Why Is It SMART To Set Goals?

Setting goals is a simple and effective way to boost your productivity and project a plan for your future progress.

Stating out your personal daily goals as well as long-term goals is a good way to get started and can inspire you to improve yourself during these challenging times.

The SMART strategy is an excellent method to follow for practical goal setting.

  • Specific: Ensure your goals are planned in detail so that you have a clearer understanding of what you want to achieve.
  • Measurable: Having measurable and quantified goals means you can record your progress and know exactly when you have achieved them.
  • Attainable: Your goals also need to be realistic and achievable. Having goals that are too far out of your reach (at least for the time being) may instead demotivate you.
  • Relevant: Keeping your short-term goals relevant to your broader, long-term goals will help you stay on track.
  • Timebound: Set time limits for your goals to keep yourself accountable and driven to achieve them.

You can also implement this measure in a business setting or a personal/private environment.

For example, you may have a business goal of gaining five new clients over the quarter. Is this measurable? Is it attainable? Is this short-term goal relevant to your broader, long-term goal?

Discuss with your colleagues or employees precisely their goals for their time with the business. Is it to attain new skills or to improve on existing ones? Does it align with KPIs, or is it a goal to allow for self-improvement?

Whatever your reason, having a strategy for setting goals can be a game-changer. Why not give it a try?