The better you get at setting a goal, the more likely you are to accomplish it.
Here are four things to consider when you set a goal:
1. Make Your Goal Measurable
If your goal isn’t measurable, you can’t assess your progress or determine your eventual success or failure.
Ironically, this is why so many people set immeasurable goals – if their success can’t be measured, then neither can their failure.
There’s psychological safety in a vague goal, but that’s not what you’re after.
A measurable goal allows you to test, iterate, and optimize your efforts which is what ultimately leads to success.
The best way to set a measurable goal is to get specific.
Your goal isn’t to “lose weight” – it’s to lose 10 pounds.
It’s not to “get better” at your sales pitch – it’s to increase your close rate by 20%.
It’s not to “be happier” – it’s to spend an extra 5 hours per week with your family, take an extra week’s vacation, or shift 10% of the time you spend doing things you don’t enjoy to doing things you do enjoy.
2. Don’t Confuse A Goal With A Result
Consider these dictionary definitions:
A goal is “the object of a person’s ambition or effort.”
A result is “a consequence, effect, or outcome of something.”
A goal is what you pursue and reaching it produces an outcome, which is the result.
They’re related, but not the same thing.
Goals lead to results.
It’s easy to confuse these concepts and set a result as your goal, but that leads you to chase an outcome instead of pursuing the thing that CREATES the outcome.
For example, health, wealth, and strength are not goals – they’re results.
They’re the outcomes attained by pursuing goals like lowering your blood pressure, earning a specific amount of money, or doing a regimen of exercises.
There’s nothing wrong with considering the result you want first and it can actually be helpful to do so, but don’t stop there and set a result as your goal.
Consider what needs to happen to produce the result you want and make THAT your goal.
3. A Clearly Defined Goal Reveals The Steps It Takes To Accomplish It
Once you choose a measurable goal that will lead to your desired result, you’ll discover something amazing:
Well-defined goals reveal the strategies necessary to accomplish them.
If your goal is just to “make more sales,” it can be paralyzing to think about how to do that because there are so many different paths to that result.
But if your goal is to “increase the conversion rate of your sales pitches by 10%,” the path becomes more clear.
You can break down the elements of your pitches to identify what needs to be optimized to hit your goal.
Your goal’s clarity encourages you to focus on ways to improve your pitch deck, get bigger decision makers in the room, shift the product you’re pitching, etc.
It shows you the way.
4. The More Goals You Set, The Less Likely You Are To Accomplish Them
Once you get the hang of the three previous tips about how to set goals, you’re going to be tempted to use them to set all sorts of goals for yourself because suddenly a lot more seems possible.
Be careful because that’s a trap.
The more goals you pursue, the less likely you are to accomplish them because you’ll spread yourself too thin.
Consider this: How much more likely would you be to accomplish a goal if it was the only one you had for a given day, month, or year?
It would make a HUGE difference and you’d almost be guaranteed to accomplish it.
It may not be realistic to limit yourself to a single goal (though in some cases and for some time frames it actually is possible), aim to limit your goals to as few as possible at any given time.
Prioritize your goals and focus on as few as possible to give yourself the highest likelihood of success.
One more thing about goals…
Don’t forget to slow down your expectations and speed up your actions.