Goal Achievement & The 1-in-60 Rule

PSA — The theme of this week’s newsletter is a mid-year check-in on your goals. We call it a RESET.  At 3 pm CT on July 18, The ONE Thing team is hosting a free RESET Webinar. If a RESET sounds right for you, click here to reserve your spot!

July 05, 2024

“I can’t change the direction of the wind, but I can adjust my sails to always reach my destination.”

– Jimmy Dean

Goal Achievement & The 1-in-60 Rule

On September 1, 1983, Korean Airlines Flight 007 left Anchorage, Alaska, bound for Seoul, South Korea. The flight never reached its destination. It suffered a small and tragic navigation error that compounded over hundreds of miles..

At the time, commercial aircraft navigated with the help of waypoints (radio beacons) and INS (internal navigation systems). While this system was state of the art, pilots essentially used the same “dead reckoning” system maritime navigators used in the 1600s. Dead reckoning allowed sailors to estimate their current position based on their speed and bearing from a previously determined position (called the “fix”).  With computers and gyroscopes, the INS worked well if your fix was accurate.

Soon after departing Anchorage, Flight 007 missed a critical waypoint and started the journey more than 5 degrees off track. It did not have a good fix. As a result, just 5 ½ hours into the flight the aircraft had strayed more than 130 miles from its flightpath. It veered into prohibited Soviet airspace, was mistaken for a spy plane, and shot down over the Sea of Japan. All 269 passengers and crew were lost.

As a result, President Ronald Reagan accelerated the availability of GPS for commercial aircraft, making the skies vastly safer for future generations. Flight 007 is a case study of how a tiny miscalculation can cascade into a monumental disaster. It’s also why we all need a GPS to get to our destination. To explain, let’s explore aviation’s 1-in-60 Rule. The 1-in-60 Rule says that a 1-degree heading error will cause a plane to miss its target by 1 nautical (n.) mile for every 60 n. miles flown.

For example, say you are flying from Point A to Point B which is 120 n. miles away. Exactly halfway, there is a waypoint, which we’ll call Point C. If you arrive at Point C and discover you are one n. mile north of your intended course, you can deduce your bearing is off by one degree to the north. To course correct, you will need to turn the plane 2 degrees to the south to get to your original destination. With half the distance to go, you must oversteer to get back on track.

So what does this have to do with goal achievement?

We are at the midpoint of 2024. You have six months of results to determine if you are on track or off course. If you’re astray by a few degrees, you still have six months left to course correct to your intended destination. Just don’t forget to “oversteer.”

This is the perfect time to pull out your business plan, compare it to your actual results, and recalibrate. When we designed the GPS One-Page Business Plan* for The ONE Thing, the name was no accident. It’s a navigation tool for your business! 

There is still time for you to hit your goals. You’ll need to evaluate your progress. And you’ll likely need to narrow your focus. Finally, update your GPS and start time blocking your new priorities. We do this process every year. It’s called a RESET.  I wrote about that process in detail last July. If you want to learn more, you can also join our free webinar on July 18!

One question to ponder in your thinking time: When I  look at my goals and my  results, am I on track?

Make an Impact!

Jay Papasan

Co-author of The One Thing & The Millionaire Real Estate Agent ​

* GPS stands for one Goal, three Priorities, and up to 5 Steps or Strategies for each priority. Thus “GPS.”