What Do You Want to Create Today?. Bob Tobin

his dreams. I didn’t ask him about his dream job, like so many headhunters had asked before. That’s different. I wanted to know what he wanted for his life, what values were important to him, what aspirations he had. It took him a while to think, but he told me he really wanted to do something much more creative.

      Jared wanted to use everything he knew. He didn’t want to work every day either. He’d be very happy if he could help in the preservation of old buildings in Yogyakarta, Singapore, and other places in Asia going through major redevelopment. He didn’t want to see all the old buildings replaced by high-rises. He could help with design and preservation. He knew several languages. He also wanted to get back into hiking and mountain climbing. These were his dreams, and I encouraged him to go toward them.

      Over the course of the next several months, he made connections in the region and he flew to Jakarta and Yogyakarta in Indonesia and George Town and Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia. He took some design work with a consultancy based in Singapore and began to make his dreams come true. In an email I got from him recently, he told me he had never been happier in his life and his work. He felt he was working with his head and his heart. He said he hadn’t thought it was possible to connect his life and his career, but now he was happily living his dream. His story is the kind I love to hear: stories of people who are making their dreams for their lives come true.

      I always make dreams a part of my discussion with new clients. I did the same with students. On the first day of class, I always asked my students about their dreams. Many would say that a dream was something for the future, but I encouraged them—and I want to encourage you—to think of a dream as something for now.

      Give some thought now to your own dreams. Write them down. Don’t be shy about declaring your dreams, and don’t be so quick to judge your dreams and say “impossible.” They may be more possible than you think. There is no end to the number of people who will tell you you’re not being realistic. Listen to them at your peril. Ignore a big portion of what these naysayers tell you.

      Marc Le Menestrel, a business professor at Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona, sees dreaming as a useful tool that can connect our personal lives to our business lives. He has found that people often dream of being part of a community that reflects their values, and of contributing to the lives of other people in some way.

      Le Menestrel has found that our dreams can help us in maintaining motivation, taking a long view, and staying flexible. When you keep your dream alive, you are not easily discouraged, you figure out how to deal with obstacles, and you’re able to adapt. Le Menestrel knows how goals can be confining and limiting: “You want to be the master of your goal,” he says, “not the prisoner of your goal.”²

       Goals at Work

      The goals and objectives you have at work or the monetary goals you have set for yourself are not the same as dreams. Goals and objectives are those achievements to which you are directing some effort, something your efforts are intended to attain. They are often work-related, such as improving the accuracy rate in entering orders online, increasing sales, or reducing legal fees. They are set for you, or you set them jointly with your manager.

      Goals do work in helping individuals accomplish tasks. Many studies show how goals drive behavior and improve performance. They certainly work for athletes, for salespeople—in fact, for all highly competitive people. But there are negative aspects to goal setting as well, and often these are ignored. You can imagine that in the rush to achieve goals, individuals may ignore their own ethical principles, and they may focus too narrowly.