Mastering Achievement: The Art and Science of Goal Setting

  • Nexdus
  • August 10, 2023
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Knowing your role, how you can benefit the company that you work for, and the annual goals you must set to ensure maximum effectiveness are all part of managing oneself in the workplace. For this to happen, you must constantly assess how you handle your job, outputs, plan, carry out, track your progress, and then plan some more throughout your career.

This applies to two different domains: your personal goals, which are the areas in which you aim to improve yourself, and your job objectives, which you intend to accomplish on behalf of your organization.

 Why Set Goals? 

  1. Goals make you more efficient by directing your focus on the most essential duties and actions.
  2. Goals energize you; the more vital you believe the goal is, the more determined you are to fulfill it.
  3. Goals motivate you to be committed to completing a task.
  4. Goals allow you to use current abilities and knowledge, as well as to develop new ones that are relevant to accomplishing your objectives.

Personal Development Goals 

Personal development goals encourage you to take responsibility for your own life and become makers of your own future, rather than becoming the passive recipients of whatever others have planned for you.

These goals assist you in determining what you want to achieve at work and in life, allowing you to decide what you want to learn or become.

Key Principles of Good Goal Setting 

  • Link your goals to your role 

This entails determining what you are responsible for accomplishing or creating. Start by thinking about:

  1. Your role
  2. Responsibilities
  3. Your important work objectives for the year
  • Setting SMART goals 

The following additional goal-setting guideline is to ensure that your goals are SMART. SMART Goals are:

  1. Specific:  Provide yourself with a clear target to aim for.
  2.  Measurable: Your goal should be quantifiable, such as financial results, production volume, sales numbers, or quality standards.
  3.  Attainable: It should be sensible.
  4.  Relevant: Your goal should be relevant to your aim.
  5.  Time-constrained: Make sure you’ve specified the date by which you’ll reach the goal.

If it’s a big goal (for a year or so), set sub-objectives that you can measure along the way to see if you’re on track or if you need to adjust your implementation strategy.

 Example 

SMART goal: To increase the number of clients from 10% to 20% by December this year.

  •  Track and adapt your goals 

The third important component of goal setting is to keep tabs on your progress, making any required adjustments to ensure you stay on track to meet your objectives. 

Final Thoughts

In this lesson, we have covered why we need to set goals and three key principles of goal setting including:

  • Linking your goals to your role
  • Making sure your goals are SMART and,
  • Making sure that you monitor your progress and make the necessary adjustments