I have a really hard time distinguishing between my professional and personal goals. That’s because my professional goals almost always spring from who I am as a person.
Lucky me, for sure, but it’s not always a good thing to have overlapping goals.
Many of us in churches and non-profits can have this problem because the big picture of our jobs align with our personal values. And the day-to-day specifics of our jobs often help us accomplish things that are important to us personally.
For example, a pastor might have a sermon series (necessary for her job), that will eventually amount to a book manuscript (nice for her job, but not necessary).
But it’s still important to distinguish between personal and professional goals. Here’s why:
Why You Should Distinguish Between Personal and Professional Goals
Even though the lines are blurry, we should still try to distinguish between personal and professional goals so we can put our energies in the appropriate places.
It’s far too easy to pour all our energy into one area of our lives, and ignore other important areas.
If all your energy goes into the day-to-day demands of your job, you won’t have the energy to develop long term projects. If you only put energies into strictly professional categories, you won’t have breathing room for creative play and relationships.
Instead of “Personal and Professional,” Try These Three Categories
Here’s what I’ve done with my goal setting:
I set three kinds of goals:
- Goals that are specific and exclusive to my job
- Goals that are important to my long term career and/or goals that benefit both me personally and the church where I work
- Goals that are specific and exclusive to me personally
So that sermon series a pastor might develop? It would start out in the first category, but as it was turned into a book manuscript, it would probably shift into the second category.
Or to make the example personal: writing this blog post is in the second category. It’s not necessary or required for my job. But both my church and I benefit from the thinking that motivates me to write it.
I think the second category is the most interesting here, because that overlap between strictly professional and strictly personal is the space for creative growth. It’s the space for the things that push us to develop our skills and explore new paths. It’s the space for professional dreaming.
Unfortunately, it’s also the space that many churches don’t value in their staff members. Too many churches expect their staff members to be static — to have a specific skill set, and just use those skills over and over, without any expectation or support for growth. But what a missed opportunity, both for the staff members and for the church! That overlap is the space for long term growth and health.
I’m curious: how do you set goals when your personal and professional identities overlap? What strategies have you used?
