I have a confession to make. I’m good at setting genealogy goals at the beginning of the year but I’m very bad at paying attention to them. One of the problems is that in the past I’ve set up complicated (though measurable) goals that I’m not able to keep top of mind. I set a complicated goal chart as part of my 2015 goals and I’m pretty sure I didn’t look at it all year. Another problem I’ve encountered is that my genealogy goals were sometimes unrealistic. In the post linked above, I wrote, “I’ve learned that when I create unrealistic goals I tend to ignore them.” That is so true.
So this year, I’m keeping it simple. I’ve decided to focus on my paternal great grandmother’s line, the Iglehearts, after having spent a couple of years researching her husband’s line. It’s full of opportunity because I have a Civil War Union veteran in that line (Benjamin Franklin Igleheart, 1845-1913) whose Civil War pension file I haven’t yet transcribed or analyzed. I can also trace myself back to the Mayflower on that line, but I haven’t verified everyone in that path. I’m excited to shift gears a little and focus on some different people.
Here are the goals I set out for myself for 2020, which I wrote in Evernote on an airplane ride on January 3. They feel gentle and realistic.
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Cultivate a daily research habit
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Transcribe Benjamin Franklin Igleheart’s Civil War pension
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Trace myself back to the Mayflower by Thanksgiving
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Eliminate the downloaded documents backlog
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Create habit of processing documents as I download them
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Keep logging each research session (including next actions)
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Consume purchased learning resources
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Watch at least one webinar a week
If I can build a daily-research habit and a habit of watching a webinar every week, this will be a huge win. I think the practices outlined above will help stay in touch with my research and give me focus if I flounder. My goal of cultivating a daily research habit probably will mean lots of 30 x 30 challenges in 2020!
I tend to select a word of the year at the beginning of each year and this year’s word is INTENTION. These genealogy goals feel full of intention and I really think my word will bring me back to them every day.
How about you? Did you create genealogy goals for 2020? If so, feel free to share them!
Photo by Hobbies on a Budget via Flickr. Used under Creative Commons License.
This is a great set of goals. I thinking watching a webinar a week is a great addition, and I also like the goal of documenting the “next action.” I tag those things that need follow up with “to do” in Evernote but don’t keep track of following up regularly.
I’m working on my portfolio for certification, so I too often think of my goals as getting the research and writing done. I need to broaden my focus a bit!
Glad you found it helpful, Donna! For me, taking note of next actions has been a game changer. I don’t spend valuable time figuring out what to work on! Good luck with your certification portfolio!
Sounds like a lot to me. But you know what came to mind as I was reading your post? If you had a 30X30 devoted to each of those goals, ONE AT A TIME, you could write a book similar to Gretchen Rubin’s The Happiness Project. (Have you read it?) You could incorporate many of your existing blog posts. And you wouldn’t have to let everything else slide completely while you are focusing more on one at at time. The Genealogy Project. Why not?
What an interesting idea, Hazel! I have read the Happiness Project, so I know what you mean. I’ll have to give that some thought. Thanks for sharing the idea!
Thanks for the blog post, Janine. I agree with you that developing a daily research habit and weekly webinar habit would be big wins. With my recent subscription to Legacy Family Tree Webinars, #2 was easy to achieve and became a reality last year. I’ll join you on Goal #1!
I just subscribed to Legacy Family Tree Webinars as well, which will definitely make the webinar goal easier to achieve. You’re inspiring me with your success!
Your goal list looks very doable, especially since several of them are more about strengthening habits than topics like breaking through brick walls. Happy New Year, Janine.
Happy new year to you, Linda! I love that my goals feel doable this year. I hope I get to see you at RootsTech!
One of the things that I love about your blog is that you frequently provide me with motivational tips that fuel my own family history research. 1, 4, 5, 8 and 9 are on my list for 2020 and I especially want to make maximum use of the family history associations that I belong to. Looking forward to a great 2020 and wish that for you, Janine.
Thank you so much for the compliment and the good wishes, Ron! I hope you have an amazing 2020.
Janine, I can relate to your post. I love setting goals but it seems like I have set too many goals in the past. When I felt overwhelmed, I gave up. Right now, I’m going to focus on two things – researching every day for January and logging down who I researched and any other thoughts floating in my head. I want to bring that into February but doing it at 20 minutes a day for 5 days will be more realistic for me. If I can keep that up for February too, then I think I’ll be on my way of getting more of my long term goals accomplished.
Janine,
I have been spending tons of time going through parish records page by page looking for people. As you probably know, you can find tons of potential relatives when doing this, which greatly decreases my ability to process each document as I download it. One thing I’ve been doing lately is putting links to those pages in an email to myself. I make the subject of my email something like “Ottery St. Mary 1813-1834 parish records” and then keep that email draft open and usable until all of my links are in there. I usually put “son of Thomas and Jane Ware” or whatever right above the link. Each email is a very long list of links, but at least I know how to get back to them when I’m ready to work with them.
I don’t save the email from day to day. I always send it at the end of the day. If I don’t get through the entire record book, my last link is under the heading “Where I left off”.
Leslie, I’m glad you’ve found a system that works well for you and I appreciate your sharing it! That’s an innovative solution. I do something a little similar: I paste the link Comments section in the metadata for the file. (I blogged about that here: https://organizeyourfamilyhistory.com/a-time-saving-addition-to-my-digital-workflow/.) Both processes provide easy access to the online version of the document. Again, I really appreciate our detailing your method!