focus

Are They SMART Goals in a Dumb Pond?
photo shows a ripple growing in a blue pond with green trees in the background

Use SMART goals.

Be smart about it.

Work smarter, not harder.

You’ve probably heard this advice at a juncture in life; maybe you’ve even said it to someone else. Goals don’t get us very far unless they are explicit, meaningful, and can be tracked. Without them, aren’t they just dreams? “Hope is not a plan,” I’ve heard it said.

None of this is meant to be cynical, but I’m thinking about an important distinction: having “smart” goals won’t matter if they’re pointed in a “dumb” direction. So let’s get out of that framework. Smart and dumb are relative anyway (not to mention judgmental!).

The fit of a goal matters. For those of us youngest children who ever wore hand-me-downs, you know that even the stuff in the best shape isn’t quite right if it wasn’t picked for you. Alignment of a goal matters too: the thing better fit into the big picture. Does achieving a big purchase now help me live the life I want, without side-tracking my long-term goals? Just an example.

And your goals stay yours. Then it’s part of our job to make sure our strategies stay aimed at those goals.

We, too, strive for good fit. We don’t splash around in “opportunities” that don’t align with our principles. We seek bargains, we focus on owning the orchard for the fruit crop, we avoid stampedes. If it’s not in alignment, it could be a distraction or a tangent.

Jane Fonda once put it nicely: “If I want to make ripples, I better be sure I’m throwing my pebbles into the right pond.”

“Right” is relative to your life, your vision. We’re just happy to be part of the effort. Time to check in on your goals and their direction? Call or email, anytime.

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Play the audio version of this post below:

SMART Goals in a Dumb Pond? – 228Main.com Presents: The Best of Leibman Financial Services

This text is available at https://www.228Main.com/.

SMART Goals in a Dumb Pond?
photo shows a ripple growing in a blue pond with green trees in the background

Use SMART goals.

Be smart about it.

Work smarter, not harder.

You’ve probably heard this advice at a juncture in life; maybe you’ve even said it to someone else. Goals don’t get us very far unless they are explicit, meaningful, and can be tracked. Without them, aren’t they just dreams? “Hope is not a plan,” I’ve heard it said.

None of this is meant to be cynical, but I’m thinking about an important distinction: having “smart” goals won’t matter if they’re pointed in a “dumb” direction. So let’s get out of that framework. Smart and dumb are relative anyway (not to mention judgmental!).

The fit of a goal matters. For those of us youngest children who ever wore hand-me-downs, you know that even the stuff in the best shape isn’t quite right if it wasn’t picked for you. Alignment of a goal matters too: the thing better fit into the big picture. Does achieving a big purchase now help me live the life I want, without side-tracking my long-term goals? Just an example.

And your goals stay yours. Then it’s part of our job to make sure our strategies stay aimed at those goals.

We, too, strive for good fit. We don’t splash around in “opportunities” that don’t align with our principles. We seek bargains, we focus on owning the orchard for the fruit crop, we avoid stampedes. If it’s not in alignment, it could be a distraction or a tangent.

Jane Fonda once put it nicely: “If I want to make ripples, I better be sure I’m throwing my pebbles into the right pond.”

“Right” is relative to your life, your vision. We’re just happy to be part of the effort. Time to check in on your goals and their direction? Call or email, anytime.

Want content like this in your inbox each week? Leave your email here.

Play the audio version of this post below:

SMART Goals in a Dumb Pond? – 228Main.com Presents: The Best of Leibman Financial Services

This text is available at https://www.228Main.com/.

Go Hard, Breathe Easy

running feet (002)

Being calm seems to come easier to some. Maybe it’s a natural disposition, but for some folks we know, they went hard until they could breathe easy.

Many of our friends and clients have what they have as a result of a lifetime of work and savings. They’ve weathered storms and chose to ignore fads. They decided on some goals and set things to work toward those goals.

Those things didn’t happen all at once. But each of us can choose a little hard now to take it easier, later. The costs of deferring pain are sometimes far too high—and we don’t realize it until it’s too late. It’s credit payments that pile up. It’s deferred maintenance that we wake up one morning to discover is now an emergency. It’s a routine that felt too hard to keep up, and now our wellbeing is anything but well.

Is it possible to buy yourself some calm, even in times of challenge? Those may be the best times to invest in some calm.

Keep your emergency savings at a level that feels right for your family. Keep working your plans; make them automatic where possible.

Know that this challenge will not last forever. (In fact, a new best and a new worst will always await us. Such is life.) We can hope that each new challenge will be more meaningful. We can hope each will make us wiser and will cause less damage.

It won’t just happen that way. Some may be born with more calm, but some of us go hard until things aren’t so hard.

Can you work with something hard today? It may help you breathe easier tomorrow. Clients, if you would like to talk about this or anything else, please email us or call.

Rocks, Pebbles, and Sand

© Can Stock Photo / Elenathewise

I recently heard the simple lesson about rocks and pebbles and sand again. You probably know it.

If you take an empty jar and fill it with rocks, you can still add pebbles and shake it until it is full again. Then you can fill it again with sand. The pebbles fit in around the rocks, and the sand fills in around the pebbles. Everything fits.

But if you empty it the jar and try to refill it first with the sand, then the pebbles, and finally the rocks, it comes out differently. The rocks will not all fit.

The moral of the story: focus on the big things, and do not let the little things get in your way. We each are happier and more effective when we have thought about our priorities and acted on them first. When we have time to take care of less important matters when they fit in. When we aren’t focused on little things that just bog us down.

We have rocks – priorities – in our personal lives, in our relationships with others, in our work or business. Our best lives may be when we can put all of our rocks from all parts of our lives into the jar, thinking about priorities and taking action. And keeping the sand out of the works, no matter the source.

Narrowing the focus to you, what are the rocks in your financial plans and planning, the big priorities? Let’s work on them first, and get to the fine points later.

In our work for you, the rocks are doing our research and taking care of portfolios, handling the service you need so your money connects to your life, and communicating with you every way we can.

Rocks – pebbles – sand. Clients, if you would like to talk about this or anything else, please email us or call.

Who We Strive To Be

© Can Stock Photo / edharcanstock

We have been reading the work of the late Donald Clifton of the Gallup Organization recently. The idea of working from your strengths was central to his work. As we think about building the optimal kind of organization to help you make the most of your position, what kind of strengths do we need?

In collaborative work such as ours with you, a deep relationship of mutual trust is a most useful foundation. This is the hallmark of what Clifton calls the Relator strength, or theme. Rather than meet many strangers, hoping to find some that might do business, the Relator seeks close relationships with those they know. We invest our time in communicating with you and working on your business, not hunting strangers to turn into clients.

The Strategic strength enables people to sort through the clutter to find the best path forward, to see patterns where others see complexity. Thinking about your goals in the context of the investment universe, and whole range of financial planning tactics, this skill might be mandatory.

The Focus strength gives people the ability to concentrate on goals, set a course, and stay on track. That is a good description of what we are trying to do here at 228 Main. The Achiever strength helps get things done, stay productive, and work effectively.

In the dynamic world we live in, change is constant. Technology advances, the economy and markets go through their cycles, and tax law changes. The Learner strength is how people adapt and thrive as the world evolves.

One of the blessings of the challenges we’ve faced: we had to figure out how to delegate, how to depend on a team approach, how to work together to get you what you need. We are striving to build a diverse team where each member works from their strengths, happily and effectively, to take care of business for you.

Clients, if you would like to talk about this or anything else, please email us or call.

Content in this material is for general information only and not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual.

What Are You Looking At?

© Can Stock Photo / sanayamirza

In planning, we take a look at the world in which we operate. Our plans need to be grounded in reality to have a chance to work out. If I plan to learn to fly by flapping my arms vigorously, the laws of biology and physics are going to have an impact.

When we look at the world, two kinds of things are especially pertinent. Challenges are the obstacles to our success. The stuff in between the challenges are possibilities. The Wright brothers evidently spent no time trying the arm-flapping thing, or fussing about the challenges of physics and biology. Eventually, one of their possibilities was converted into the accomplishment of flight.

The way some people talk about challenges, fighting them or overcoming them seems to be a key element of success. In that line of thinking, challenges occupy a central role.

I have been in a situation where the challenges seemed impossible. In fact, many have failed to overcome the same kind of challenges. Reflecting later on this chapter in life, a surprising realization emerged.

Under the pressures of the situation, I had no time to think about anything but the possibilities. After the initial planning, the challenges turned out to be totally irrelevant.

The realization: when you focus on your possibilities, your challenges disappear.

Thus the question in the title. What are you looking at? Your focus, your perception, these things change the world.

We’ll be thinking about this more. There are applications to other parts of our work for you. In the meantime, if you would like to talk about this or anything else, please email us or call.

Hit ’em Where They Ain’t

© Can Stock Photo / dehooks

Investors can learn a lot from Willie Keeler, one of the smallest major league baseball players in history. Wee Willie stood 5’4” and weighed 140 pounds.

Playing from 1892 to 1910, Willie was a prolific hitter, with a batting average of .345 over that long career. He explained his success with words that have become part of baseball lore:

“Keep your eye on the ball, and hit ‘em where they ain’t.”

We believe it makes sense to strive to understand investment opportunities, researching companies, trends, and economic developments to try to gain an edge. This is what it means to “keep your eye on the ball.”

As contrarians, we seek to avoid stampedes. If the crowd is there, we probably want to be somewhere else. As Warren Buffett once said, “be greedy when others are fearful, and fearful when others are greedy.” Isn’t this the investment version of “hit ‘em where they ain’t?”

It would be interesting to know whether Wee Willie Keeler did any investing. Did his investing philosophy match his baseball hitting philosophy?

We cannot know the answer to that. But we do know, our investing philosophy matches up very well. “Keep your eye on the ball, and hit ‘em where they ain’t.”
Clients, if you would like to talk about his or anything else, please email us or call.

The opinions voiced in this material are for general information only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual.

All investing involves risk including loss of principal. No strategy assures success or protects against loss.

Passion and Indifference

© Can Stock Photo / Vicheslav0

“Indifference is as important as passion.” Organizational expert and author Robert Sutton (no, not THAT Bob Sutton) included this on his list of 15 things he believes—his core principles.

In recent years, seeing the occasional life and death struggle up close, juggling time constraints and geographical complications, most of the non-essentials have been stripped from life. Time and energy must be focused on the things that really matter.

Health and family are at the top of the list. But business provides the resources for the necessities of health and the niceties that keep life worth living. So 228 Main is really integral to everything else. It is fair to say I am passionate about my work for you.

What makes room for our passions, our priorities, is indifference to many other things. If it has a spark plug in it, chances are good that I am indifferent to it. If it is on television, ditto. Worrying about my appearance? That would have to rise a thousand places to get on the bottom of my list. Yardwork, fine wine, dust, arguing with strangers on the internet, complaining about things beyond my control…we do not have enough space to list the things to which I am indifferent.

Connecting with you, time with family and those I love, attending to health, the economy and markets, striving to grow your buckets, building an effective organization, these are the things that matter to me now. It is an interrelated, integrated life.

We all have interests, preferences, and our own ways to regenerate. But we can’t focus on our passions unless we let go of a lot of things that really don’t make much difference. Wise clients, mastering the art of contented retirement, made this point to me recently. Many things that seemed important enough to worry about years ago don’t even appear on their radar anymore—indifference is the word.

Clients, if you would like to talk about your passions or anything else, please email us or call.

The opinions voiced in this material are for general information only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual.