SMART Goals

All of us have the desire to be smart in life, for most of us smartness comes as an aspect of personality, but what if I tell you that the goals & targets we set to achieve can be smart too ? This blog will help you to understand how exactly we can have smart goals.

Introduction

Smart goals are nothing but a result of meticulous planning & effective amount of time invested in right kind of work. When you set yourself a goal to be achieved you need to analyse all the aspects of it, consider everything that can help you to make the process of achieving that goal with optimal efforts. Lets see what exactly smart goals are:-

SMART is an abbreviation , now we will explore each aspect in brief.

S - Specific

Whenever you set a target / goal its very crucial to make sure that its specific. While setting a goal one must know what they want from the process they are going through. For e.g. I want to be a pilot. Here becoming a pilot is a goal , that is specific , person is sure that he / she wants to be a pilot & not a doctor / engineer / architect.
Just like this one has to be 100 % certain what they want to achieve.

Specificity gives you the clarity to reach your goal. Once you know what you want you automatically know how to get there. The path becomes less & less clumsy. Though you still need to put in all the hardwork & efforts but you know for sure that all of that is going to pay off in right way. There is no point in working hard & reaching nowhere , all of that is waste. Hence always ensure of specificity in your goals.

Sometimes, people have a backup target ; as in there are 2 parallel goals you are looking to achieve, the other one serves as a backup in case you don't achieve the first one. Here too being specific helps.
From the above e.g. person wants to become a pilot but if he / she fails to become one, they have chosen aeronautical engineering as a backup. Again there is no confusion in the choice of second option. So specificity again proves its crucial role here.

M - Measurable

Moving on, the next aspect of smart goals is measurability. Your goals must be measurable, throughout the process of achieving your desired target you must be able to know whether you are on the right track or not, for this there are certain clues to look at which tell you whether your efforts are going in correct direction.

From our example of becoming a pilot, one needs to keep a track record of how the theorotical scores are coming up, how is performance going in terms of sorties, how many more hours one needs to invest in order to sharpen up the skills , what more can be improved, what mistakes are made etc. These all factors are measurable & if kept track of correctly can yield optimum results to guide you to the set goal.

Its also advisable to have a helping hand, or someone by your side to help you keep a check on your process. Instructors, coaches , mentors & guides help you in this task & one must take their word seriously because they exactly know what is lacking & what needs to be done. If you don't have anyone in your corner , do it by yourself it will make you even more clinical & solid in your approach.

A - Attainable

Your goal has to be attainable, meaning it should be set bearing in mind all the resources you have & analysing 360° picture of the situation you are in. For e.g. If someone sets a goal of earning million dollars in 1 day , its highly unlikely.
So whenever you set a target you must be aware of its attainability & accordingly take efforts towards it.

To make sure that your goal is achievable you must have the knowledge of certain things , they are listed below:-

• Resources - Financial, Human power, Academic, Your own potential, talent etc.

• Time Span - make sure you have ample time to achieve your desired target, plan wisely

• Merit - Be aware of your own potential, merit, talent & capacity only then set the goal.

• Choice - You must know what you want, this is the bottom line , if you don't know what you want to achieve everything is a waste. Make a firm choice.

R - Realistic

The most important aspect of smart goals is the goal must be realistic, something that is certainty to occur. One cannot set a goal to bring Jupiter onto the Earth! Your goal must be something that can be turned into a reality, & can exist as a fact. From our earlier e.g. becoming a pilot is a realistic goal, a task which is achievable with proper efforts & meticulous studies.

A realistic approach works in another way as well as in you are aware whether your goal can be achieved by you or not given all the circumstances & conditions. You know the best whether it makes sense to achieve what you want to achieve & whether it can be achieved. This doesn't mean you must limit yourself & cut down any out of the box ideas , in fact you must always tweak things & experiment to find out something new & innovative to motivate you towards attaining your target.
Fantasising , dreaming or even day dreaming is alright, but remember your dreams must be your ambitions & not just some fable tales. You must be able to chase them & turn them into reality of life. Only then real success would come your way.

T - Time Based

Time is money & so is an essence of everything we do in our life. While achieving your goal make certain of the time it demands to be invested in it. Analyse properly whether you really have that much time with you & some extra in case to deal with some spur of the moment hassles.
You must know these few things as far time is concerned.

• How long will it take to achieve your goal?

• Whether its worth investing any time in your goal at current given position & situation ?

• Do you have enough time to backout in case things don't work according to plan ?

• Does the time allow you to switch to an alternative option in case you have to ?

• Are you certain of attaining your goal after investing the time you want to ?

Calculate a percentage of risk to reward ratio, check all the positives & negatives see which one of the two is heavier & only then take a step forward.

Summary

SMART Goals is not only about the above factors but its also about smart work, there is no point in taking efforts for 10 hrs & achieving 50 % versus working for 4 hrs & achieving 80%.
Nowadays the life demands quick solutions, inventive approaches to tackle problems in such situation rigorous old school methods have to be chucked out & being economical is the right choice.
Lets be Smart & achieve Smart goals!

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