Why Do We Need To Set Goals?
I am stopping drinking.
We will be more productive.
I am going to the gym every day.
We will be more organised.
I am going to write a book.
The list goes on. But for all the enthusiasm, planning and organising to get these goals started… Sticking to them proves to be quite challenging for so many people.
The challenge felt by many, and the goals that fall by the wayside, mean that only 3% of people actually set meaningful goals. That are written down. Many studies have been conducted that show that around another 13% had goals. But they were not in writing. And the remaining 84% of those involved in the studies had no specific goals at all. One study by Mark McCormack in 1979 followed the study group for 10years and then interviewed them to see how each participant was doing.
The 13% of the group who had goals were earning twice as much as the 84% with no goals. On average. The 3% who had clear written goals were earning 10 times as much as the other 97% put together.
My point from this?
Goal setting is fundamental to success. You cannot reach a goal if you have not set one. And this post will explain why in more detail.
The Importance Of Effective Goal Setting
The importance of effective goal setting cannot be overstated on a journey to success. There are countless articles on how to set SMART goals (discussed below), and it is filtering into our education system. Learning the importance of goal setting and techniques of sticking to those goals, is the determining factor in whether we reach our personal and professional success.
Everyone’s version of success is different. One may see it as the amount of money they have. Another may judge success based on how fulfilled they feel. And there are countless other ways of determining success.
Numerous psychologists, researchers, neurologists, authors and other scientists have said that setting goals pushes us to “invest in the target as if we’d already accomplished it”. By setting a goal a part of our brain believes that the desired outcome is an essential part of who we are. We are a cybernetic organism, which means that we need something to aim at. If we do not consciously provide a goal, a target to aim for, we drift through life aimlessly. Not living to our full capacity. Often feeling underwhelmed, miserable and frustrated.
Having a goal to work towards, a target to hit, provides the mind and body with the motivation to keep living. Without a goal it has been proven that people age faster and die earlier. We all know 80-year-olds that look like they are in their 40s, and 40-year-olds that look like they are in their 80s!
People who have ambitious goals show better performance and outputs. They are more motivated, enthusiastic, have more drive and seem to be more skilled. Their skills are available to be learned by everyone. If they have the drive to learn them!
The 4 P’s Of Goal Setting
Leaders Excellence state that it is important to remember the four P’s when setting your goals. Positive, personal, possible, prioritised. These four things allow you to set goals that are achievable for you, with no mind as to anyone else’s opinions or thoughts. They also allow you to word your goal in such a way that will enable its success rather than sabotage your efforts!
Your goals must be:
Positive
You must focus on what you want to achieve rather than what you want to avoid. For example, if you want a new job, you will focus on the job that you want. Not on getting away from the job you are in. Where attention goes, energy flows. If you are focusing on what you don’t want, your current job, you will stay where you are. Reaching your goal will automatically help you escape your present circumstances, so be specific with what you want and focus on that.
Personal
Your goal should be about you and only you. If your goal is not personal, you will never achieve it! This is because making it personal places the burden of responsibility on you. You alone can make your goal happen; it is not dependent on other people. For example, if you set a goal to be more appreciated and get promoted at work, your success is determined by your upline actually noticing your efforts and giving you recognition. You cannot control what others think or do so do not put your success into someone else’s hands.
Possible
A goal is only ever possible if you have the will and ability to do it. You can learn any skill that you choose to learn. A big goal is the best motivator, but make sure that you assess your talents and determine what you can achieve with hard work. Do not put yourself down about this. Focus on what you want to do, and then get to learning the skills to do it. If you can see yourself doing it in your imagination then it is possible in the real world with effort, determination and hard work.
Prioritised
When setting goals, you will be overwhelmed by the number of things you want to achieve. But to achieve even one of these goals, you must only work on one or two at a time. Write down every goal you want to achieve, but then put them in order of priority. You will find that a lot of them will be easily achievable once you have done one or two of the others. Once you have your prioritised list, start with number 1 and ignore all the others until number 1 is achieved. Then move onto number 2.
The 4 Primary Purposes Of Goal Setting
As well as needing to be positive, personal, possible and prioritised, it is important to realise WHY you are setting a goal in the first place. Ask yourself, “what is the purpose of my goal?” The four primary purposes of any goal are to provide motivation, vision, accountability and fulfilment. Considering these purposes ensure that the goal you set will get you to the success you want.
Upraise describes these purposes as follows:
Motivation
Setting goals can motivate people to achieve what might look like out of their comfort zone. People are always more engaged when working towards something, be it individually or as part of a shared goal. This engagement ensures better performance and optimism.
Vision
Goals align people and teams with a destination. Every goal is a place that the setter can go to. It provides the vision needed in the imagination to aim towards and reach. Sharing a vision with others, say in a work setting, allows all team members to be working towards the same objective. This encourages cohesion and creativity as opposed to competition.
Accountability
Having something to work towards keeps people accountable. It gives them the ability to do the things they don’t want to do because if they don’t do them then the goal will not be achieved. Being accountable to each activity that is needed to reach the goal provides further motivation to get them done.
Fulfilment
Ensuring that goals can be specifically measured and there is definite line of success means that knowing when a goal has been achieved is easy. Having an easy way of knowing when the goal has been achieved allows for the sense of fulfilment when you reach the goal. It could be a certain number of clients in your business. An amount of money in your bank account. Moving into your new house. Buying the car you want. The easier that progress can be tracked towards a goal, the more purpose the goal has. There are no questions as to whether the goal has been achieved or not, or whether you are on the right track or not.
The Benefits Of Goal Setting
You have probably recognised the benefit of setting goals already. But lets set 14 out clearly for everyone to see.
- Goals guide and align our focus – you must have a destination to aim for or you will wander aimlessly. Avoiding disappointment is not an excuse to avoid goal setting! Without a goal, you have nothing to shoot for. No reason to live. And no life in your life!
- Goals help you avoid ‘shiny object syndrome’ – shiny object syndrome is where you flit from one opportunity to the next before you have reached the object. Its always looking for the next big thing, so you never actually accomplish anything. Having a set goal gives you focus on one thing. The thing that you want more than anything else. This helps you to avoid shiny distractions.
- Goals give you manageable steps towards what you really want – goals help break down often impossible destinations into smaller, more manageable chunks. Each small chunk is like a brick being laid in a wall. The wall is the end goal, but it is only built by putting each individual brick in its proper place. One at a time.
- Goals encourage you to take action – having a destination, a goal, is the first step. But to reach it you must then take steps towards it. This is taking action. Without action, your goal is nothing but a dream. With action, your goal is an achievable destination.
- Goal setting helps you continually improve – have you noticed the difference in your productivity, effectiveness and mood when you are working towards something as opposed to when you are not? When you have something to work towards you are more motivated, determined, happy, fulfilled and enthusiastic. We are at our best when we are improving ourselves. When we are developing ourselves into the person we want to be. Your goals define the person you want to be, and the life you want to live. So keep working towards them a little bit each day.
- Goal setting keeps you accountable – to be held accountable by your goal you need to make sure that you have a schedule. As discussed in this post, you need to make your goal achieving activities into a schedule. You need to know when and for how long you are going to do your activities and then stick to your schedule. Setting the schedule is the first step to being held to account. You then hold yourself to account by completing the schedule.
- Goals make you feel good – achievement of goals, even small ones, is incredibly motivating and addictive! That boost of self-confidence, praise and dopamine release is a reward that continues to motivate us to hit the next goal, and the next! When you set and stick to goals you feel better about yourself. Actively working towards things that you want allows you to feel the ultimate reward.
- Goals help you live your best life – when you are working towards the things you want, your life becomes exactly how you want it to be. And what more benefit is there than living the life that you want to live? Our time is limited so setting clearly defined goals helps ensure that you make the most of your life and live life to the fullest.
- Goals give you clarity – they help you to have one main focus and to stay focused on it. You can then put your time, energy and effort into the things that really matter to you and your life. You live more consciously rather than drifting along with the crowd.
- Goals drive you – your goals are a representation of your inner desires. These desires motivate and inspire you. They are the fuel that drives you when the going gets tough. If your goals are not aligned with what you deeply desire, then drawing motivation from them will be practically impossible. Hence why you must ensure your goal is personal and positive.
- Goals help you achieve your potential – When we stay in our comfort zone, we don’t grow. We are essentially stuck in a prison of our own making. By setting a goal we force ourselves to grow in order to reach the goal. This helps us to self-improve and unlock our unlimited potential.
- Goals create new productive habits – to reach a goal you have to change your behaviour. Your behaviour is habitual, 95% of it is automatic, but when you set a new goal you force your habits to change. When you create more productive habits you feel more fulfilled as you take each step towards your goal.
- Goals help keep your priorities in order – when you have a goal you are working towards you are able to prioritise much more effectively. You know what activities will take you closer to the goal and which will not, so you are able to choose activities accordingly.
- Goals help to improve your mental health – having a goal puts more things in your control. It helps you brush off unnecessary stress and depression by giving you something worthwhile to focus on. Goals help to declutter your mind and to look forward to something instead of getting anxious about what tomorrow will bring.
Still Not Seeing The Need To Set Goals?
Working towards a goal will take you to amazing places in your life. We all have the same basic talents and ambitions and can achieve anything we want to by studying and practicing. If you feel like there should be more to life, like there is something missing, then you need to set goals.
It doesn’t have to be the generic New Year resolutions of getting fitter, drinking less, eating less etc etc. A goal can be anything you want to work towards. I will discuss this in greater detail in another blog post this week.
If this article resonates with you and you want to discuss this further, then get in touch today. Either here or through any of my social medias or schedule a call to discuss it with me directly.
I look forward to speaking with you soon.
To your success,
Jaiye
