COMMANDMENT SIX: Thou Shalt Remain Accountable

Accountability often seals the deal on our success. AND it’s what most of us dread!

In his new book, “The 4-Hour Body,” Tim Ferriss talks about accountability systems that have proven extremely effective for weight loss, including:

• Posting your goals to a public forum like Facebook or a Goal Announcement website
• Creating a private group or email list for you and your friends where you update them on your goal and s#@! talk them in the process so that you’ll never live it down if you don’t succeed
• Creating an Accountability Group with weekly calls and/or have a buddy you talk to each morning and each evening

I encourage you to adopt at least one of these as you begin executing and moving toward your goals. This will ensure that you take action on what you learn and that your actions breed progress and profits.

At the least, I highly recommend you have an accountability partner. He or she will hold you accountable to the tasks you assign yourself each day. You can focus only on your business tasks, however I prefer to include personal goals and tasks as well since it’s all LIFE and a better life is really the BIG goal here!

And just to be clear: Your accountability partner is not here to pass judgment, give you another hand to beat yourself up with, or to nag you into doing what you otherwise would not do. These are all inappropriate uses for an accountability partner and will invalidate its effectiveness.

Instead, your accountability partner is there solely to train you to do what Wallace Wattles calls “acting in a way that causes you to more than fill your present place” in his book, “The Science of Getting Rich.” This allows you to exude a certain essence that, when encountered by others, will inspire them to want to work with you, help you, or profoundly change their own lives and ways of being as a result of encountering you.

Let’s move away from the typical goal setting fodder we’ve all read… and have some FUN!

I’ve learned working with hundreds of consultants, small business and clients that we can never assume that goal setting is a simple or easily understood process. Most businesses never bother to create tangible, quantifiable goals. Or they set a few massive goals and have no milestones for measuring and celebrating progress.

So here’s a simple approach to goal setting that keeps it fun and focused on the things that REALLY matter…

The Ten Commandments of Goal Setting

Goals are thrown around in meetings and trainings like Mickey Mouse is at Disney Land.

There’s just one problem though: most people don’t know how many elements go into setting proper goals, because a goal is more than an amount you want to see in your bank account… or a number of clients you want to hit.

Our goals define us and we must therefore be careful to define our goals. With care. With love. With integrity.

You see the funny thing about goals that I had to learn the hard way is that it’s really easy to set them too high. As we quickly feel the sting of that whip we sometimes switch to setting our goals too low. We either feel beat up or bored.

The key to creating effective goals is to know that…

"Look deeeeep into my eyes" *Photo by Jennconspiracy*

First a few quick updates…

November is going to be a massive month! I’m kicking some things into high gear and that means a bunch of freebies coming your way {think of it like a Halloween Grab Bag O’ Treats you get to indulge in for the next 30 days – and without all the weight gain and cavities! }

• In two weeks I’m releasing the complete 100% revamped… rewritten… updated and awesomified version of my freelance product (based on the original Turbo Charged Consulting) and to celebrate I’ll be shelling out some kick ass videos and blog posts on the secrets and foundations of my consulting success.
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  Look out for strategic money-maker posts on exactly where to find hungry clients… laser-focused workshop posts on the components of your sales funnel like autoresponder emails… and the big one everyone’s been asking me for:
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  How I went from nearly broke and borderline homeless to making $100,000 in a single month… all in less than 12 months’ time!
  
• 11/11 is a special day for me. Yeah, I have a thing for numbers… {and cupcakes! } I’m planning a fun surprise for y’all on that serendipitous day so look out for that! (And no, it’s not to sell you something. I’ve got a whole other fun plan for that!)
• My 30th birthday is on 11/22. Can you believe it? ME. THIRTY. I have a very heart-felt, special announcement I’ll be making to you via video that day and I would be honored for you to be here and share it with me.
• Lastly, I’ve been invited to be interviewed on Sheila Gale’s upcoming star-studded teleseries: Your Life Is Your Message on January 4th. It’s part of a 12-week FREE series where you’ll hear from Doreen Virtue, Gregg Braden, Joe Vitale, Marci Shimoff, Arielle Ford and plenty others! So run over to this page here {do it now before you forget! It’ll open in a separate window} to get free access. The live calls are starting now and will continue into January. Definitely don’t miss these!

Okay now with updates out of the way…

Here are 4 ways you can woo new clients!

I’ll be sharing WHERE you can find new clients in about a week. I’ll teach you exactly what to say or do to open up the dialogue both online and offline in person (and without cold calling!). However in this article I want to share some tried and true tactics you can use anywhere, at any point, to woo clients (or some sexy gal or fella!) so they become your greatest fans.

My latest column over at FreelanceSwitch.com:

Why would a freelancer want to establish herself as a thought leader in her industry or client niche? Well even for the most bashful of us, the day often (and quickly!) arrives when pushing hours for dollars or pounds just doesn’t quite cut it anymore.

I’m not saying everyone will be interested in this path. But if you are, then this article may just become your road map!.Ask yourself:

What if you had an additional option for making money that steadily grew over time, reinforced your freelancing efforts, landed you more clients, and required less and less of your time?

Yeah, it sounded good to me too. That’s why my client projects now take up less than 50% of my time and I focus the rest of my efforts on my own business, which includes establishing myself as a thought leader in my two primary industries: freelancing and women’s empowerment.

This dual focus has given me the success and financial freedom to travel this past year full-time and without paid work. Here’s how I did it and how you can too.

The Freelancer’s Path to Financial Freedom Via Thought Leadership

The following process will help you build a website that you can eventually make money with, either through sponsors or advertisers, or by partnering with fellow experts who have products or services they’d like to offer to your audience.

>> Click Here to Read More