In the first two installments of our Elevate 2019 series, we explored the pitfalls of lacking accountability and not surrounding yourself with the right people.  

If you read those posts, you know you need to build accountability into your New Year’s resolutions AND find the right people to support you in achieving your biggest and most important goals in 2019.

But odds are, you still don’t have adequate accountability in your life.

And no matter how much you appreciate your family, friends, and co-workers, in thinking about your goals, you might realize that where you are right now isn’t ideal for the transformation you’re after in 2019.

So what’s next?

You know you need accountability.

You know you need to surround yourself with high achievers—people who will help you and push you to create, do, and be more.

But that’s a lot to pull together in the first few weeks of the year. 

It sounds like a life overhaul that could lead to a lot of stress and overwhelm.

It might not be sustainable.

Luckily, as I emphasized last week, you don’t have to do it all by yourself.

In fact, the help starts right here.

Get the clarity and confidence to achieve your biggest goals

So many experts I’ve talked to agree: Having ACCOUNTABILITY and surrounding yourself with the RIGHT PEOPLE are the keys to achieving your biggest most audacious goals in 2019

But creating that kind of accountability and finding the right people to motivate, push, support, and celebrate you can seem overwhelming.

Next Thursday January 10th, I am going to be hosting an epic live webinar exclusively for my email subscribers that will give you the clarity, confidence, and accountability you need to crush your goals without stress and overwhelm. You can sign up to register here before the webinar fills up.

If you want to brave the stress and overwhelm yourself and are looking for some strategies, here are a few expert-approved ways to tap into accountability while strengthening supportive relationships in your life.

Join a Mastermind Group

Surely you’ve heard the word “Mastermind” used all over the place – it’s kind of a hip buzzword in personal develop and business right now. 

But you probably have the wrong idea of what a TRUE mastermind is. So do most people.

They aren’t a willy-nilly, slap-together group of random people who just met in a Facebook group. They also aren’t a group coaching program led by a guru or coach.

A true Mastermind is a curated peer mentoring group of high achievers that grow, learn, evolve and support one another to achieve their goals. True Mastermind Groups have a rigorously-vetted mix of people, a proven structure for collaboration, and a professional facilitator to manage the process.

A tight group (no more than 10 people or so) of curated, like-minded high achievers and entrepreneurs brought together to pull each other through, give ideas, and offer strategy to help one another.

If you can find a great one, Mastermind Groups are the absolute best way to create accountability and surround yourself with the right people to achieve the big, audacious goals in your life.

Remember the story of Scott Gerber (who I interviewed earlier this year).

Scott started his career by lying about his age while he was in college to get big high-profile clients for his growing video production company, he spent lavishly on business dinners to impress people and stumbled through a series of devastating mistakes that left him nearly bankrupt when his company imploded.

This was a wakeup call for Scott. As he told me in our interview, “I had no one around me of real value, and I don't mean value in the sense of money or connections. I mean people that could’ve helped me in the rough times.”

He had a realization that he needed to surround himself with the right people – and went on to create the Young Entrepreneur’s Council and several other thriving businesses.

Scott knew he needed the right people in his life. “It wasn't to create a sphere of influence around young entrepreneurs,” he says. “It was because I genuinely wanted to have real conversations with people that had similar experiences to me.”

That’s the real power of peer focused mastermind groups (versus guru or coach-lead), but it’s important that everyone in the group is qualified and can bring their own real-world experiences to the party too.

Real Mastermind Groups can short-cut learning curves and help you see your blind spots – because you get input and advice from others who have gone before you.

They can also bring vetted resources and contacts to your life and business. It’s like having the network of the entire group available.

Another huge benefit of being in a true Mastermind group is that it’s an instant support system of people who “get” you. Your group is there to support and encourage you. They’re there to pick you up after big losses and to celebrate with you after big wins.

Scott could have used all of this and more on his own journey – and once he surrounded himself with the right kind of people his life and career transformed seemingly overnight.

Identify and Spend More Time with High Performers

When I talked to Marc Effron, founder and president of the Talent Strategy Group and publisher of Talent Quarterly Magazine, he shared some insights that inspire a simple step toward community and awareness:

Join a professional organization.

He says an important way you can invest in your professional success is “to understand whose opinions are most valued in the environment you work in.”

“It may be that your best friend is a high performer and you should listen to him or her, [or] maybe they're the office slacker and their opinions probably aren't quite as valued.”

Step one, he says, is to identify your high-performing peers.

From there, you can get to know other high-performing leaders at your boss’s level.

And what better venue to do this in than a professional organization—which exists for the purpose of networking and talking shop?

Effron says you should ask yourself, “Who are other high-performing leaders at my boss's level who I would like to get some feedback from?”

Joining a professional organization and multiplying your contacts will give you opportunities to ask questions like “I'm trying to get better at X. Do you have any suggestions for me for how I can do that?”

And, “I'm trying to get even better at my job. I’d love some more input. Can you tell me the few people who are at my level who I should speak with and who might have some great suggestions?”

Effron says you can “grab a cup of coffee with [someone] and say, ‘Look, I'm really trying to get better at what I do. I'm trying to be really open about the fact that there are things I can improve at. Would you have a suggestion for me about something that I could do going forward that would make me more effective?’”

Harness the Power of Your Peers

Jenny Blake, bestselling author and career and business strategist, used to work in Training and Career Development at Google. Now she devotes all her time to her own projects. 

One of the strategies she used to make these pivots? Working with accountability buddies or what she calls “friendtors.”

“I find [it] very awkward [to] try and ask a stranger, ‘Will you be my mentor?’” she told me when we talked.

She went on to say, “I’m a big proponent of ‘friendtors,’ people who are at your level, who you can set up shared accountability with and shared support. It’s okay if they don’t know more than you. It’s about checking in, sharing wins, setting up regular calls.”

So what does this actually look like?

Blake says she and one friend do “30, 30, 30 calls.”

“We catch up for 30 minutes and then we’ll do 30 minutes of brainstorming for his business and then 30 minutes for mine.” 

She and another friend have accountability email threads. “We just start an email thread at the beginning of the month and we check in about what our goals are and what we’re getting done as we go.”

Call them a “friendtor,” a buddy, or an accountability partner...this person can up your goal-getting game and help you benefit from a consistent sense of community—no matter how small—in 2019.

An idea that brings us full circle to Dr. Sean Young’s lesson last week that “social support and competition and other people” are what really get us to stick with things.”

The most effortless and powerful way to get results

If you’re ready to get started creating the clarity, confidence, and accountability you need to crush your goals without stress and overwhelm in 2019 you don’t have to go it alone.

Remember, accountability and having the right people in your life are the keys to achieving your biggest most audacious goals in 2019 and I will be revealing the most effortless and powerful way to create this in your life in an exclusive live webinar next Thursday, January 10th.

Click here to register now before the webinar fills up.