How to Plan a Team to Harnesses Success

“None of us, including me, ever do great things. But we can all do small things with great love, and together we can do something wonderful.” Mother Teresa

If you were writing the Acknowledgement page of a book, who would you recognize, thank and appreciate for helping you set goals, define obstacles, keep you accountable, praying for you, mentoring you and keeping you on track with your passions? Have you ever thought about your team? A team is a combined effort of a group of people who have a common interest or goal.

Are you intentional about who is on your team? Are you on someone else’s team by asking them how their plans, their school, their life, their hobbies are going and offering assistance? Do you long for others to be on your team that checks up on you and keeps you accountable?

“The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team.” Phil Jackson

Each member of a team has different responsibilities. I have people I lean on while writing my book about my adoption story. I should ask them to be more involved. I have a good friend who has just found her biological family. I have a friend who is a publisher. I have a network of adoptees that teach me different aspects of adoption that I never experienced, but it helps me understand in a larger sense about adoptee issues.

Having a team to help you achieve your goals is so important. Do you have a plan of action to share with your team or help you determine who should be on your team? Do you have goals written down or just in your head? Do you know the obstacles you must overcome?

Let me briefly describe the process I use when I teach adults about achieving goals at our local benevolence center. Then, you can determine where your process needs tweaking for a better outcome. You can use this to ask friends to be on your team to help you in specific area.

1. Set aside a good amount of time for reflection, prayer and thought.

2. Write down goals for each area in your life: emotional/mental health; physical health; spiritual health; social/family/relational health; career/recreational health; financial health. Make them specific and easy to track.

3. What are the desires of your heart? Is it to write a book? Teach a Bible study? Forgive a hurt? Volunteer? Plant a garden? Declutter (yes, please!)?

4. Create three action steps for each goal. The first one can be easy like just gaining the information and knowledge… Google it.

5. Write down obstacles and strongholds keeping you from your goals and desires.

6. Make a deadline for your progress. Make deadlines specific.

7. Ask for support in achieving your goals from a team you trust. Find mentors, cheerleaders, supporters, people farther along than you with the same goal who can encourage you. Be specific about how they can help.

Now that you know the process, I bet you have also determined where your process is broken. Is it not making your dreams and goals a priority? Is it not making action steps towards your goals and thinking your will eventually get to it? My breakdown is #7.

Sadly, when I started my book about my adoption and how to set yourself up for success, my acknowledgement page would have been VERY short. I admit I didn’t really have a team. Even now, I have people who are sitting on the bench waiting to be put in the game, but I have not coached them on how to help me and what I need from them to succeed. My publisher friend, my marketing and my friend who is also adopted are priceless. I just have not drafted them. Shame on me! Oh, how much farther along I would be!

Some of my obstacles are time, money and being too independent. Excuses! Excuses! I see people who write books with small children at home or a full time job and my excuses crumble. I fear that if I don’t finish this book, I will be just like all the other people who say they want to write a book and fail…there are thousands. I fear if I write this book people will reject its proven contents and that scares me.

“Find a group of people who challenge you and inspire you and spend a lot of time with them, and it will change your life.” Amy Poehler

I encourage you to go through these 7 steps and find where your process breaks down. I have waded through all these steps many times and know the struggles when there is a lost piece of the puzzle.

For a more in-depth study on the process above, I created a course called 15 Days to a Purpose-Full You

“Small steps equal a large gain towards your goal.” Erin McEndree