Setting goals and objectives

For successful development, it is important to set the right goals. They are a reflection of our dreams. It is important to formulate and formulate goals correctly, because they motivate to perform actions, active, conscious actions. This is a kind of internal resource that helps to overcome obstacles, not to give up in front of difficulties in difficult moments.

Let’s try to understand how goal setting helps in business and life. What should be taken into account when setting goals? How does competent goal-setting contribute to the efficiency of companies and managers? Let’s analyze these and other questions in detail, review the basic rules and techniques of goal setting, and talk about current approaches, methods, and principles of goal setting.

What it is

A goal is a model of an ideal future. The result you want to achieve. Buy a new car, lose 10 kilograms by summer, take your company to an international level. All of the above are goals that require certain actions. When we set a goal, we ask ourselves the question: “What to do?” And the question of how to do it correctly is answered by the tasks performed along the way.

The ability to achieve goals helps to improve self-organization. It makes a person stress-resistant and self-confident. A properly set goal helps to separate major and minor tasks. Effectively distribute efforts for their fulfillment, excluding useless waste of time.

Areas of a person’s life for goal setting

People set goals in different spheres of life. They can be divided into 10 types:

Health	Activities aimed at improving physical health (sports, proper nutrition, active lifestyle)
Family	Building relationships with loved ones
Relationship with others	Communication and cooperation with colleagues, management, friends and acquaintances
Career	Everything related to business development and running a business
Education	Obtaining a university diploma, certificate of advanced training, additional or special education
Material situation	Proper distribution of financial flows
Public life	Participation in public organizations, events, charity and volunteer activities
Spirituality	Formation of world outlook, definition of spiritual values
Personal development	Overcoming negative qualities by introducing useful habits into life, performing humane and noble deeds, learning new skills
Vacation	Hobbies and activities that help keep you positive and rejuvenated.

After analyzing the listed areas, they are given scores from 0 to 10 on a 10-point scale. In this way, it is possible to determine which points should be paid more attention to in order to increase satisfaction and quality of life.

Methods of goal setting

Having made a hierarchy of values, we need to find out which of them are in conflict with each other. In what way it can be resolved. The following ways of goal-setting can be used for the search:

• Intuition.
• Invention.
• Calculation.
• Choice and prescription.

The first method is “automatically built in” in every person. The algorithm of goal-setting in this case is extremely simple and clear. To understand what you need, you need to listen to your inner voice and life experience.

Invention is an experimental process based on achieving a certain result in the foreseeable future. For example, you can’t decide on a hobby. So you decide to try your hand at embroidery or scrapbooking. After attending classes for a while, you can make the right conclusion: whether this activity is right for you or whether you should try something else.

Using the calculation method, identify the key objective. It is written down on a sheet of paper or digital media. Under the main goal are placed smaller ones that will help to fulfill the main dream. These in turn are evaluated according to the following criteria:

• Achievement time.
• Complexity of execution.
• Choice Opportunity.

The best option is given a high score (4). The problematic and costly one is given a low score (up to 1). After calculating the sums of the obtained values, more realistic and profitable ways of implementation are determined. This method is rather cumbersome and complicated in execution. Therefore, it is practically not used in everyday life.

Using the prescriptive method, they choose one goal for themselves from the existing benchmarks proposed by someone else. They draw up a step-by-step instruction for achieving it. As an example, we can cite a case from the life of an ordinary family raising a school graduate. His mother sees him as a journalist, his father recommends choosing a career as a lawyer, and his grandfather and grandmother believe that he will achieve better success if he becomes a doctor. The young man can choose one of the options offered. Or he can follow his own path.

How to set achievable goals

Many people set goals for themselves for the New Year. But, only a small percentage fulfills the intended. Various methods are used to clarify their rationality. For example, setting goals and objectives using SMART technology. According to this method, the goal should be clearly described, measurable, achievable, commensurate with other goals and limited in time. Let us consider these criteria in more detail:

• Specific implies being as close to reality as possible. The goal should accurately describe the result to be achieved. If we are talking about improving the quality of employee labor, the specific goal is to increase productivity by 40% by the second quarter of this year. In order to achieve this target, the company will automate production.
• Measurable means the ability to present the result obtained in any unit of measurement. If you plan to become a popular blogger, an approximate goal would be to increase the number of subscribers to a specific figure, for example, 10,000.
• Achivieable is the belief that the goal can be realized. Analysis of ways to achieve it. If you want to become a software market leader, you need to be able to competently promote and sell the developed product. Lead a team of experienced specialists. Team members should be “on the same wavelength” with you. Understand what benefits they will get if you achieve a positive result.
• Relevant is proven by its relevance to the company. It should not be imposed from above or stolen from a competitor. The goal should be a result that brings real benefit to you.
• Time bound assumes that the goal has a schedule of milestones and an end date.

A brief deciphering of the SMART mechanism can be described as follows:

1. Maximizing Specificity of Results (S).
2. Presence of measured and analyzed indicators (M).
3. Achievability Assessment (A).
4. Necessity, Importance, and Relevance (R).
5. Due Date (T).

The search for and formulation of personal goals is influenced by many factors: family, social environment, mass media, and so on. But the responsibility for them lies with the person himself.

Signs and tools to achieve the goals

Using different ways of setting a goal, it is important to understand at what point the desired result can be considered achieved. It is not enough to want to buy a car. It will be yours only at the moment when you receive the title deed to the vehicle.

Various tools can be used to achieve the intended goal. The most common tools include:

Countdown

List the key steps of the plan from the last to the first. Describe the steps that need to be taken to achieve them. Each of them is given a deadline. Example:

Goal: Move into a new apartment by October 2024.

• What does it take to move into an apartment? Finish the renovation (by October 2024).
• What do you need to complete the renovation? Interior finish (September 2024).
• What does it take to complete the finish? Hire a crew, purchase materials (July 2024).
• Materials Procurement (June 2024).
• Finding a repair crew (May 2024).

That is, the first step is to select a construction crew and sign a contract for repair work.

Daily activities

It is mandatory to perform one or more activities each day to accomplish the work of the overall goal. This should be done on a regular basis.

Suitable environment

Make your life the most fulfilling and interesting. Getting new knowledge, communicating with successful, educated people, you will always remember your goal. For its successful realization it is very important to have the support of your relatives and the help of qualified specialists.

Self-hypnosis

This tool should be used by those who believe in the materiality of thoughts. Visualize your dream. Visualize and capture yourself at the moment of achieving it. It can be a drawing, a presentation or a collage of photos. Modeling the feeling of possessing what you want, you will get moral strength for new achievements, you will want to make more efforts.

Common mistakes that prevent you from achieving your goal

The main obstacle on the way to the dream is the unwillingness to face negative emotions. Unpreparedness for change, fear of failure – it deprives you of strength and prevents you from moving forward. To become successful in business and life, it is important to be sure that you can always find a way out of any situation. Proper goal-setting implies active actions. Among the frequent mistakes that do not allow you to achieve the desired result, it is worth highlighting:

• Insecurity. It does not allow you to open up, to fully utilize your capabilities and inner resources. It becomes a reason for endless postponement of important things “for later”. You can get rid of this negative factor by concentration. Acquisition of life and professional experience.
• Fuzzy wording. Without knowing what you want, you won’t be able to focus on the main objectives. This means that key goals will not be achieved.
• Failure to be serious. If you set a goal, you will have to constantly work to fulfill it. Without active, balanced, competent actions, the result will be zero.
• Lack of desire to work on yourself. Passing in front of difficulties on the way to the fulfillment of dreams, you will tread on the same place and will not achieve anything in life. Only constant striving for self-improvement and development will give a positive result.
• Lack of self-control and reminder system. Sometimes it’s hard to keep everything in your head. Especially with a large number of tasks and errands. Therefore, it is convenient to use special universal programs – task managers – to organize your own time and review your goals.
• Exaggerated demands. Achieving the ideal is difficult. This does not mean that you should not strive for it. However, feeling guilt or regret at a negative result is also not worth it. It is necessary to analyze the situation, analyze the mistakes and make a new attempt.
• Lack of a team of like-minded people. It is impossible to cope with all the problems alone. The support of relatives, teamwork, understanding and friendly attitude of colleagues are important for accomplishing the set goal.
• Lack of a contingency plan. It is necessary for prompt corrections to the set tasks.
• Complete abandonment of the intended in case of failure.

If you get a negative result, you should not despair. It is impossible to foresee all the pitfalls and obstacles. In this case, it is good to have a backup plan with carefully worked out actions to overcome the situation.

What will help you achieve your goal

You can achieve what you want faster by focusing on what is important. Movement towards the goal should be constant and regular. Steps can be tiny, even microscopic, but they must be made daily, without stopping. Visualize and designate your intention in a positive coloring. Set clear and measurable goals. Track their fulfillment every step of the way. Don’t be afraid to ask for help and start over. And most importantly, believe in yourself and your abilities.

LeaderTask for goal setting

LeaderTask can help you organize your personal and working time and avoid getting lost in the endless flow of things to do. With its help, you can make personal and work plans, assess productivity, and control the degree of achievement of the intended goal. Create tasks and assignments for your subordinates. Sort tasks by importance and due dates. Receive notifications about events and new projects. Share information with colleagues and stay up-to-date on company events.

LeaderTask application combines the functionality of an electronic organizer, task planner, agenda and task manager. It supports flexible project management technologies. Suitable for any activity. It has the ability to simultaneously manage several projects in different directions. The program provides an advanced to-do system, including:

• prioritization;
• moving tasks in the list;
• setting deadlines;
• filtering and search system by task;
• color labels to highlight tasks and many other options for comfortable and efficient work.

The application has separate modules for managing goals and objectives: “Goal Ladder and SMART Goal Setting. LeaderTask electronic planner works on all digital platforms and differs from other programs by its convenient and full-featured mobile version. It supports working offline, without internet. Synchronizes with many popular services and programs.

Conclusion

With goal-setting and planning skills, you will have a powerful tool for effective time management, strategic and practical management of your company. By setting yourself a real, achievable, measurable and relevant goal and making a quality plan for achieving it, you will make your life clear and structured. You will bring harmony and order into it.

Don’t be discouraged if you can’t fulfill your dreams right away. Do not be afraid of mistakes and disappointments on the way to the realization of dreams. Proper planning will help you avoid many obstacles. Having a backup plan, you will be able to quickly react to a force majeure situation and make the necessary adjustments. Do not think about the fact that something you will not succeed or you are not worthy of it. Do not be afraid to dream. For successful results, it is better to resort to proven advice or guides from experts and psychologists in this field, such as Brian Tracy. Everyone can set a goal and achieve what they want. To do this, you need to be confident in yourself and constantly work on yourself.