Why Goals Fail

Posted on January 15, 2024 by Tara Lehman, One of Thousands of Life Coaches on Noomii.

There is a lot of talk around setting goals and what those goals may be. In the new year, many people have personal goals, but it tends to be a high season for performance appraisals and setting goals there too. Setting goals is great and a needed process if they are done correctly. However, why don’t we always achieve them?

Throughout my own growth and development, I began to understand that creating and determining a goal is part one. But many do not get past this, so I started to look at the why behind goals failing. Here are a few reasons that come up over and over again.

First, the goal is set and is written down. Maybe you even have a SMART goal – on that is Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time Bound (due date), but now what? This is where a lot of people fail with their goals. That is all they do. And if it is a performance goal then it may be reviewed again in the next performance appraisal…in a year. That goal never came to fruition because you simply set it and hoped someone or something would help you to achieve it, but that never happened.

Second, is that you do not have an accountability partner or follow up administrator. This is vital to all goals if you want them to work. We are all busy and goals tend to fall behind because we have other things to do. Have someone who will keep you accountable or someone responsible for following up to your or your employee’s goals before the due date. I say before because if you wait a year until the due date…guess what? Nothing probably happened. Coaches and mentors can help you with accountability and keep you on track, by the way.

The next one is that you did not create action steps for the big goal. If you set an annual goal, you may feel you have lots of time to work on it and then suddenly the ball drops on January 1st , and you forgot all about it. Another issue with the not creating the steps is the goal can suddenly seem too big if you waited to work on it. Creating action steps that are weekly, monthly, or even quarterly help you stay on track (with the accountability partner of course, to help you meet or beat the due dates).
The last one I will share today is the list of excuses as to why the goal did not get done or get done on time. The biggest excuse? I bet you guessed it…time. I hear all the time about how people did not have enough time to work on the goal. Here is a not so big secret you need to remember…time doesn’t change. We have 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. It’s not time that is an issue. It is how you manage the time on your calendar you need to look at. Again, a coach or mentor can help with this too, as I (for example) have learned throughout my career just how valuable time is and how to manage my calendar, so I had not only a full time (ok, more than a full time) job, my coaching side hustle, and work / life balance too. It is so important to understand your time and how you need or want to manage it. Time itself does not change, so stop making that your excuse.

If you need help with goal setting, an accountability partner, or someone to help with organizing your time in life or as a leader, feel free to reach out for assistance.