Happy New Year! You may be expecting me to motivate you to set your goals. To aim high because it's a new year … to try again. That this year is THE year to make a change. But I'm not because you've heard all of that before. You probably have listened to this every year. By January 15^th, 1% of those who set New Year's resolutions had already thrown in the towel.

Do you know why most goals don't see past January 15^th? Lack of accountability. We try to accomplish these big goals we've never been able to achieve on our own. Or we step into a New Year motivated and driven to make changes. We don't realize then how easy it is to push our daily action steps to reach our goals into the next day or week. Before you know it, today becomes someday…if you don't have a plan to hold yourself accountable.

You don't have to spend much time with my team and me to know we're constantly discussing accountability! We know it's what separates influential communicators from good communicators. Accountability is one of the topics we researched with the Social Research Lab at the University of Northern Colorado. We wanted to prove the power of accountability over time.

No surprise here…Participants who didn't hold themselves accountable quickly took steps backward, jeopardizing their influence as more time passed since they attended our workshop.

Yet, 76% agreed that the following steps, which I will share with you here, helped them and their teams hold themselves and their teams accountable.

If you're serious about taking action NOW to improve your ability to communicate with influence, make these your first steps.

My goal for you is that every month we meet here, your goals grow, and you add more action steps because you accomplish every action you've committed to.

1. By the end of this week, be clear about who you want to hold you accountable and reach out to them. Three characteristics that are essential for an effective accountability partner;

• Someone you trust that's going to tell you the truth…every time.
• They show up prepared to make you comfortable with being uncomfortable. They push you to take action you don't want to or tell you what you don't want to hear—especially when you need it the most!
• They hold you accountable every time. They hold you to what you said you would do the last time you met. They make sure you do it until you see results.

2. Lock and load a time and date when you'll meet with your accountability partner weekly and monthly. What we write…we invite into our lives!

3. Every 30 days, commit to doing a self-check-in to monitor your progress. This is a critical step to help you stay focused, consistent and driven. If you're not checking in with yourself, you'll miss the signs telling you to create a new action step or edit the ones you already have.

You'll also miss the reward—the pat on the back that we all need to give ourselves for our accomplishments, large or small, which motivates us to keep moving forward.

When you commit to these three action steps, you're ready to identify what you're willing to do to ensure that your influence improves every 30 days.