Achieving Goals: the Way of SMART Setting

Introduction to the Essay Achieving Goals

If we ask ourselves a question, “What is success in life?”, the immediate answer would be achieving our desires and goals as this is the destination that every one of us is running towards. There is a famous saying, “Man is a wanting animal”. Yes, our desires and goals don’t come to a point of destiny till we die. Our desires and goal keep moving forward which in turn pushes us to keep forward overcoming all the failures that come our way.

We also, sometimes meet people who live their life, the way it comes. They need someone every time to keep pushing them to have a goal and work towards achieving them. The other set of people are those who work hard but don’t have a clear idea on the effective ways to achieve their goals .In this chapter, we are going to comprehend the ways of framing smart goals and its importance to build a strong personal and professional life.

Learning Objective

This chapter demonstrates the mechanics of setting a goal, the ways to explore goals smartly, Implement self- analysis and demonstrate self-efficacy with a commitment towards goal setting. The objective of this chapter is to enable the students to effectively work towards goals which enhance their metacognition skills as this enables them to be competent enough in exhibiting efficiency in their professional life where achieving goals determines their performance eligibility

Importance of Framing SMART Goals

Setting a goal helps students to acquire life skills namely planning, organizing, self-realization, time management, overcoming failures etc;. Creating and tracking our goal is a great source on determining the direction for future. It is important as it:

• Gives focus and determination;
• Increases motivation and enhances self confidence;
• Enables to measure progress to work on the areas of improvement;
• Imparts time management and preparedness to face challenges;
• Learning outcome.

Subsequent to this chapter, students would be competent in the below:

• Identify the types of goals;
• How to set the goals;
• Implement SMART goal theory;
• How to achieve goals consistently.

Types of Goals

Goals are part of every aspect of life, may it be personal or professional. It provides a sense of direction, motivation, and focus. Goals are categorized as long term and short term goals.

Long term goals are those achieved over time as a person completes the various stages of his/her life. The term to accomplish the goal would be set for five to 5 years-20 years from present. Short term goals are those achieved in the near future which is typically less than a year. Short term goals are always considered as the bridge in achieving long term goals as this would pave way for accomplishing a greater goal.

Life time goals: Goals that are accomplished over life time. These goals are usually very general in the initial stages but it may turn more specific, if worked with complete focus.

Capstone goals: Goals that are considered as the first step to achieve in order to accomplish the life time goals. A simple example to connect the life time goal with a capstone goal is, a life time goal of owning a Rolls-Royce car would connect with the capstone goal of saving money to buy the car.

Foundational goals:Goals that are accomplished in less than one year. They are often used as physiological improvements. This need not have any relation to the long term goals. Example of learning a foreign language, saving money for buying a cycle etc;

Provisional goal: Goals that are achieved in less than a month. Examples are finishing a college project, preparing a presentation etc;

Steps to Goal Setting

Identify your short term and long term goals. The first stage of setting a goal is to identify what we want to achieve, may it be long term goal or short term goal. Ask the below questions before you set a goal:

• What are my areas of interest?
• How much existing knowledge do I have about the goal that I wish to achieve?
• Where do I see myself when exploring about achieving the desired goal?

Write down the goals according the time line as specified above which can be for both personal and professional life mentioning the year within which you wish to achieve the goal. Please note that any goal without a destination in timeline is considered as swimming in treacle

Design SWOC ANALYSIS. SWOC Analysis is a tool to a self-realization process in achieving the goals. This is a technique that helps in preparing a strategy to fine tune the process of developing the action plan.

• STRENGTHS An internal ability or the skills that you possess to achieve the goals;
• WEAKNESSES The area of improvement or a barrier in achieving the goals;
• OPPORTUNITIES An external condition that could provide a competitive advantage;
• CHALLENGES An external conditionthat could damage the scope for attaining objectives.

Please note that the SWOC analysis has to be prepared separately for short and long term goals as the same cannot be common.

Create an action plan. Upon analyzing your SWOC, develop a plan of action towards the goal. Determine the specific steps that are required to achieve the goal. Always remember that plan once created should not be manipulated or deviated which would lead you to a destination no where.

Share your goals. Talk about your goals to either your friends or family members which can help us in getting their feedback on our performance. Please be really careful while doing this which can result in we getting diverted in others opinion.

Act and evaluate consistently. Act daily towards the desired goals as the same needs to be revisited and our progress on the planned action has to be evaluated regularly.Evaluating our goals would result in identifying our heading in the right direction. During our evaluation, any failure in the intermediate action plan would enable us to sequence the upcoming plan without creating an impact in achieving the goals. There is a famous statement- “The best goal in the world will never materialize unless consistent action is taken”. Please ensure that the desire goals are challenging, it grabs new opportunities and improve your deficits.

Criticize your mistakes and celebrate your success. The best way to present your evaluation is self-efficacy in order to identify the mistakes or accept genuine feedback. May it be criticizing your own mistakes or celebrating your own success, be genuine and ethical. This is a psychological theory frame and Self-efficacy is, according to psychologist Albert Bandura who originally proposed the concept, a personal judgment of 'how well one can execute courses of action required to deal with prospective situations'.

SMART Goal Theory

In the above steps of goal setting, it was highlighted to ensure that the goal setting is done not for the sake for doing but it has got to have a purpose. He is an important theory that helps us in exploring effective goal setting- SMART Theory. This tool helps us setting structure and traceability to our goals.

Specific Goals: This is one of the common blunders that we make when someone asks us a question-“What do you want to become in life”? The immediate answer would be “I want to become a successful Engineer”. Do you think that this desire or a goal is specific? The reply is actually vague and a common unspecific goal. If your goal is clearly specified then, you would answer as “I would become a Mechanical Engineer in Jaguar in the next 8 years by exploring motor mechanism”.

Before you set a specific goal, ask yourselves W&H questions in order to ensure that you leave no path left which can be considered as a loop whole during the journey towards destination.

• What are my values?
• What do I want to achieve?
• By when should I achieve?
• How am I going to work in achieving the goals?
• Why do I want to achieve this goal?

Measurable Goals: If the goals are not put to an Intermediate review or evaluation to measure the progress, it may sometimes result to all our efforts in vain. For example, if your goal is to clear your GRE, you should know what it takes to reach the goal and tracking the scores of all preparation tests for GRE (which are usually measurable) would help us in measuring what more does that take you to work in order to clear your exam. Measurable goals can play a vital role in defining what exactly we want to do.

Attainable Goals: Sometimes, we lack maturity in framing our goal and this is because of a common human psychology of comparing us with others who are successful. For example: the desire to become like Anil Ambani or Ratan Tata is not wrong, but we as human should understand that the everyone has their own life to live which differs from others. That doesn’t mean that you can’t take something that seems impossible and make it happen by planning efficiently. Ensure that our goals are realistic and achievable taking into consideration on the SWOC Analysis tool in a long way. In short, the achievability of the goal should make you feel challenged at the same time it needs to be well defined that you can actually achieve it.

Relevant Goals: The goals must be set in such a way that it has a close connect with what we have got as an internal resource and does that matters. You cannot set a goal of swimming in a tournament when you don’t like to swim or just because our parents wanted us to win. For example, If you wish to work in France, you may always choose to have a goal in learning French.

Timely Goals: Always remember to set your goals grounded with a time frame. Putting a final destination to your goal gives you a clear target to propel towards it. Also ensure that the time is realistic. For example: You cannot set your goal as “Want to become a singer someday” or “Would work to become a collector in 6 months”.

Conclusion

A goal is a desired result that an individual intends to achieve in the future. Setting a goal involves the development of an action plan that guides an individual towards achieving those goals.

The ultimate essence or rather a challenge is not only setting the goal and an effective action plan, but to accept and overcome the hindrances that comes our way in achieving the goal. So when we plan our goal and the action plan, it is always advised to frame our mindset clearly that it is indeed not a simple task. This mindset gives us the readiness to face the challenges. Most of the time, it is the fear of loss that stops us in exploring and achieving. Once we are ready for both success and failure, propelling ahead during the tuff times would always be a cake walk for us.