I recently wrote about asking for an umbrella in a restaurant.
Since then I’ve been percolating.
It’s reasonable to assume that if you don’t ask for something you’re unlikely to get it.
And that if you ask for what you want, the chances of getting it increase.
However, when I reflect on a lot of my client work, the bigger challenge is realising or deciding what it is you want.
If you don’t know what success looks like then it’s difficult to know when you get there. One of the best questions you can ask (in a ton of contexts from getting a decision from the board, looking for the perfect outfit for an occasion or designing a team away day) is ‘What does success look like?’
Do you know what success looks like?
When you know and can articulate what success looks like you can then plan how you are going to achieve success.
This is why goal setting can be a really helpful exercise. Whether it’s for the next week, month, year or longer, knowing what success looks like means you can focus on steps to get there.
Even when we do know what success looks like we often hold back on asking for what we want. Or perhaps it doesn’t occur to us. For example, it took us a few moments to ask for the umbrella.
There are so many reasons why we don’t ask for what we want. Perhaps we feel uncomfortable or lack confidence to ask for help or don’t want to be rejected. Maybe we don’t like being thought of as pushy (women more than men in my experience feel this). Often it doesn’t even occur to us that we could ask.
Let me give you an example. Recently I was working with a coaching client about their next career move. We talked about what success looked like and what they wanted. They said they wanted their managers job – and that their manager was leaving.
I asked if they’d talked to their manager about going for their job.
No.
We agreed they would have a conversation with their manager.
They did. Their manager is now coaching them into their role. The role they wanted.
Take action today
- For any situation get clarity by asking yourself ‘What does success looks like?’
- Then consider what your steps are to get there.
- Consider what (if anything) is stopping you from achieving the success.
- Can you identify what is stopping you? Here’s where you might need a bit of help (coaching mentoring or a chat with a friend or colleague) to unlock what is blocking you.
- Take action – for example make the ask.
- It works and you get what you want – hurrah!
- It doesn’t work, and you don’t get what you want, you’re still no worse off than before you asked and consider what you’ve learned.
If you’re stuck on what success looks like it can be really helpful to give some thought to your goals. You can do this on your own, with friends or colleagues, with a coach or as part of a facilitated session in the Lucidity Network.
If you’d like to talk about coaching drop me a line at lucy@lucidity.org.uk and if you’re interested in joining the Lucidity Network there’s more information here.
What are your next steps?