. I also made plans to start a web design business. Thankfully that business never left the planning stage as I’m terrible at design.
I eventually fell into a career in web development and at one stage, planned to start my own web development business.
Over the years, I’ve had lots of ideas for a new business. Funnily enough, none of them ever got past the planning stage.
By way of redundancy, I suddenly found myself freelance as a web developer, so by a twist of fate, I got my business after all. I then threw it all away after I took a sabbatical for personal reasons. I eventually reinvented myself as a freelance writer and ended up with the career I wanted all those years ago.
A freelance writer is, however, a rather broad term. There are all sorts of writers: bloggers, copywriters, content writers, grant writers, novel writers, short story writers, poets, journalists, and other areas of writing — the list goes on. So, what sort of writer did I reinvent myself as? Well, herein lies the problem — I didn’t define it for myself and kept it deliberately vague because I didn’t really have a specific goal to achieve.
After a year, my writing business has barely reached take-off velocity let alone left the ground.
When I set out, my aim was to gain experience and make money. Not unreasonable but I didn’t have any business goals. I took on whatever work I could find and didn’t consider focusing on specific services and setting goals. It’s that old age adage — a Jack of all trades, a master of none.
I’m now in a position to look back and see my business from a more objective perspective. I’ve done some proofreading, some editing, some content writing, some blogging, and even some technical document writing. I’ve also enjoyed the majority of this and who’s going to turn down money where you can get it?
Basically, I’ve been muddling through with no goals on how to progress my business. And that is why my business still hasn’t left the…
