Are Your Goals SMART?

Photo by lululemon athletica, available under a Creative Commons Attribution license

The start of a new year is always a time when people set goals. Usually, they end up spending the first portion of the year struggling to stick to their goal and making themselves feel bad about. Why do people keep setting goals and not sticking to them?

Most people don’t know how to set actionable goals and end up setting really vague goals, like “I want to lose weight” and “I want to make more money”. You can’t possibly stick to something that vague because you don’t know how to approach it or when you’ve been successful at it.

Let’s take one of these vague goals and examine why they never get you anywhere and then I’ll show you how to set much more actionable goals.

“I want to lost weight” is a common goal that people set for themselves. The problem with setting a goal this vague, is that it doesn’t give you any direction on what to do next. Why do you want to lose weight? How much weight will you lose in total? How much weight will you lose each month? How will you modify your diet? Will you begin exercising? What types of exercises will you do? As you can see, this goal leaves too many questions unanswered.

If you want to make your goals actionable, then you have to get SMART about goal setting. SMART goals are specific, measurable, actionable, relevant and timely. Let me give you an example so that you can see exactly how this works.

Vague goal 

I want to write a book.

Specific (What exactly do you want to accomplish? The more detail, the better.)

I will write a book on social media that is a minimum of 150 pages.

Measurable (How will you know when you reach your goal?)

I will write one chapter per month, and at least 3-5 pages per week.

Achievable (Do you have the tools you need to achieve this goal? If not, how and where will you get them?) 

I will work on the manuscript first, and once that is completed, I will begin to search for a publisher or explore self-publishing. I have a friend who has written a book so I will ask her for insight on how the publishing industry works and how to pitch a book idea to a publisher.

Relevant (What will achieving this goal mean for you/your business? Why is it important?)

Writing a book on social media will help me establish myself as an expert in my industry.

Timely (Set yourself a deadline for this goal)

The book will be completed in 10 months.

SMART goal

In order to establish myself as an expert, I will write a 150-page book on social media by writing one chapter per month (at least 3-5 pages per week). The book will be completed in 10 months, and then I will search for a publisher or explore self-publishing. In the meantime, I will speak to my friend to learn more about the publishing industry and how to pitch a book idea to a publisher.

Do you see how much more actionable the SMART goal is now that some detail has been added? Creating a SMART goal is a simple way of setting your goal and putting together a mini action plan that helps you get the ball rolling.

Time to take some action! After all, “The secret to getting ahead, is getting started” -Mark Twain (Click here to tweet this quote!)

1. Take 10 minutes to write at least 1 SMART goal for yourself.

2. Share your new SMART goal in the comments below. You might just find someone who has the same goal as you and you can work together to hold each other accountable.