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SMART Goals and Business Coaching

SMART Goals | By Kris Koonar | Read time minutes

Target and arrow with word goal

Leaders of all industries know the importance of setting achievable and effective goals for themselves. These goals are termed SMART goals. Goals are one of the most under-utilised yet important tools that businesses have. Once the main outline of your project has been set, your attention needs to be turned towards developing certain goals that can help make your project a success. The SMART goals checklist can be used to evaluate the set of goals to be used. This process can help the employees as well as the employers share a certain understanding of how the goals have been set and how they are to be achieved.

SMART goals should be:

Specific: A precise goal has a greater chance of being accomplished than a general goal. When charting out a specific goal make sure to specify what needs to be done and within what time frame. In order to set a specific goal you should know what you want. You need to ask yourself certain questions like:

  • Who is involved?
  • What do I want to achieve?
  • Where do I need to do this?
  • When should I be able to complete it?
  • What are the requirements and constraints?
  • Why am I doing this?

An example of a specific goal would be some thing like "Join a Gym and workout four days a week."

Measurable: Concrete evidence needs to be established in order to measure the progress you made towards attaining your goals. Measuring your progress enables you to stay on track, to meet your targets and to experience the excitement of achievement that encourages you. While setting up measurable goals you need to ask yourself questions like:

  • How much?
  • How many?
  • How will I know when it is done?

An example of a measurable goal is "Edit twelve articles by the end of each workday."

Attainable: If you have partial blindness and you think you can become a pilot then you might have to rethink this goal. You need to set goals for yourself that are attainable and not out of reach. Setting unattainable goals is a recipe for disappointment and failure. Even difficult, long-term goals can be made attainable by planning steps wisely and creating a time frame for yourself in order to carry out those steps.

Realistic: You need to be both willing and able to work towards achieving your goals. This would make it a realistic goal. By setting unrealistic goals for yourself you would probably give up very soon. A goal can be both high and realistic; you are the only one who can decide how high your goal needs to be. If you truly believe you can achieve your goal then it would be termed as a realistic goal. Another way of knowing if your goal is realistic is to think back and determine whether you have accomplished something similar in the past.

Timeline: All goals should have a set time in which you choose to achieve them. This ensures that you don't get lazy and keeps pushing you on further to meet your targets. Also you need to make sure that your timeline is realistic.

Business coaching focuses on helping a business owner create a business plan with its own identity. Business coaching involves teaching, helping, directing and encouraging individuals with their business problems. Business coaching is applicable to any field of commerce and it involves helping certain individuals with problems regarding business start-ups or with problems within the enterprise itself. Coaching enables you to gain clarity in your business planning which leads to progress towards your goals.

Your business coach can help you develop and achieve your SMART goals. Take the next step and contact a qualified business coach - in fact, make that a goal!


Visit www.businesscoach.com for more information, free articles and be sure to sign up for our newsletter. BusinessCoach.com is a full service Business Coaching firm, founded in 1989 and based on the philosophy of Gary B. Henson, an entrepreneur and business owner for over 25 years. Chari Darneal is Vice President and Senior Business Coach. Our clients manage anywhere from five to 500 employees each, and cover more than 60 industries.


Recommended read: Better Coaching Using the GROW Model, by Duncan Haughey.

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