Goal Setting Tips
As you sit down to working on your goals, the first question you are faced with is how do you set effective goals. Here are a few tips that will help you get started:
• Make sure that each goal is a positive statement. Instead of saying ‘I will not be nervous before a presentation’, say ‘I will be positive and confident before a presentation’.
• Be as precise as you can be. Do not be vague about when you want to reach your goals. ‘I want to lose weight’ is a very vague goal. ‘I want to lose 10 pounds in the next six months’ is a more precise way of stating it.
• Setting priorities. When you have set yourself quite a few goals to achieve, you will obviously need to prioritize them. This will help you focus on the most important ones first.
• Write down each and every goal and as you work downwards, write down the specific details of what you need to achieve everyday. As you write down the steps you will know what is feasible and what is not.
• Break your plan down into very small operational steps. This will give you something to do everyday – in this way not only are you making steady progress but you will also have the satisfaction of striking out that step for the day, helping you know that you are on the right track.
• Be practical. When you set goals, you can only work on your performance. You should therefore understand that you can only work on that which is in your control and you cannot always control the outcome. For example, despite all your hard work and planning for a major sporting event, you may find yourself out of it because of a bad injury. This should not set you back. Therefore rather than basing goals based on a certain outcome, base your goals on the kind of performance you can deliver.
• Be realistic. Most of the times, in our life, our goals are determined by what our parents, our family or our peers want. At times, this is in complete contrast to what you yourself truly desire or beyond what you are capable of. Setting goals that are not realistic is a surefire way of setting yourself up for disappointment. This will have long-term repercussions as any failure is only going to make you more dispirited and less motivated to want to achieve anything further. Make sure you understand the kind and level of skills that you possess and what you need to achieve various goals so that you can set some realistic ones for yourself.
