People talk about wanting to accomplish big things in life – which is AWESOME – but the only way we will ever actually accomplish those big things in our life is to create an actual game plan of how we are going to make that big thing happen! A game plan need to be a specific layout of exactly how we plan to get from point A to point Z. The best game plans always start with a visual picture of what the final result will look like and then outline all the steps it will take to get there with specific dates for each to get done.

Every big thing I have accomplished in my life with my businesses throughout the year stemmed from having detailed game plans that laid out a plan for everything. I always start with something visual that helps me picture what the end result will look like – this is an important first step for me because the moment I can visualize something I start to get excited about making it happen. I always take the visuals and lay them out in a PowerPoint presentation that will act as the core of my game plan. Then I sit and make lists of all the steps that will help make that picture come about. I then create a budget for each step of the process so I know my costs involved. And then I always lay it out on a calendar that maps out exactly when each step needs to be completed for me to hit my end target date. Going through this process has always helped me to turn every business dream I have into a reality.

The same process has worked for accomplishing my personal goals as well. A perfect example of a game plan was when I built my dream home a few years ago. I started my game plan by collecting digital pictures of what I wanted each room in my house to look like when it was completed. It had pictures of molding designs I wanted, and paint colors, and furniture, and flooring, and every other detail I wanted to incorporate. I then laid those pictures out into a massive, organized PowerPoint presentation that gave a visual of exactly what I wanted my finished home to look like. That became the starting of my game plan for building my dream house. I then created spreadsheets to go with my PowerPoint that laid out budgets for each room and I created excel checklists of everything I needed to purchase in order to have each room complete. I also created a calendar schedule that laid out the timeline for everything that needed to be accomplished at each date in order for us to finish the home on schedule. All of these things became the game plan for building my dream home. And sure enough, we were able to build it and be finished by our deadline date with every room decorated exactly as I had planned.

Had I not done the work to create a game plan for building my dream home, it never would have happened. It would have just stayed a “dream” and never become a “reality”.  If I had not done a game plan for each big project within my companies they never would have happened and those dreams would not have become a reality either.

Over the years I have had people tease me about my massive Game Plan PowerPoints and my extreme Excel sheets that go with them, but as soon as people see my projections come to fruition they are always in complete awe that I was able to pull it off. But the fact is that anyone can pull off incredible things if they are just willing to set the goal of what they want to achieve and then do a Game Plan to making it happen!

Get out your Powerpoint and start your Excel sheet! It is time to make that dream come true!!

~Amy Rees Anderson