Setting Goals the SMART way!

 If you’ve been to business school or read books on goal setting you might be familiar with the acronym SMART, which stands for Specific, Measurable, Actionable or Attributable, Realistic, and Timed. Let me explain briefly what each letter of the SMART Goal formula entails

S = Specific Your goals mustn’t be vague they must be as specific as they can be. For example, a goal to "Be more successful in 2009" is too vague as it doesn’t define what success is. For one person success might be to pass their exams, for another it might be to retire from their job, and yet for another person it might be to earn over $75,000.

M = Measurable As well as being specific your goals should be measurable. If your goal is related to money you might set a goal to "Earn over $100,000" or maybe to "Increase your monthly income by 25%". If your goal was sports related you might say "To knock three seconds off my personal best time" or "To win three major tournaments".

A = Actionable or Attributable There’s no point in setting goals that are not actionable or attributable, i.e. you have no direct control over the outcome. For example it would be silly to set a goal for your favorite sporting team to win the league if you cannot directly influence that outcome. If you are the team coach, the owner of the team or even one of the players this could be a goal that is actionable, but if you are just a fan there is nothing you can do that will have any impact on the outcome and so it is not actionable or attributable. Likewise, you couldn’t set a goal to "Win the lottery" as it is not a goal that you can directly influence. Yes, you can buy a ticket, or even several tickets, but you cannot influence the numbers that will be drawn out and so it is not actionable.

R = Realistic When setting goals you need to be realistic. Setting a goal such as "To be the world’s best-selling singer" is not a realistic goal if you’ve never made a record, don’t have a recording contract and sound like a cat being strangled. Even if that was your ultimate goal it’s best to break it down and take several smaller steps. For example, you might start off with a goal of taking singing lessons, forming a band, writing a song, recording a song, or maybe getting a recording deal, but having a goal to be bigger than Madonna is not a great first step.

T = Timed A well thought out goal must include a timescale and must not be open ended. For example "To get promotion" is too vague. It would be far better to have a goal that said "To get promoted by 1st July 2009".

Using this clever acronym means you can easily remember all of the attributes necessary to set SMART goals for yourself or other people. As soon as you start to use this method of goal setting you will see an amazing transformation. Gone will be the vague goals that you set and then forgot about. In their place will be highly targeted goals that give you razor-sharp focus that will let you hit your goals like a heat seeking missile.

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