New year, new decade, new plans. This year is pretty ambitious, let’s take a look!
⚠️ I usually write about my approach to goal setting and tracking in addition to my actual goals. This time, I’ve decided to keep this post simple so I’m just writing about my actual goals. My approach to setting and actually achieving them is constantly changing, so I will be covering that in another post that will be kept up-to-date with my latest methodology.
Career & Finance
Become Senior PM by mid-2021
- Update my Product Management Playbook
- Define the long-term strategy for the Results section of Typeform
- Launch 3 major, successful features or products
By market standards, I might already be a senior PM, but by objective standards of what skills and experiences a senior PM should possess, I am not. At Typeform, I am still a mid-level PM, which is a good thing. It means that the seniors are true seniors and that I can learn a lot from them. I’ve already seen my fair share of failures, and learned a lot about the wrong way of doing things. Now it’s time to score some successes and learn about the right way of doing things. In doing so, I believe that I will truly earn the title of senior PM and will be able to tackle any product problem thrown at me in the future.
Achieve financial freedom by 2025
- Earn €1000 from a new source of income
Achieving financial freedom means not being dependent on my day job for earning a living. This is my top long-term goal — I don’t want to stop working but I do want more flexibility about how to spend my time. My AngularJS Unit Testing course was my most successful side hustle to date, but it was never going to cover the bills. It’s been a while since I launched that course, now it’s about time I tried something new and expand my passive income portfolio.
Personal Growth & Learning
Feel at home in Spain
- Achieve B2 level in Spanish
- Visit 3 other Spanish cities
Moving to Spain is a bigger change in scenery than moving to Berlin had been. Having been born and partially raised in Germany, I already spoke the language and knew a lot about the country when I moved to Berlin. I never felt like a foreigner. Things are different here. I don’t feel unwelcome, but I do feel like an outsider who doesn’t yet know how things work (and who has to ask a colleague to translate every time he needs something fixed in his apartment). I want to change that, I want to make Spain feel like home — and that starts by learning how to speak the language and getting to know the country and its people a little better.
Become a productivity machine (again)
- Setup the information architecture for my Personal Growth Playbook
- Write blog post about my goal setting & tracking approach
2018 was my best year so far in terms of personal growth. I had significantly improved the way I set my goals, created systems to help me achieve them, and managed to get a whole lot done. Even though I achieved a lot in 2019, I often had this lingering feeling that I could be doing more. To get back in form, I need to invest time in setting up systems that will make it easy to be productive in my free time.
Travel & Adventure
Go on another epic adventure
- Go on another long-distance trek
The Tour du Mont Blanc, summiting Kilimanjaro, and the Salkantay trail to Machu Picchu were physically and mentally challenging treks — they weren’t always fun, but the reward, in terms of the stories to be told and the sense of fulfilment of having overcome the challenge, made them worth every second. I want to keep pushing myself on these sorts of trips for as long as I am able, and so, want to try another long-distance trek or summit in 2020.
Improve my outdoor skills
- Go scuba diving again in a tropical paradise
- Go skiing 2 times
- Go climbing 10 times
Over the last few years, I tried my hand at a number of outdoor-related skills. I learned how to ski, surf, scuba-dive, free-dive, and even did a bit of climbing here and there. I’d like to get better at them and get out of the beginner zone. For that, I need to practice!
Health & Fitness
More holistic fitness
- Be able to do a handstand
- Touch the floor with straight legs
Even though I’ve been going to the gym for over 10 years, I still don’t consider myself to be a fit person. I can move weights, but I can’t move my body in the ways that I’d like to. This has often led to unnecessary injuries and restricted my ability in certain sports. I’d like to have a more holistic, functional level of fitness that allows me to use my body to its full potential and ensures my long-term wellbeing.
Altruism
Help the environment
- Eat less meat
- Take part in a beach cleaning event
All my goals thus far have been pretty selfish — they’re all about improving myself and the things that affect me directly. I want to start doing more for others, starting with the planet.
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