Setting SMART Goals

Several years ago, I did a few projects with a corporate trainer named Maria, who taught me about SMART goals. She did not originate the concept, but she taught it well. SMART stands for criteria your goals should meet if you want them to work.

• Specific
• Measurable
• Action-oriented
• Realistic
• Time-bound

The more specific you can be in your goal, the better. Think of the GPS in your car—it wants to know exactly where you want to go, not just a general direction. "I want to be rich" is not a goal, but "I want to have $100,000 in my savings account" is a good start on one.

To know if you have met your goal, it has to be measurable. "Rich" is not measurable; specific dollar amounts are. "I want to lose weight" is not measurable; a specific weight to reach, or inches to lose, or a specific number of calories or carbs per day...all measurable so you know if you reached them or not.

SMART goals must be phrased in an action-oriented way. "I want to win the lottery" does not qualify, but "I want to win the lottery by buying two tickets a week until I win" does. "I want a new job" is a nice vision, but it needs more to become a goal. Better: "I will find a new job by looking at several sources daily and attending one networking event a week." This is the "how" of your goal, and sometimes the steps will need to be more detailed (outside the one sentence goal statement).

So far, a goal of "I want to have $100,000 in my savings, from buying winning lottery tickets" meets the first three criteria, but will fail on the fourth: realistic. Setting goals you can't possibly meet is setting yourself up for failure. There is no problem with some of your goals being a stretch, and not easy to achieve. In fact, some should be like that. Others are easier to reach and just need the other four criteria to make them effective and not just wishes. Wanting to look more proportioned in your figure by getting taller, not realistic; by getting more toned or slimmer, realistic.

Time-bound is the last criteria that separates a wish from a goal. That $100,000 in your savings, when do you want to have this? "I want to move to California." OK, when—next year, when you retire, before you die? Choose a time-frame that allows for the action-oriented stage to work effectively. Alternatively, if the time is set by outside events, adjust your action steps to better meet the deadline.

Putting all this together, last year I had a goal. I wanted to weigh 150 by my high school reunion in September, by burning more calories and eating more carefully. Given that I started at 183 in January, this was realistic, as well as specific, measurable, action-oriented, and time-bound. When the first four months of the year were not producing results at a rate that would meet the goal, I changed the action steps to "kick it up a notch" (as Emeril would say). When I have had SMART goals in the past, and stuck with them, they worked for me.

Good luck with your SMART goals in 2012!