Introduction – Why Strategy and Being Intentional with your Time and Energy Shouldn’t Stop at Work
We spend years helping organisations build strategic plans — clarifying purpose, setting measurable goals, aligning teams, and tracking progress. Yet few people apply the same discipline or intentionality to their own lives. A personal strategic plan brings clarity, focus, and accountability to what really matters — your health, relationships, purpose, growth, and joy. It is the ultimate investment in yourself: a blueprint for living intentionally rather than reactively. Further, it narrows in on what success means for you in terms of the freedom to choose what you do, who with and how. An asset so valuable but not always taken advantage by most of us.
To do this, BRS utilises the Human Synergistics suite of tools to really understand our clients initial thinking and their response. In particular, we will work with our clients to undertake a Life Styles Inventory (LSI) 1 combined with a Leadership Impact or LSI2 to determine this baseline and what shifts are required on the path to satisfaction. It is Australia’s most widely used individual development tool for leaders and professionals backed by decades of research and used by thousands of organisations. It also allows us to understand how your thinking and behaviour impacts your effectiveness both as you see yourself and as other experience your style and or impact.
These baseline results are really important in understanding the security needs someone has currently with their thinking. It highlights the patterns of thinking they have developed over time in terms of their strengths and potential blind spots which are influenced from childhood right to the present day. This is critical in getting them to reflect and think about the shifts and strategies they want to put in place to increase their satisfaction and subsequently their performance which leads to the development of a personal strategic plan.
In terms of the key elements of what a personal strategic plan looks like for someone we coach, they are as follows:
1. Start With Vision and Mission
Every meaningful plan starts with why. Your vision captures the life you aspire to live — one that inspires you and those around you. Your mission is how you want to live each day — the principles and behaviours that will guide you on that journey. Both are important in ensuring you are clear on your why and what which are highly personal to you.
Example:
Vision: “I choose to live a constructive, purposeful and adventurous life – one that inspires my family and community to grow, contribute and thrive.”
Mission: “To be useful, honourable and compassionate, and to make a difference that I have lived and lived well.”
Both are driven by intrinsic motivation rather than external validation which is critical to ensuring that you are focused on comparison to your previous self rather than others.
2. Define Your Core Values
Values are the non-negotiables — the anchors that keep you true to who you are when life gets busy, conflicted or challenging. We encourage clients to choose no more than six, then describe how they show up in action. An example of these are as follows:
- Authenticity – Be the best version of yourself
- Integrity – Do what you say you will
- Adventure – Enjoy the journey and new experiences
- Passion – Love what you do
- Growth – Pursue learning and progress
- Humility – Be useful and of value to others
I love the quote that success is the peace of mind and freedom that comes from liking yourself, liking what you do and liking how you do it. Being clear on what values are important to you and living them helps you on the path to achieving this definition of success. When we live our own values, we minimise the integrity gap within between knowing what to do and doing it by holding ourself accountable to our key values.
3. Clarify Your Unique Ability and Key Strengths
It is really important to understand through powerful reflection and thinking what are your key strengths or unique ability. This not only allows you to then play to these key strengths your satisfaction subsequently follows as a result of playing more in this space. This section of the plan captures the intersection of your strengths, passions, and contribution to others. As an example, for professionals, it can be worded like a positioning statement:
“I am a trusted advisor who facilitates outcomes, strategies and solutions on complex challenges. I help people see possibilities they can’t, providing clarity, insight and focus.”
4. Visualise the End – Your Legacy Paragraph
A powerful way to become more intentional is to reflect on the end of your life. How will I be remembered by those close to me? What will really matter to me when I am on my deathbed. This focus is important in really trying to visualise and reflect on what is truly important to me. When preparing this for yourself, consider the following: “If today were your last day, how would you want to be remembered?” This reflection creates emotional alignment for people with their daily actions. When people can visualise their legacy, their goals become deeply personal, not just practical.
5. Identify Your ‘Big 5 Projects’
These are the life pillars — the key areas that, if done well, make everything else flow. We encourage clients to define no more than five so that you are focused. You have limited time and energy so where you choose to put it is important. Designing a personal strategic plan is not just about what you choose to do, but also what you choose not to do particularly where it is driven by the external validation of others.
In your own personal strategic plan, as an example, your Big 5 projects can include:
1. Become All I Can Be – health, energy, discipline
2. Family First, Always – presence, connection, and love
3. Work – meaningful professional impact
4. Adventure and Joy – travel, sport, hobbies, laughter, experiences
5. Grow Every Day – learning, growing, reading, writing, and reflection
Each project should have: a vision statement, key initiatives (actions), and KPIs or measurable habits to track progress. This turns aspiration into accountability — the same logic we apply in business strategy, but directed toward life.
6. Build Measurable KPIs and Habits
The best personal strategic plans convert vision into metrics. Motivation kicks off the inspiration you have but habits and consistency will embed them. Simple habits that tie back to the Big 5 projects or identify you are striving to achieve. Examples can include:
- Health: Number steps daily, gym a few times a week, other activities
- Family: fortnightly date lunch, cooking regularly or family experiences
- Adventure: regular holidays a year, hobbies regularly or new experiences
- Growth: daily writing, podcasts, journalling, training and development
The key with these areas is less is more. Do fewer things consistently and identify them in your plan rather than try and do everything.
7. Commit to Reflection and Review
Like any strategic plan, a personal strategic plan is a living document. We encourage clients to revisit it quarterly, celebrate progress, and realign priorities. Journalling, habit tracking, and structured review conversations with a coach or partner make the plan real, not theoretical which is critical for making progress.
Further, don’t estimate the shift in thinking that occurs when you live an intentional life focused on your satisfaction. How you thought about things 12 months ago shifts quickly with your plan needing to be updated for this shift. It gets refined gradually as you get more intentional about what is important to you.
8. The Outcome – A Constructive Life by Design
When people build a personal strategic plan, they take ownership of their future focused on intentionality and satisfaction. It becomes a compass for decision-making — helping them choose presence over distraction, growth over comfort, and purpose over busyness. The outcome isn’t perfection — it’s progress, peace of mind, and the freedom to choose that comes from living a life aligned with what truly matters.
If you would like an example of a personal strategic plan template or would like to know more about our leadership and executive coaching, please email enquiries@brsresults.com.
