Setting aside time for reflection and goal setting is crucial, especially in the ever-increasingly more volatile world we find ourselves living in.
As we approached the end of last year, I took some time to pause and reflect on the experiences, challenges, and successes I encountered throughout the past year. This reflection period offered me a valuable opportunity to acknowledge my accomplishments, identify areas for improvement, and learn the lessons that will guide me towards growth and development in 2024.
If you haven’t had an opportunity to do your own (formalised) reflection on 2023 yet, I encourage you to take some time this week to do so.
Feedback loops and reflective practices are integral components of continual improvement and are practices where agile and coaching intersect. These practices form the bedrock for learning, adaptation, and growth both for teams and individuals.
In agile contexts, these loops are embedded within frameworks and methods like Scrum or Kanban, enabling teams to receive frequent feedback, iterate on their work, and continuously enhance their outputs. By gathering insights from stakeholders, customers, and team members, these loops promote agility and responsiveness, ensuring that the final product or outcome aligns with evolving needs and expectations.
Reflective practices, such as the Gibbs Reflective Cycle, provide a structured approach for individuals to analyse experiences, extract lessons, and apply newfound insights to future actions. The cycle comprises six stages:
1. Description
2. Feelings
3. Evaluation
4. Analysis
5. Conclusion
6. Action Plan
These stages guide individuals through a comprehensive reflection process. This systematic approach encourages deeper introspection, fostering self-awareness and the ability to discern patterns or areas for improvement. By systematically reviewing experiences and actions, individuals can refine their approaches, enhance their skills, and make more informed decisions in similar future scenarios.
The beauty of feedback loops and reflective practices lies in their synergy. Feedback loops offer real-time insights, while reflective practices provide a structured framework to analyse and internalise this feedback effectively. This combination empowers individuals and teams to continuously evolve, learn from both successes and failures, and refine their strategies and behaviours for improved outcomes.
By incorporating these practices into the fabric of life, agile coaches, scrum masters, and team leaders will create an environment conducive to growth, fostering a culture of continuous improvement and learning within their teams. This not only enhances the quality of work but also nurtures a mindset of adaptability and resilience in the face of evolving challenges.
When setting goals, it's essential to delineate between developmental objectives and maintenance goals. While one aims at acquiring new skills or expanding knowledge, the other focuses on preserving and refining existing competencies. Both are crucial in ensuring a well-rounded skill set and sustained proficiency in the field.
Maintaining interest and engagement, particularly for my neurodivergent brain, involves setting incremental goals aligned with larger objectives. These intermediate milestones not only maintain motivation but also provide checkpoints for assessing progress and adapting strategies as needed.
Remember, the journey of self-improvement is not just about achieving milestones; it's equally about the process and the lessons learned along the way. Find ways to celebrate small victories and learn from setbacks to refine your approach continually. I have a retrospective page in my journal for the end of each month, where I write out all the things I want to remember about the month gone: my wins, my losses, and what experiments I’ll run next month to try to build upon everything I’ve learned.
There are two essential things to do with goals:
1. Write them down.
2. Don’t tell people about them.
Although it would be good to occasionally read the goals you’ve written down throughout the year, studies have shown that just the act of having written them down at all will increase your likelihood of achieving them. Interestingly, it’s also been proven that telling people your goals will dramatically decrease your likelihood of achieving them. When you tell people you receive all the dopamine up front without doing the work, and therefore, you don’t do the work. Instead, quietly get on with achieving the goals and then shout about it when you have actually achieved something.
Lastly, don’t forget to consider the need for a healthy work-life balance. While striving for professional excellence is admirable, nurturing personal well-being is essential. This balance ensures sustained energy, enthusiasm, and resilience, enabling you to perform optimally in both your professional endeavours and personal life.
Cheers to a year of growth, learning, and achieving milestones, both personally and professionally!