Do you have ambition? If you’re not sure, then tell me what your strongest desire is and how you’re working to achieve it.
One of my strongest desires, like so many others, is to be successful. The question is, do I want to be successful in my company, in my entire industry, or in the world? Well, being successful in the world requires being successful in my entire industry, and that requires being successful in my company. So ultimately, we need to dream big but start small.
Ambition means you have a strong desire to achieve something that requires hard work and determination. Many of us have desires, but we lack the ambition to seek out or create new opportunities, to face adversity without hesitation, and to learn from every possible mistake. If you’re lacking ambition to achieve your desires, take heart in knowing that you can build your ambition!
To me, ambition is like a muscle. The harder I work towards something the harder I want to keep working. Here are my 5 steps to build your ambition:
1) Evaluate your desires
We can often be multi-passionate, which leads us to make little or no improvement in multiple areas. Step 1 is to get clear on your strongest desire so that you can focus more of your attention and energy on that one area. Be as specific as you can! For Wish Group, my strongest desire is to be a success in my company and be certified as a “great place to work.” This desire highlights certain goals that I need to achieve, such as building on company culture, continuing to communicate directly with all employees, planning new and creative ways to connect the company, and much more.
Building on my ambition to be a success in my company, will lead to bigger success since I am laying strong foundations. Without the clarity of the desire I am most passionate about, I would be working on too many projects and stretching myself thin, which wouldn’t lead to much success in any area.
2) Seek out experts
You don’t need to do everything on your own to consider yourself successful. Seek out support from family and friends, and seek out advice from other experts. Talking with other experts, even in different fields from your own, will motivate you, give you actionable ideas, and keep you focused.
3) Create a plan
Now that you’ve narrowed down your desires and met with others who have built success, you need to write out a plan to get you from where you are right now, to the end goal of achieving your strongest desire. The easiest way to do this is usually a work-back plan where you write down everything that would need to be in place to consider your goal achieved. Once you have that list, you have all of your sub-goals written out. Determine which sub-goals need to be achieve first, and you’re already on your way!
4) Evaluate periodically
Some desires can be achieved quickly, while others take years to complete. Ambition can fade, which is why we need to work to build it. To measure your progress towards sub-goals and your end goal, create a schedule to evaluate yourself. You need to measure your progress in the same way each time, and ideally at intervals that allow you to make progress. If you measure your progress every day, you probably won’t see much movement towards your goal and that can be discouraging. Measuring your progress every week or month is ideal for most goals. If you wait to measure quarterly, you may lose track of tasks that are moving the needle and this could stall your progress.
5) Reward milestones
Once your evaluation plan is ready to go, you will know when you reach certain milestones. Each time you reach a milestone, such as accomplishing a sub-goal, reward yourself and celebrate! The most joy in success comes from your journey towards it, so don’t lose sight of your smaller successes on your way to achieving your strongest desire. Once you achieve it, you’re going to be moving on to your next goal anyway! There is no stopping ambition, there is only letting it dwindle away or building its fire.
So, tell me what your strongest desire is in a comment and how you’re working to achieve it.
Let’s build our ambition so we continue to reach success!
Frank
My number one immediate goal, is to become the top Permanent Recruiter at Peoplesource Staffing Solutions. Each morning, upon awaking, I partake in habits, routines, discipline, structure, attitudes & work ethic, dedicated to moving me closer to that end & ultimately, to provide me with the satisfaction & fulfilment that I can only feel, as the result of a job well done & the accomplishment of a personal desire or achievement.
I also work each day to be the best person that I can be, appreciating all of the gifts & blessings which have been bestowed upon me. The combination of these two goals in my life, provide me with a strong sense of self & a feeling of serenity, peace & joy & this enables me to look at myself in the mirror & like what I see.
It sounds like you have a solid routine that keeps you on an ambitious path! Each day is a new opportunity; it sounds like you put a lot of thought and hard work into each and every day. What you said about “the satisfaction & fulfillment that I can only feel, as the result of a job well done” is so true. If we don’t know what our ambitions are, we wont know what we are trying to achieve or what marks a job well done. Being able to feel satisfaction from our achievement is so important.