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A map with the goal at the center

Like many meth­ods, over the years it has become mul­ti-faceted and gained many com­po­nents, but what I myself was most drawn to is the cen­tral ​“goal break­down map” con­sist­ing of 81 box­es that result in 64 con­crete tasks to do (often recur­ring) to reach the set goal.

This is how the map is structured:

1. In one box, you write the big goal you want to reach.
2. Around the goal box, there are eight equal­ly sized box­es in a 3×3 matrix (with the goal box in the mid­dle). In these box­es, you write eight keys, sub-goals or areas you need to suc­ceed with to man­age to reach the cen­tral goal.
3. The cen­tral 3×3 matrix is sur­round­ed by eight addi­tion­al 3×3 matri­ces – one for each key, sub-goal, or area (which is writ­ten in the mid­dle box of each matrix).
4. In the eight sur­round­ing box­es in each 3×3 matrix, you write con­crete tasks for you or your team to car­ry out (recur­ring or one-off) in order to man­age to reach the key or sub-goal or area, and in turn reach the cen­tral, big goal.
    

From the map, you thus get 64 con­crete things you can do to reach your big goal.

(In this blog post from an Amer­i­can vol­ley­ball coach, you can see the map that Ohtani used, trans­lat­ed into English.)

Do this

1. If you want to try the goal break­down map that Shohei Ohtani used, draw it on a sheet of paper (prefer­ably on graph paper, to make it easy).
2. Choose which of your goals you want to test the method on.
3. Write the goal in the mid­dle, the sub-goals around it and work out the 64 tasks.
4. To make sure this does not just become a pleas­ant exer­cise but some­thing you actu­al­ly put into prac­tice, add the 64 tasks to your reg­u­lar to-do list. Some you add as one-off tasks, and sure­ly some should be recur­ring, with the inter­val you find appropriate.
5. Then get to work and check in with the goal break­down map now and then (per­haps once a week) to see how far you have come with the 64 tasks and toward the cen­tral goal. Tick off and cel­e­brate a lit­tle as soon as you have tak­en a step forward.

A clear­er direc­tion toward the goal

If you use the Hara­da method’s goal break­down map, you get a frame­work for mov­ing from a dis­tant goal to prac­ti­cal action every day. By clar­i­fy­ing what you need to do on sev­er­al dif­fer­ent fronts to reach the big goal in the mid­dle, it becomes eas­i­er for you to pri­or­i­tize the activ­i­ties that move you in the right direc­tion. The chance that you will reach the goal increases.

Per­haps this way, you can become the bright­est shin­ing star in your own field?

How do you do it?

Have you used the Hara­da method in your work? How? Write to me and tell me. Meth­ods like this, which pro­vide us with sup­port in achiev­ing our goals, fas­ci­nate me great­ly, so I am curi­ous to hear about what you have done.

(Want to learn more about dif­fer­ent meth­ods? Check out The Ivy Lee method, cre­at­ed by the PR expert who lived in the ear­ly 1900s!)