A fantastic question for everyone to think about. When was the last time you reflected on your working day? If you are brutally honest with yourself, I suspect not very often. I do hear the word  ‘rarely’ a lot when I am coaching, the most common word I hear from coachees when I ask this question. Why is this? Are we working at our best at work, are there no minor changes you can make to improve your work?

Work for the majority is routine, go to work do your job and leave. Does it have to be this way? If you are not driven why not, how about making yourself feel better, taking more ownership. This, in turn, helps self-esteem and confidence. Think about your working day daily, think what was good through the day, why and what did not go so well. What would you like to change, why and how? What is the purpose of you being there? Sometimes it is good to have the purpose for the day, week and month, always have a long-term goal and look at the small steps you can make for changes.

Reflection on your work is excellent, it is about forcing a pattern to your head. The pattern then gets formed then a new habit is created and this then becomes normal. If you need to push yourself to do this because you may lack the action in yourself, then it is a good idea to have a coach on the side to do this, to encourage you.

Reflection is great, develop the pattern, keep a diary, write a couple of things down on an evening both positive and areas you wish to change and watch the process build. The key then after reflection is to do something about it, take action.

Making the decisions and taking the actions are critical to change and believe it or not is the critical area that stops people. The procrastination that holds you back, sitting with the information and not doing anything with it.  Another big area I often hear in coaching, procrastination. Some people lack part of the cycle in RAPDA. Recognise, Analyse, Prioritise, Decide then Act. Interesting to follow RAPDA in yourself. This is used a lot in the flying and controlling aircraft world.  RAPDA, more on this in my next blog.

Claire Moody is our head coach at Target Training, and you can read more about her here.  She delivers training on coaching for managers courses, and you can learn more about these courses here and see dates here.