SMART Goals – How often do we achieve them?

SMART goals – how often do we achieve them or feel energised by doing so?

I know for myself, despite the fact that SMART goals are important & helpful, in years past I’ve ‘pasted’ them on simply because I needed to set a goal…

…and I had little motivation to work towards what I’d come up with. Months would pass & I’d done little to actively work towards them.

Why? Because there was no ‘why’; not a fulfilling one, anyway. There was no emotional drive fueling this ‘good looking’ goal.

We human beings want something that gets us excited to be a better version of ourselves in the future, to be able to do special things that are currently just out of reach, to feel fulfilled and like we’re contributing something to the world, & to feel energised & enlivened by the journey.

If your newbie (or your team, or you) are a little unmotivated by your goals, you might be finding the SMART framework is taking all the fun out of it.

Find your wild dream – we need wild dreams! The bigger & bolder, the better! If all goals were ‘achievable’ would we have built the computer, reached the moon or have the lightbulb…? (Would we have Beyoncé??)

Then take that dream & work backwards: figure out the landmarks that need to be reached to get there, & then use the SMART system to get the first smaller step happening. (And then the next one, and then the next one)…

Let it be agile – if something changes, re-jig your SMART goal, whilst keeping the big exciting dream front of mind:

It’s the emotion-grabbing dream goal that will light the fire to get you pumped for the smaller, SMARTer steps that are necessary for growth and development.

What are your thoughts on goal setting? I would love to hear from you – write to me here!

Written by: Vanessa Cole