1/01/25 Weekly Email
Hi All,
Welcome to 2025! I wanted to get everyone’s year off to a good start so I spent far too much time writing about New Year’s Resolutions. If you aren’t interested in goal-setting or are already an expert feel free to skip to the bottom. I’ve included a 2-minute survey asking for feedback on our organization. That said, I want to help people form better and more important goals in the next year so please stick with me - this is a long read but potentially super helpful for your health.
Let’s start with a shocking statement - I’m not the biggest fan of many people’s New Year’s Resolutions. First, I think many people want to be “healthier” but limit themselves mainly to goals around weight-loss. Being healthy is not just being a certain weight - it also means eating enough vitamins, sleeping the recommended amount, and having a thriving social life. If you want to be “healthier,” great, just form a couple of goals that encompass more than just caloric restriction. Second, I think many people (myself included at times) think of goal-setting as a way of making themselves a more “productive” individual and not necessarily just a happier person. Wanting to be a better version of yourself is a great thing to strive towards, but do it because it will make you more confident and proud of yourself, not just because it will make you a better worker. We all need happy lives outside of the workplace and we shouldn’t limit improvement to things that will look good on a resume. Pick some goals that you’re genuinely interested in achieving, not just things that you can talk about in job interviews (If you are interested in career development, try to do as much of it as possible on the clock. Taking Employee Development classes is a great way to improve without using your own time or funds). Finally, many people set goals that are for themselves and not for or with people in their lives. This intuitively makes sense (you can control your personal actions a lot more than you can control other’s actions), but I think it de-emphasizes opportunities to build relationships or communities. It’s actually easy to set goals that include other people - either talk to them directly and form the goals in tandem (ie “Hi, significant other, can we set some goals related to spending more time together?”) or set goals for yourself that involve engaging people directly (ie, “I want to host 3 dinner parties for my friends this year.”)
With that in mind, here are a few fun sample resolutions to consider prior to my discussion of setting resolutions that will make an impact. These won’t be things that appeal to or apply to everyone but they can be a jumping-off point for forming resolutions that will be meaningful to you.
Compliment someone every day
Wear sunscreen whenever you’re outside
Make plans with a friend once a month
Sleep 8 hours a night on average
Tell your partner/children/parents something you love about them every week
Eat 3 vegetables a day, on average
Floss every time you brush your teeth
Read 20 books, 5 of which have to be recommended by friends/family
Use each of the Xmas presents you received at least once and let the gift-giver know how much you enjoyed it
Clean up your backyard. Put out the junk you’ve been saving for bulk trash when your week comes around
Download an app to cut down on phone usage/switch your screen to black and white mode
Visit 5 museums
Learn a new skill you’ve always wanted to be able to do (juggling, card tricks, hand-stands, ripping an apple in half with your bare hands, whistling, etc)
Paint a room in your house a calming color
Fix that broken item that you haven’t gotten around to. Alternatively, donate or recycle it.
Plant an edible tree in your yard. Do a little research in advance or get some help to reduce the chance it dies tragically in the summer.
Make a list of 25 old movies you want to see and watch them (need help? Pick a specific genre (“I want to see 25 heist films”), a list of critically acclaimed films (“I want to see the last 25 Critic’s Choice Best Film winners”) or an actor you like (“I want to see 25 Jack Black films”).
Start a bookclub, a dungeons and dragons group, or a running club with some friends
Join a local organization doing work you care about. Volunteer with them at least 5 times
Leave 10 reviews ranting and raving about some of your favorite local businesses
Run for a position in an organization you care about (don’t forget UAEA has elections coming up…)
Meditate 3-5x per week for at least 20 minutes a session
Stop using electronic devices an hour before bed/install a blue light filter on your screens
Sign up for 3-5 Tempe Educational Development classes on any topics that interest you (destressing, Excel for beginners, Crucial Conversations, etc).
Try 3 new hairstyles. This applies even if you’re a man - this could be the year you bring the handlebar mustache look back.
With that out of the way, let’s talk about setting goals that will make a significant difference in your life.
Many organizations (including Tempe) have embraced the SMART model of goal-setting in recent years. If you’re not familiar, SMART is an acronym that stands for specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-oriented: any goal you set should meet each of those 5 criteria. These goals could be professional (ie “I want to grow my sales 5% each month this coming year”) or personal (ie “I want to spend 20 more minutes playing with my kids every day this year”). While this format makes intuitive sense, recent studies of organizations that use SMART goals have consistently found that the structure incentivizes people to mentally set low goals, things that are not just achievable but also almost guaranteed to happen regardless of what the goal-setter does. People also tend to forget about their goals as the year progresses since very few companies check in on progress more than once or twice. The research is limited to professional goal-setting but one can imagine the same applies to individual goals that are structured in the same way.
The new research suggests that successful organizations (and individuals) use a different goal-setting strategy, something now colloquially referred to as the “FAST” method. This acronym stands for frequently-discussed, ambitious, specific, and transparent. In terms of forming the goals, they only need to be ambitious and specific, but they also need to be publicly available to and frequently-discussed by your peers (co-workers/supervisors in the workplace, friends/family at home). This tweak means both that the person who formed the goal and their peers are constantly thinking about ways of achieving the goal and there’s a support network to help people catch-up if they begin to fall behind. This support network also doesn’t need to be mean about it - sometimes they know the goal-setter better than the goal-setter knows themselves and they can provide crucial feedback if goals are too ambitious, if the goal-setter isn’t working on the goals in a productive way, or if the goal-setter is trying to do too many things at once.
I bring this up because I think the same principles that help successful organizations can help the individuals in our group. I strongly encourage people to set goals that are ambitious but also to find some people who can frequently check-in on their progress and hold them accountable. I really want UAEA to be a community that people can learn to rely upon - if possible, I would urge you to find a friend in UAEA, exchange goals, and then check-in at random intervals throughout the year. Don’t know anyone in UAEA or don’t feel comfortable asking someone you work directly with? Feel free to fill out this survey and I’ll match you with another employee by January 15th. If you’re not comfortable sharing things with your peers, I am also more than happy to play the same role - feel free to fill out this survey if you want me to check in on your progress throughout 2025.
One final thing - resolutions are not just for individuals - they can also be for groups of people. UAEA’s Exec Team would love to set some goals for 2025 and we need your feedback to do so. Please take this quick survey and let us know what you liked about our work in 2024, what you’d like us to improve in 2025, and any other thoughts you have about our organization. This survey requires no email or employee ID to take so please feel free to be as open and honest as possible - after all, we can’t fix problems we don’t know about.
Looking forward to a great year,