#GOALS – It's all about being SMART(ER)

Posted on February 25, 2022 by Dr Larry Davies, One of Thousands of Executive Coaches on Noomii.

Coaching, if you haven’t already figured it out, is built around collaboration between two people: the client (YOU) and the coach (ME). It’s a COLLABORATION.

We work together to help YOU to establish some goals that you hope or want or need to achieve some time in the near or hopefully not-too-distant future.
I have a little bit of an advantage in coaching that I take from my other careers: instructional design, teaching, and teacher-training. I have worked for years with teachers to help them to think about and construct goals. These goals need to follow an old and very reliable formula that comes with a simple acronym to help people remember. That acronym is, of course SMART. Now, you can run and do a Wikipedia search for SMART goals, and they do a great treatment on it … but you’ll also see there is a bit of a conflict over what exactly this five-letter acronym denotes.

Here’s where the client-coach collaboration comes in. We can invent these for ourselves! So, here’s my proposal and explanation for what the acronym should stand for. Let’s start first with a generic goal that we can turn into a SMART goal.
‘I want to lose a lot of weight!’

That sounds noble, weight loss. That’s always one of my goals! I really should get a weight coach to help out with that one. But I digress. Let’s apply SMART once we get the concept down. The acronym is:

S = Specific which goes with the question What is it you want to achieve?
The easiest example is probably ‘I want to lose a lot of weight!’ OK, well, we have something general here – weight-loss – as a goal. That’s not bad, but the phrase ‘a lot of weight’ isn’t anything specific. ‘Five kilograms’ … ‘20 pounds’ … ‘half a stone’ (Ok, i have no idea what half a stone is, but I DO know it’s a measure of weight – I just hope it doesn’t mean something like 150 kilograms or more) … all of these are pretty specific. So, when you think of your ultimate achievement, keep it simple, but keep it specific, too!

M = Measurable which goes with the question How are you going to measure it?
OK so I used numbers in the example above, but that makes them specific AND it makes them measurable. You can get on a scale one day, and make a note of the weight, and come back a day or a week later, get on the scale again, and make a note again of the weight. If you’ve been doing a proper diet with exercise, then hopefully the second number will be lower than the first. You are able to measure the difference. One day you were 75 kilograms and a month later you were 73.5 kilograms. You reduced your weight by 1.5 kilograms. That’s great, and measurable, progress. So, when you think of your ultimate achievement, what means will you use to chart your progress to your goal?

A = Achievable which goes with the question Can you do it?
In my opinion, those who overlook this one are making a big BIG BIG mistake. it’s a very simple question, for sure, but there’s no point in making a goal of something that you honestly cannot complete. If you are like me, you start a project, like weight loss, then you don’t finish it. I’ve done that far too many times to admit, but it all came down to not having an achievable goal in the end. ’I’ll lose 10 kilograms this month’ is really not possible or achievable unless you get very very sick and you don’t eat for days. But you CAN lose one or two kilograms per month with careful planning and commitment to the goal. Not finishing what you started is a pretty common phenomenon. Finishing something can be done if it’s a reasonable thing that is either within or slightly above your current skill set. Improvement is always a good thing if you know how to do it in increments … you know, like ‘leveling up’ in a game or having a coach who can help you decide what increments are acceptable to show achievable progress … So, when you think of your ultimate achievement, what are the reasonable increments you can put in place that will get you there?

R = Relevant which goes with the question Is it worth it for you?
For many, being overweight can lead to health issues, so weight loss is usually something that is needed and, in the end, worth it. The best goals are things that add some kind of relevant value to your life, whether it is improving your knowledge, your skill, or your competence in something … if it has meaning for you, if it gives you purpose, if it engages you, then – oh yes, it is worth it and very relevant.

T = Time-bound which goes with the question By when can I do it?
You CAN lose 50 kilograms if you need to, but the healthy way to lose that is to try to drop about one kilogram per week. That requires consistent effort to eat more healthy and to exercise reasonably at a steady pace – not too much, not too little. So, dropping 50 kilograms is achievable if you plan for it to happen in 50 weeks – that’s ONE ENTIRE YEAR. That becomes a long-term goal, but it can be done. You won’t, however, drop 50 kilograms in one month, or even six months without super extreme dieting, which can be just as unhealthy. So, even though setting time limits seems to be the easiest part of understanding what SMART goals are, they provide the balance found in the other four parts of the acronym.

I’m not a weight loss coach, and oh I need one to keep me looking forward and getting to my ideal healthy weight, that’s for sure, but the examples provided here can apply to just about anything else. Looking to be successful in business? Well, ‘successful in business’ is very general, and definitely not measurable. You need to generate targets within a timeframe that are reasonably stated. It means setting and resetting and resetting and resetting your goals as you make progress. Let’s apply smart goals to my weight loss and see if I can incorporate all five.
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My dream weight is 75 kilograms! By the end of this year, I will have lost 25 to 30 kg by losing 1.5 kg or more at the end of each month. I will do this by closely monitoring my calorie intake to 1600 calories a day, and do one hour’s worth of exercise three to five times per week.
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So, there’s the plan. it’s specific – weight loss, measurable, 1.5kg per month, 1600 calories, one hour exercise, three times a week – achievable, 1.5kg is a very realistic and obtainable number if weighing in is done at least three times a week and adjustments in diet/exercise are made – relevant, ideal weight has many health benefits that add value to one’s life, and time-bound, with increments of weeks, months, and the end of the year as milestones in place to make sure the pace of the change is working.

No matter what you want achieve as your goal, when you make it SMART, you set yourself up for success!

I can work with you to develop SMART goals so that you can grow your dreams. It takes a collaboration. Are you ready for it? I know I am.
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If you got this far and you re-read the title … you saw there’s the (ER) at the end of title. No that doesn’t stand for Emergency Room. SMART has been around a very long time and has been successfully implemented in a lot of educational institutions. But we are applying this acronym to reaching YOUR goals that enhance YOUR life. So, what are these two others?

E = Exciting which goes with the question Is this something that ‘sparks joy’ in your life?
Are you making goals that in the end aren’t really fulfilling you? Who doesn’t want happiness? Make sure the goals you make for yourself will result in you being happy with your life. This is another given in life, that we tend to slide easily into unhappiness, and it’s more than likely because we are doing things that don’t bring us the joy we seek. So just like Marie Kondo who says get rid of the clutter by talking to your things and seeing if they spark joy in you, the same should be said of your SMART goals.

R = Rewarding which goes with the question Once I achieve my goal how will I reward myself?

If you’ve reflected on your goal, and you have considered any part of it achieved, what are you going to do to celebrate that victory? Give yourself a pat on the back. Let the world know what you’ve done. Go take some time off. Treat yourself family and friends to a big meal (if you’ve lost those 25kg that is!). Do SOMETHING to reward yourself as a kind of ceremonial closure to the SMARTER goals you’ve set and achieved. In my personal opinion, I think this one is the most neglected, but why? Winners get trophies, why shouldn’t you when you finish something you started? After all you’ve achieved, don’t you feel SMARTER in the end?
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This blog post appears on my website at the following URL: drlarry.coach/blog/f/goals-%E2%80%93-its-all-about-being-smarter