In one sentence, describe what the following article is about: Often times, when dealing with short-term goals, we may have many goals at one time. It is important to decide which goals are most important so that you can achieve them first.  If company is coming to visit, you may need to clean your house. But, you might also need to stock up on groceries. You might want to clean your car. It might be a good idea to make plans for things to do while your friends are staying with you. You may need to get ahead on work that you won't be able to while they are visiting. If you try to do all these things at once, you won't work as efficiently as  if you picked the most important task, finished it, and moved on. In fact, by trying to do all of these things at once, you might not finish any of them. Prioritizing your goals will also avoid wasting time after you've completed a goal. You will have already figured out what you need to do next. As with any goal, short term goals are only accomplished through putting in time and effort. Once you get started, you'll develop momentum that can help carry you through to the end. If your house is a real disaster, it may be hard to get started on the cleaning. But, look at your plan and try to dive in on the first step as soon as you can. Once you've got one room clean, the satisfaction you feel will help you fell motivated to keep going. To achieve any goal, you have to work on it steadily. With short-term goals, this is even more important. Because you don't have long to complete your goal, it's crucial to keep your eye on the prize and not get distracted. There are several ways to promote this.  Track your progress. Keep one eye on the clock (or calendar) and one eye on the plan you wrote up for achieving your goal. The timeline you set for yourself can be a strong motivation to stay focused. No one likes to feel that they've failed. Create a good environment for success. Try to remove things from your environment that might prevent you from achieving your goals. Imagine you are trying to clean your house, but you know that your dog is likely to follow you around begging for attention all day. You might want to take it to the kennel for an afternoon so you can focus. If you don't think you'll be able to resist the temptation to play your favorite video game, put the game controllers in a drawer in another room. Don't take tem out again until you're done working on the goal. Sometimes, you may find that your work toward short-term goals isn't having the effect you had hoped. Or, once you've been working on something for a while, you might think of a better way to do it than you had planned. If this is the case, don't stick rigidly to the plan for its own sake.  If a short-term goal is not working out as you expected, or is taking a lot more time than you thought it would, don't be afraid to revise the plan. Having a plan is important, but sometimes, you need to change the order of your steps, remove steps entirely, or add new ones. Sometimes, you might need to drop one short term goal altogether in favor of another one. Using the example of writing a book, you might have a plan to draft the first chapter in a month. But, in writing the chapter, you might come up with a new idea for the book that you hadn't thought of before. If it's a good idea, it might be worth going back and revising your outline to include it. The time this takes might prevent you from achieving your original goal, but if it means a better book, be flexible and revise the plan! When you achieve a short term goal, give yourself a reward. This is called "reinforcement." It helps your brain associate following through on goals with good consequences. This makes it easier to motivate yourself to achieve future goals.  Reinforcement comes in two types. Positive reinforcement is when you add something good to your life. For example, you might reward your success by going out for a fancy cocktail or dessert. Negative reinforcement is when something unwanted is removed from your life. For example, imagine you you don't like walking your dog. You might make a deal with someone else in your household in which they agree to walk it for you for a day if you achieve your goal.  Reinforcing good behaviors is more effective than punishing bad ones. It will increase your motivation to follow through much more.
Summary: Set priorities. Get to work. Stay focused. Be flexible. Reward success.

In one sentence, describe what the following article is about: Depending on the setting, an apology may be seen as an admission of guilt, especially if you are apologizing on behalf of your company to customers. If you or your company is not at fault for what happened, you do not need to issue an apology.  Don’t take responsibility for things that are not your fault, and you will avoid over-apologizing, which can weaken your image with co-workers or customers. It is certainly appropriate to express empathy, but you should avoid taking responsibility. You can tell people “I’m disappointed to hear that,” and offer to help resolve the problem, but avoid saying “I’m sorry.” If you are apologizing on behalf of a business to your customers, this may be seen as an admission of responsibility, and you may be held legally and financially liable. Make sure you discuss what happened with a lawyer to discuss any potential legal difficulties before apologizing. This isn’t effective for lots of the smaller mistakes that may happen with customers daily, so you may consider creating company policies for certain mistakes, and how your employees should handle them. If your customers are angry or upset with something your business has done, you need to move quickly. They are more likely to listen to an explanation if you issue it as soon as possible. The longer you delay saying anything, the more angry the future recipient will be. While there are times when you should delay apologizing in order to consult with other people, such as a lawyer, it is important that you get on that as quickly as possible so you can get your message out as soon as you can. Depending on the nature of your error, including what you did and who it was against, there are different mediums you can use to respond.   If your mistake was one that affected all of your clients, an email is a good choice. If your error was posting an offensive or inappropriate message through social media, using that platform as a place to express your contrition. If you need to apologize to someone in your own company, or to a specific client, try to arrange for a face-to-face meeting. If you can’t be in the same place, try video-conferencing, then a phone call. The closer you are able to get to the person you are apologizing to, the better. This will make you look more serious when offering your apology. Once you have apologized, and the apology has been accepted, you both need to be prepared to move past it. Hanging on to the issue will only make the situation more difficult to handle. This goes for recipients too. If someone apologizes to you, and you accept it, there is no need to dwell on the mistake any longer. Bringing it up again will look petty or unprofessional.
Summary:
Make sure it is appropriate. Act quickly. Find the appropriate medium for your apology. Move on after apologizing.