The 3% Rule: Why Writing Down Your Goals Could 10x Your Consultancy

I hope you are well and ready to start 2025 with the drive to achieve even greater success in your consultancy.

This blog is for you if you currently work within the NHS and are considering leaving to become an independent healthcare consultant. You might be a GP practice manager, pharmacist, physio, data analyst, quality improvement specialist, HR director, or finance manager looking to leave the confines of your current role and work on a range of projects as an independent consultant.

The focus of this blog is planning for 2025 and, more importantly… writing these plans down.

In this blog, we cover:

• The Power of Written Goals
• Setting Measurable Targets
• Mindset and Behaviors
• Planning Styles and Systems
• Tools and Implementation
• Next Steps

Section 1: The Power of Written Goals

You may have already heard of this, but if not, a Harvard Business study found that 10 years after graduation, the 3 per cent of their students who bothered to write down their goals ended up earning 10 times as much as the other 97 percent who did not.

Gail Mathews’ international research is another study that emphasises the importance of making plans, writing them down, and creating an additional layer of accountability.

149 participants, comprised of entrepreneurs, educators, healthcare professionals, artists, attorneys, bankers, marketers, human services providers, managers, vice presidents, and directors of non-profits, were divided into the following groups.

• Group 1: Unwritten Goal
• Group 2: Written Goal
• Group 3: Written Goal & Action Commitments
• Group 4: Written Goal, Action Commitments to a Friend
• Group 5: Written Goal, Action Commitments & Progress Reports to a Friend

Mathews’ study found that:

1. Those who wrote their goals accomplished significantly more than those who did not write their goals.

2. Those who sent their commitments to a friend accomplished significantly more than those who wrote action commitments or did not write their goals.

3. Those who sent weekly progress reports to their friend accomplished significantly more than those who had unwritten goals, wrote their goals, formulated action commitments, or sent those action commitments to a friend.

Source: https://www.dominican.edu/sites/default/files/2020-02/gailmatthews-harvard-goals-researchsummary.pdf

🎯Let’s separate ourselves from the majority and repeatedly write our goals down and get some peer support.

Section 2: Setting Measurable Targets

You may have goals relating to:

• Income
• Client retention
• Profit
• Business development
• Brand awareness
• Team and leadership
• Health, fitness and family

🎯Write down what you want to achieve and provide a measurable target to help you monitor progress.

Side note: In the book 10x is Easier than 2x, the authors Dan Sullivan – The founder and president of The Strategic Coach Inc and Benjamin Hardy, PhD organisational psychologist and author encourage us to proudly identify the goals we want to achieve with no justification.

We can want, just because we want it, which, for many, is a real mindset shift.

The book can be found here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/10x-Easier-Than-World-Class-Entrepreneurs/dp/140196995X

Your goals can be as big or as little as you like, but I encourage you to believe in yourself and go for it. With clarity, focus, consistency, the right strategy, tools, tactics, a great support system, and the right mindset, YOU CAN achieve the success you are looking for.

Section 3: Mindset and Behaviours

Underpinning your measurable goals is your mindset and behaviours.

Consider these questions:

• How would you behave if you 100% knew your vision would come to fruition?
• How would you structure your time?
• Who would you have around you?
• What do you need greater clarity on?
• What do you need to stop doing?

If you are scared, fearful, consistently negative, focused on the past, reject accountability, are self-critical, jealous of others’ success, fail to look after your health and well-being, retreat for too long during difficult times, or let the limited beliefs of others influence you, growing your consultancy will be incredibly draining.

Section 4: Planning Styles and Systems

• Are you a visualiser who likes to use vision boards and mind maps?
• Are you a structured planner and like to create business and project plans

Or are you a mixture of the two like me?

• I have a vision board for my life.
• I also have a 1-page vision for the business, which is split into three pillars:
• The Business of Primary Care Networks
• The Business of Healthcare Podcast
• The Business of Healthcare Consulting

These 1-page documents were created using Canva and printed out in my office, where I can always see them.

I then have a yearly plan, broken down into monthly goals and weekly actions, which I share with my team.

I also set up a WhatsApp mastermind for accountability and support, which currently includes fellow entrepreneurs in the healthcare space Monique Carayol , Dr Ndubuisi ‘Andy’ Egwim, Dr. Abeyna Bubbers-Jones.

Section 5: Tools and Implementation

Choose tools and systems that match your style.

Apps like Notion, Asana, or Microsoft Teams all provide electronic ways to create, monitor, and update your plans. Or a notebook may be sufficient.

Do not allow this process to turn into procrastination. Your planning system doesn’t have to be fancy. The simpler, the better.

Section 6: Time to Take Action

Read the above sections again, and then, building on what you already know about making a solid plan that helps you deliver regardless of the hurdles that come your way, what can you incorporate from this blog to take your planning to the next level?