Everybody continually talks about setting goals, to-do lists, and other measures to increase productivity and performance. When making goals, you should ask: what makes a quality goal? Are there a better ways than others to make goals? How can goal setting be more effective? The best way that I have found to make goals is by using SMART goals.

This is a specific way to make goals that will allow you to have a measurable goal that can be tracked. Also, it gives a goal some way to be measurable and quantitative. Now, whether you are making a personal goal or a career goal, this method is the sure-fire way to keep yourself on track.

SMART goals are a goal that is Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Timely, or SMART for short.

Specific

A specific goal is a goal that points to some concrete and specific action. An example is I want to learn Spanish. This is not a SMART goal in and of itself, but the specific part is that you want to learn Spanish. If you said you wanted to learn a language, this is too vague. Also, you can make this goal more specific as you will see through the rest of the explanation.

Measurable

So the measurable component is, does your goal have aspects that will allow you to measure your progress. In our goal, I want to learn Spanish, you will want to be able to measure your progress. Can you measure your progress? Of course, and this can be done by the number of words you have learned. So you will want a component that will specify needing to measure the amount of words you have learned.

Attainable

Is learning Spanish an attainable goal? Well to learn Spanish is broad, but to learn Spanish to a conversational level in 1 year is a little more specific. The question is, is this attainable? If you can make a goal attainable by placing more details in the goal itself it will become more attainable. By practicing Spanish for at least 30 minutes a day I can learn Spanish in a year. If this is attainable then you can say it is attainable.

Realistic

Is learning Spanish a realistic goal? Of course. Learning a language is something anybody can learn. Knowing this you know that learning Spanish is realistic. Now learning Spanish to a native level in 1 month may not be realistic, but let’s keep the goal to something simple such as learning Spanish.

Timely

If a goal is timely, then it has a time period in which to be accomplished. If you want to be conversational in Spanish in 1 year, which means you need to know 2,000 words, this is time bound. This goal is actually the SMART goals you are working to formulate.

The SMART goal is that you want to be conversational in Spanish in one year by learning 2,000 words. This is a specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and a timely goal. By using this metric you can create goals which you are able to accomplish.

Good luck and good selling!