What Is Goal Setting?

Goal setting involves the development of an action plan designed in order to motivate and guide a
person or group toward a goal.[1] Goals are more deliberate than desires and momentary intentions.
Therefore, setting goals means that a person has committed thought, emotion, and behavior towards
attaining the goal. In doing so, the goal setter has established a desired future state which differs from
their current state thus creating a mismatch which in turn spurs future actions.

Goals are your first step and the ultimate answer to achieving great things. Goals fuel motivation and
define your roadmap to realizing your dreams.

Research in clinical and real-world settings has shown that goals can help you accelerate your success
and personal growth. Setting goals helps us to assess where we are currently in our personal and
professional lives while allowing us to create the future we dream of.

It’s the process of living with intention and letting life happen FOR us rather than TO us.

Why Set Goals

A goal represents an aim, desire, or objective that you'd like to accomplish in the future. When you
establish goals, you're taking an active role in outlining the steps necessary to achieve that outcome. For
example, if your goal is to become a nurse, you might write down the steps needed to achieve your
career objective, which might include training, studying, and creating a study or work schedule.In This
Article

Why Set Goals

How To Set Goals and Achieve Them

The Bottom Line

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Goal Setting Tips

How to set goals and achieve them. PHOTO: IMAGE (C) LWA / GETTY IMAGES

Goal setting can help you create a realistic plan to put you on the right path to accomplishing your goals
or objectives. If you are having trouble achieving your business or personal goals, you're not alone. It
might be time to change your approach to goal setting. Successful goal setting starts with identifying
specific goals and planning how you intend to achieve them in a realistic way. This article contains goal-
setting tips to help you establish, track, and accomplish your goals.

Key Takeaways

Setting goals can help you establish a short, medium, and long-term strategy for success.

Effective goal setting includes having goals that are worthwhile, achievable, and specific.

Prioritize your goals and make them public to help keep you stay committed.

It helps to evaluate and track your progress, quantifying your results along the way.

Why Set Goals

A goal represents an aim, desire, or objective that you'd like to accomplish in the future. When you
establish goals, you're taking an active role in outlining the steps necessary to achieve that outcome. For
example, if your goal is to become a nurse, you might write down the steps needed to achieve your
career objective, which might include training, studying, and creating a study or work schedule.

Setting goals can help you establish a short, medium, and long-term strategy for success. Goal setting
can help boost your engagement and provide a sense of purpose, particularly when working in a team
environment.

To stay on target, it's essential to track the progress of your goals by revisiting them periodically. If
possible, quantify the results of your progress. Sometimes a long-term goal can be daunting, but
tracking your progress will help you gain confidence and momentum as you see your short and medium-
term goals being accomplished. If you're working in a team, goal setting and tracking the results can help
ensure everyone is on the same page and working towards the same outcome.

How To Set Goals and Achieve Them

Choose Goals That Are Worthwhile

You would think it would go without saying, but lots of people set meaningless goals and then wonder
why they don't feel any sense of achievement. Remember that the purpose of goal setting is to move us
forward and spur positive change. If a goal doesn't have this motivating, transformational quality, don’t
bother with it. You'll just be disappointed.

Deciding to start a business is a worthy, life-changing goal—it can spur you on to investigate business
ideas, put together a business plan, obtain debt or equity financing, hire employees, and market your
products or services. Going back to school for a degree or to learn a trade is a worthy goal.

Choose Goals That Are Achievable Stretches

The fact that goals have to be achievable is standard advice on the topic of how to set goals. Pretty well
everyone knows that there's no point in setting a goal that you will never be able to accomplish. All
you'll do is get frustrated and abandon it. Less well known is the fact that goals need to stretch you in
some fashion. If a goal isn't engaging, you'll get bored and abandon it. (See Your Goal Setting Guide for
more on this.)

Make Your Goals Specific

Goals that are vague or non-specific are a recipe for failure. To decide that you're going to lose 20
pounds or get out of debt, for instance, is nice, but provides you with no guidance for doing that.

Think how much easier it would be to accomplish if you knew exactly what you were going to do to lose
the weight. So when you're goal setting, use a goal-setting formula that gives your goal a built-in action
plan. You'll start accomplishing more than you thought possible. If you're running a business and wish to
increase your sales by 20% this year, for instance, you will need to come up with a plan; perhaps you
need to increase sales productivity, or create a social media marketing campaign on Facebook.In This
Article

Why Set Goals

How To Set Goals and Achieve Them

The Bottom Line

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Goal Setting Tips

How to set goals and achieve them. PHOTO: IMAGE (C) LWA / GETTY IMAGES

Goal setting can help you create a realistic plan to put you on the right path to accomplishing your goals
or objectives. If you are having trouble achieving your business or personal goals, you're not alone. It
might be time to change your approach to goal setting. Successful goal setting starts with identifying
specific goals and planning how you intend to achieve them in a realistic way. This article contains goal-
setting tips to help you establish, track, and accomplish your goals.

Key Takeaways

Setting goals can help you establish a short, medium, and long-term strategy for success.

Effective goal setting includes having goals that are worthwhile, achievable, and specific.

Prioritize your goals and make them public to help keep you stay committed.

It helps to evaluate and track your progress, quantifying your results along the way.

Why Set Goals

A goal represents an aim, desire, or objective that you'd like to accomplish in the future. When you
establish goals, you're taking an active role in outlining the steps necessary to achieve that outcome. For
example, if your goal is to become a nurse, you might write down the steps needed to achieve your
career objective, which might include training, studying, and creating a study or work schedule.

Setting goals can help you establish a short, medium, and long-term strategy for success. Goal setting
can help boost your engagement and provide a sense of purpose, particularly when working in a team
environment.

To stay on target, it's essential to track the progress of your goals by revisiting them periodically. If
possible, quantify the results of your progress. Sometimes a long-term goal can be daunting, but
tracking your progress will help you gain confidence and momentum as you see your short and medium-
term goals being accomplished. If you're working in a team, goal setting and tracking the results can help
ensure everyone is on the same page and working towards the same outcome.
Note

Goals need to be specific and good intentions aren't enough. Just because you intend to change a
particular behavior, such as saving more or eating healthy, it doesn't necessarily lead to the behavioral
change and the accomplished goal.

How To Set Goals and Achieve Them

Choose Goals That Are Worthwhile

You would think it would go without saying, but lots of people set meaningless goals and then wonder
why they don't feel any sense of achievement. Remember that the purpose of goal setting is to move us
forward and spur positive change. If a goal doesn't have this motivating, transformational quality, don’t
bother with it. You'll just be disappointed.

Deciding to start a business is a worthy, life-changing goal—it can spur you on to investigate business
ideas, put together a business plan, obtain debt or equity financing, hire employees, and market your
products or services. Going back to school for a degree or to learn a trade is a worthy goal.

Choose Goals That Are Achievable Stretches

The fact that goals have to be achievable is standard advice on the topic of how to set goals. Pretty well
everyone knows that there's no point in setting a goal that you will never be able to accomplish. All
you'll do is get frustrated and abandon it. Less well known is the fact that goals need to stretch you in
some fashion. If a goal isn't engaging, you'll get bored and abandon it. (See Your Goal Setting Guide for
more on this.)

Make Your Goals Specific

Goals that are vague or non-specific are a recipe for failure. To decide that you're going to lose 20
pounds or get out of debt, for instance, is nice, but provides you with no guidance for doing that.
Think how much easier it would be to accomplish if you knew exactly what you were going to do to lose
the weight. So when you're goal setting, use a goal-setting formula that gives your goal a built-in action
plan. You'll start accomplishing more than you thought possible. If you're running a business and wish to
increase your sales by 20% this year, for instance, you will need to come up with a plan; perhaps you
need to increase sales productivity, or create a social media marketing campaign on Facebook.

Commit to Your Goals

You need to dedicate yourself to accomplish the goal you have chosen. That's why writing your goals
down is a common goal-setting tip; it's the first step to committing to achieving your goals. Develop an
action plan that clearly outlines your goals and how you intend to achieve them. Motivate yourself with
a rags-to-riches story or famous quote.

Also realize that accomplishing a goal is not an overnight process and that you are going to have to work
regularly at transforming your goal into an accomplishment. And you have to set aside the time you will
need to work on your goal.

Make Your Goal Public

Making your goal public is a technique that is really effective for many people. Think of organizations
such as TOPS (Take Off Pounds Sensibly) and their weekly weigh-ins. Knowing that others are going to be
monitoring your results ensures commitment to the goal and is extremely motivating. You don't have to
join an organization or broadcast your goal on a Facebook page to make your goal public; having a goal
buddy, a single person interested in your efforts, can be just as effective.

Prioritize Your Goals

Goals don't have to be huge projects that take months or even years to attain, but because they require
commitment and need to be worked on regularly, every single goal that you set will be demanding. So
don't sabotage yourself by taking on a bunch of goals at a time. Assuming that you are following all the
other goal-setting tips presented here and know how to set goals that are worthwhile, I would
recommend working on no more than three at a time, and even then you should choose one goal as
your top priority.
Make Your Goals Real to You

Goal setting is basically a way to approach the process of accomplishment. It's a very successful way, if
done right, but like all such processes, it's a bit abstract. Using techniques such as visualization to focus
on what actually accomplishing your goal will be like and what it will do for you can be very powerful—
and a great help in staying motivated. Choosing and posting pictures that represent successfully
accomplishing your goal is another way of doing this.

Set Deadlines To Accomplish Your Goals

A goal without a deadline is a goal that you have not fully committed to and a goal you will not achieve.
For one thing, if working on achieving a goal is something you can do whenever, you won't. For another,
having a deadline will shape your plan of action.

To return to the debt example, it makes a great difference whether your goal is to be out of debt in two
years or in five. Obviously you will have to reduce your spending or increase your income much more
drastically to get out of debt sooner.

Evaluate Your Goals

Remember that goal setting is a process—and evaluation is an important part of that process. Don’t just
settle for a "good" or "bad" assessment; think about what you did, how you did it, and what you got out
of it. Whether you successfully accomplished your goal or not, there's always something to be learned:
what works or doesn't work for you, whether achieving your goal lived up to your expectations, why you
failed. Extracting these lessons will increase your accomplishments even more as you apply them to your
future goal-setting experience.

Reward Yourself for Accomplishment

Internal satisfaction is a great thing, but external rewards can be immensely satisfying, too. When you
accomplish a goal, you've devoted time and effort to your success, so take the time to celebrate your
success, too. One caveat: don't undermine your efforts by choosing an inappropriate reward. Eating a
huge slab of cheesecake is not an appropriate reward for losing 20 pounds; for example, a new outfit
would be a more suitable choice.
The Bottom Line

Don't defeat your efforts before you even start to work on accomplishing your desired goals. Set
yourself up for success rather than failure by applying these goal-setting tips and start achieving what
you want to achieve.

What Are The 5 Principles Of Goal Setting Theory?

Locke and Latham have identified five goal-setting principles that can help you succeed.

Here are each of the five principles of goal-setting theory and how you might apply them to your goals
for your professional and personal life:

SMART Goals1. CLARITY

Goals that are clear and specific are more likely to be completed successfully. For example, rather than
defining a goal in general terms like “increase sales this month,” choose a more specific goal like “close
10% more sales in September.”

Clear goals should include a timeframe rather than being open-ended, like simply saying “sell more,”
and define a time frame and an achievable target date where you can check in and analyze your
progress.

2. CHALLENGE

Goals that are more challenging will be more motivating than goals that are easy to achieve. Your goal
must be challenging enough to require initiative.

Hitting manageable goals will give you a satisfying sense of accomplishment, encouraging you to
continue on your path to success.

That said, be sure your goals are achievable so as not to discourage you when unreachable goals are not
met.
3. COMMITMENT

Commitment means you genuinely wish to do what it takes to complete a goal. You must feel ownership
and be sincere about taking on the short-term goals and long-term goals you are working towards.

Without self-regulation, a commitment to the process, and the growth that will come from it, you will be
far less motivated to work towards them.

4. FEEDBACK

Create methods for receiving regular feedback on your progress. You can create a feedback process or
invite others with insight to share their feedback regularly.

Seeking healthy feedback gives you opportunities to analyze your goal progress and adjust goals that are
not working to set you up for more success.

5. TASK COMPLEXITY

When goals are particularly complex, be sure you have allowed yourself the time to learn and properly
break up the challenge into manageable chunks.

The complexity of a task may not be evident from the beginning, but once understood, it should be
broken down into a series of identified tasks.

As an example, if your goal is to update your website, you will likely need to break it down into stages
for content, design, programming, testing, and so on.

Let’s move on to a concrete example of goal-setting theory to help you better understand how to apply
them to your life.

6 Reasons Goal Setting Is Important

The final outcomes of goal setting are greater success and satisfaction in every aspect of your life. But
the goal-setting process itself brings many benefits that make goal-setting important. Here are six
reasons to set goals and consistently strive for goal attainment.

1. Goals Give You Focus

Without a goal, your efforts can become disjointed and unfocused, causing you to lose sight of what you
truly want out of life.

For example, a goal takes the flight of a hummingbird, which is chaotic and erratic, and focuses it much
like a hawk swooping down for its prey.

It allows you to zero in on each day’s tasks with laser precision, weeding out wasted effort and idle
movement.

2. Goals Let You Measure Progress

Being able to keep track of your progress toward achieving a goal is only possible if you set one in the
first place.

Keeping track of how you are making progress on measurable goals is extremely rewarding and will help
you maintain focus, and keep your head held high and your energy up. It will also apply principles of
preventive psychology by keeping you from getting discouraged and avoiding negative outcomes.

Sometimes, when working towards success, it’s easy to become disheartened because you don’t feel
you have “arrived” yet.

However, when you measure your current performance while working towards a specific goal, you will
be able to see that though you might not be where you want to be yet, you have made movements in
the right direction and are a lot better off than when you started.
3. Goals Help You Stay Motivated

It’s easy to put off work until tomorrow when there is no goal on the line.

For example, let’s consider the life of an athlete. If they have to get in shape for a competition, you
better believe they are going to be working out each and every day, whether they feel good or not,
whether they are sore or not, whether they are tired or not, whether they want to or not, because they
have a goal.

They have a destination. They are striving for higher performance.

Their desire to achieve their goal keeps them in the gym, on the field, or on the track when they would
much rather skip.

In much the same way, having a goal will keep you intrinsically motivated for better performance!

4. Goals Help You Beat Procrastination

Procrastination is something we all battle from time to time, myself included. However, when you set
goals in life, specific goals for what you want to achieve, it helps you understand that procrastination is
dangerous.

It is wasted time. It is another day you aren’t moving closer to that goal.

Consider this inspirational from Pablo Picasso the next time you are thinking of putting off that next step
toward your goal and rethink your stance:

“Only put off until tomorrow what you are willing to die having left undone.”
5. Goals Help You Achieve More

When you set a goal and reach that goal, it gives you the taste of victory. You will want to taste that
again. Goal setting is a positive habit-building process.

What does that mean? You push yourself toward the next rung of the ladder, challenge yourself to
improve your performance, and you achieve even more.

Working towards meeting and surprising goals helps you achieve way more than you ever thought
possible.

6. Goals Help You Determine What You Want In Life

The act of setting goals forces you to contemplate what you truly want out of life.

What is the level of success you want to achieve? What is the income level you want to have? What
does your life of ease look like? What about your dream home? What do you need income-wise to
achieve your dreams?

Once you set these outcome goals, you then break your desires down into attainable, measurable goals.

These goals keep you motivated, helping you avoid procrastination and keeping you laser-focused on
achieving your dreams. It is, therefore, the act of setting, achieving, and surpassing goals that make
living your best life possible.