Already Broke Your New Year Resolution? Try This Scrum Inspired Method Instead

Most people don’t make it past the first month of the year before breaking their new year resolutions. And the primary reason is that most of us fail to put a plan in place. And even if there’s a plan, the hustle of routine life takes over and the resolutions are forgotten.

Also, it’s a human tendency to think that we can make drastic changes to our life overnight. While it’s good to have big hairy audacious goals, but it’s important to be remember that big goals require consistent efforts.

“Most people overstimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in ten years” – Bill Gates (probably)

While working with agile scrum teams for the past 7 years, I realized that the key reason for their widespread success is that they plan, act, and reflect on small goals consistently. These small goals add up to deliver some amazingly complex projects with time.

So I took my learnings from working with scrum teams to come up with a method that helps you take a path of continuous achievement and improvement.

Step 0: Create a  bucket list (Your life’s backlog/roadmap)

If you don’t have a bucket list, then take out time and start creating one now. Think of your core values, ambitions, and dreams, or simply jot down goals across categories like travel, self-improvement, achievements, family, etc.

A dipstick check before you add an item to your bucket list should be that it should give you joy while you are working on it and it should give you a sense of fulfillment/achievement once completed.

P.S. There are many good online tools that you can use to manage your bucket list. Here’s the one that I use

P.P.S. If you are still struggling with bucket list ideas, try the Flip-It! exercise.

Step 1: Identify a Focus Item

In this step, go through your bucket list and pick one item that you are going to focus on in the immediate future. Ensure that it is something on which you can make some form of progress within a week’s time.

While some items can be finished within a short duration of time with focussed efforts, there are going to be items that are going to take a lifetime to complete. If you decide to focus on such an item, identify a smaller goal that takes you closer to the end goal and treat it as your focus item.

For example, a bucket list item for me is to write a book. But with my current full-time job and other commitments, I don’t have the time and energy to start writing a book and take it to completion. So I decided that a good goal for the near future would be to create a habit of writing. So I made “write at least 1000 words daily for the next 28 days” as my focus item. Once I achieve it, I’ll revisit my bucket list to figure out my next focus item (or continue with the current one).

Step 2: The Weekly Retro Hour

Once you have your first focus item, go ahead and put a weekly recurring 1-hour block on your calendar. This is the hour where you are going to reflect on your week and plan for the next week. This is the best thing that you can do to keep you focused on your goals in the routine hustle of life.

First 30 minutes: Keep your bucket list, the focus item & the list of previous week’s actionables in front of you. Now, reflect on your past week and write down things/activities/behaviors that you need: To Continue,  More of, Less of, Start, Stop.

Next 30 minutes: Look at the things that you have written down and find out the actionables for the next week

Step 3: Work!

No amount of planning can help you achieve a goal unless you work on it. So use the list of actionables from the retro hour at the start of each day of the week and make consistent effort to complete them one by one.

Instead of planning day by day, I prefer to pick up items from the list depending on my energy and mental inclination throughout the week/day.

Don’t worry if you are not able to complete all the actionables of the week. As long as you are consistent with your retro hours, things will eventually fall in place!

Step 4: Celebrate!

Whenever you complete a focus item or a bucket list item, ensure that you celebrate it.

Share it with friends/family, share it on social media, put up a picture on your wall, go out for drinks, or anything else that works for you. Don’t spend your entire life waiting to achieve that big goal.

But ensure that at the end of the celebration, you’ve identified the next focus item!