How to Create the Perfect Goal
What is a Goal?
Whether it’s in your personal life or professional life, a goal is something you can measure and strive towards; it has a clear deadline and acts as a barometer to define if you are successful or not. A good goal should be hard enough that it’s an improvement from your current state, and not just an easy target to hit. A goal should act as a beacon that elevates you from your current position.
Did you know? You are 42% more likely to hit a goal simply by writing it down
Steps to Creating a Goal
When establishing a goal, a commonly used acronym to remember is SMART.
S - Specific: Make sure your goal is focused and not too broad
M - Measurable: A goal should have a number associated with it. Otherwise is it aimless
A - Attainable: Attainability is a synonym for realistic. You do not want to set yourself up for failure right out of the gate. A good check is figuring out your starting point today
R - Relevant: Make sure the goal you choose ties into the bigger picture. If you measure one item that doesn’t get you closer to your ultimate goal, then it might become a distraction
T - Time-based: Put a deadline to reaching your goal. This will help you focus and help you check in leading up to your deadline.
Let’s see an example.
Let’s say growing revenue is my #1 goal this upcoming year. How would I go about creating a good goal to measure revenue?
Step 1: I define what I wanted to measure: revenue. You could even further breakdown revenue in terms of products offered or sales channels like in-store vs. online (specific)
Step 2: Let’s say I want to make $100,000 this year (measurable)
Step 3: Critical checkpoint here. I always look at the past year or prior months to get a benchmark. If I only had revenue of $20,000 last year, I may want to re-evaluate my goal. Likewise, if I was at $105,000 in revenue, my goal may be too easy. (attainable)
Note: If this is your first year in business, be careful. Setting a goal too high out of the gate can be dejecting so we recommend ramping each month upwards to grow your business over time and help you hit goals along the way.
Step 4: Maybe profit is the number I really care about. If I measure revenue, I am missing half the story of cost. This is a good check to ensure you’re not missing anything (relevant)
Step 5: Now that I’ve done my checks in step 3/4 to ensure I am measuring the correct goal, I need to put a deadline to it. The easiest way is to create a full year goal (time-based)
How to get the most out of your goals
Goals hold you accountable and allow you to take corrective actions when needed. The easiest way to see this in action using weight-loss to illustrate the point.
Imagine you want to lose 12 lbs this year. I would argue checking your weight loss on a monthly basis will provide enough feedback and allow you to see the progress you’re making so there is time to correct and ask questions if you’re not getting closer to your goal.
If you hypothetically didn’t weight yourself until December 31 to see if you reached your goal, there is no time to self-correct or make adjustments. However, if you create a framework to weigh yourself on the final day of each month, you are setting yourself up for success. In an ideal world, if you wanted to lose 12 lbs, you could target 1 lb loss per month. The key point is creating enough check-ins to ensure you’re on track or trigger an alert if you’re falling behind. You’ll thank yourself at the end of the year. If a monthly review seems too intense to measure your goals, we suggest quarterly at the very least.