How to make progress on vague goals with the the APP method
Happy New Year!
January is the time many people make New Year’s Resolutions. So I thought it would be a great time to reveal my APP process for turning our wishes and dreams into concrete projects we can act on.
I’m still figuring out what my main goals for the year will be. When I do, I’ll share them in a future issue.
For now, let’s find out how to use APP to make progress on our cherished aspirations this year.
Rodney
Article: How to make progress on vague goals with the the APP method
The tiny golden frog has enough poison to kill 100 men.
Why would this little animal contain such a massive quantity of poison?
The animals that eat most frogs would be killed by merely touching the golden frog.
The answer: The fire-bellied snake evolved to digest it's toxins.
Each generation of frog then became more toxic to kill the snake.
Each generation of snake then became better at digesting the toxin.
After millions of generations, the toxin levels rose to ridiculous proportions.
As you can see, we now have an answer to our mystery.
And that answer is a simple process that leads from one result to another.
Similarly, the path to reaching certain goals can be a bit mysterious. We don’t have a clear path to reach the goal. Fortunately, the solution to this goal problem is also a simple process that leads from one result to another. It’s called the APP approach.
APP stands for Aspiration, Project and Packets.
It’s a three-step approach to ensuring you make progress on goals even when the path is mysterious. As you use it, you’ll gain clarity on next steps and gain the confidence to make progress.
Here’s how to deploy each step of the APP approach to reaching your goals.
Aspiration: Identify an abstract goal you’re motivated to reach. I call it an aspiration since it is not something specific and measurable like a SMART goal. It just needs to give you direction and a dash of motivation. Here are a few examples: “Get in awesome shape”, “Build a business I love” and “Find the man/woman of my dreams.”
Of course, dreams are nice but we need something more concrete to help us make progress and that comes in the next step.
Project: Determine a project that would represent progress toward your aspiration. The project must meet three criterial. 1) The project needs to have an end point so you know when it is complete, 2) a timeframe by which you want it completed and 3) be small enough to finish in 4-5 weeks. By creating a project with a short deadline you ensure your aspiration doesn’t get lost in the shuffle. Your dream is not a thing you’ll work on someday. You can start now.
Packets: Create or source packets of information that will help you produce the project. I learned this from Tiago Forte, who calls them “intermediate packets” but I call them packets for short. They are small things you create or find that help you produce your project.
For example, if you were writing a book, a list of topics might be one packet you’d create. You might read a research paper and take notes. Those notes would be another packet. A third packet might be an outline of chapters. As you collect these packets, you get closer and closer to completing your book.
By creating or finding packets that help you produce your project, you ensure that you don’t endlessly research without creating something.
Reading a relevant book becomes reading + taking down notes.
Watching a video becomes watching + note taking.
Interviewing a potential mentor or expert becomes ask questions + take notes.
You may notice a theme here. Many of your packets will be in the form of notes. But notes are not the only type of packets you’ll create. They are just the most common. Now let’s see what this looks like in action.
I used APP recently to make changes to an 8-week course I teach every year.
My aspiration was for students to have greater confidence as they learn our coaching process.
I brainstormed several options for improving the course and decided on one project - to add video observations to each week’s course assignments.
And here are some of the packets I found or created.
Notes I previously took on coaching sessions.
Transcripts of sessions + my annotations.
Video recordings of coaching sessions + timestamps of the relevant sections.
List of coaching sessions I reviewed with notes about which were suitable to use in training.
List of actions required to more efficiently edit the videos that I developed as the project progressed.
Each of these packets helped turn a vague project into a series of small creations that let me make the needed changes with great efficiency. But there may still be a question on your mind we’ll get to next.
What if my project takes much longer than 4-5 weeks?
You might be writing a book, building a house or planning a destination wedding. Most of these can’t be done in a short time frame. When that is the case, define a subproject that can be done in a month or so.
For writing a book you want to get published, your first project might be to create a book proposal.
When it comes to building a house, one project might be creating a blueprint to guide construction.
And your first milestone when planning a destination wedding could be drawing up a budget.
Each of these subprojects can be completed in 4-5 weeks and will move the larger project forward.
Whew! We’ve covered a lot, now it’s time for a brief summary.
To sum up:
The APP approach helps you achieve goals when the path is unclear.
The letters stand for Aspiration, Projects, Packets.
Your Aspiration can be abstract but should be motivating.
Your Projects must be specific with a defined end point with a deadline up to 4-5 weeks away.
Packets are information you create or find to help you produce the project.
If a project is too big to complete in 4-5 weeks, then define a smaller subproject.
Waiting until the path is clear, is poison for your goals. The mystery of “how-to” will be resolved by defining a project and creating your next packet. So why not start today?
Next step
As you work on your goals, you may wonder how to keep all your projects and packets organized. I show you how to do that in my tiny course called iPARA: How to organize your digital information for action. Click the link to see why people love it.