Are you wandering aimlessly through life hoping that good things will come your way purely by chance? If so the chances are you will never reach your full potential unless you are that one in a million exceptionally lucky person. In order to achieve a goal generally we need to work at it in order to get success. This is why we use personal goal setting in our confidence coaching sessions.

Yes and I know you have probably read The Secret that says you just have to think about something and suddenly it will appear miraculously in front of you but it just isn’t true. 30 million copies of the book were sold and I can tell you that all of those people didn’t suddenly get everything they wanted. In fact 29.9 million are probably still there waiting for their life to change because they didn’t do something to make things happen.

Setting Personal Goals

In order to get what you want you need to plot, plan and then execute your strategy for success. The goals you set for yourself can be short term or long term ones but you have to do something to make them happen. When we work with our clients the first thing we do is look at what areas of your life do you want to set goals for. These will depend on your age and circumstances but here are a few areas that appear time and time again.

Career – Career coaching questions could include: Do you want to work for yourself or somebody else? If you work for a company where do you want to see yourself in a year, five years and ten years from now? Do you need to educate yourself to make this happen? Do you need experience in a particular area to meet these goals? Can you achieve this in your current company or do you need to move jobs?

If you work for yourself what kind of business do you want?  Are you going to work as a sole trader or do you want to staff? Can you work from home or do you need premises? How are you going to expand your revenues and profits year after year? Do you need outside help or investment to make things happen? What are financial goals for the company?

Money – How much per year do you want to make in the short and long term? Will your current job or career path enable you to do this? What would enable you to reach your financial goals faster? Do you have a stretch target? Can you work on two things at the same time to make this happen?

Education – If you are younger what kind of education do you need to achieve your life goals? Do you need an apprenticeship, A levels, degree or something even higher such as a master’s degree or doctorate? Do you need to be in continuing education to build your skills?

Relationships – Do you see yourself with a partner? At what age would you like to settle down?  Do you want children? How many friends do you want? How can you build a friendship group? Do you need help or relationship coaching with your current partner?

Physical – Do you want to get fit? What would you like to achieve? What exercise plan would you need to put in place to make this happen? How often would you need to exercise? When are you going to fit your exercise into your working life?

SMART Objectives and Targets

Now that you have identified the areas where you need to set goals you now have to start creating some. The standard model for personal goal setting is to follow the SMART acronym. In other words you goals need to be:

• Specific
• Measurable
• Attainable
• Relevant
• Time-Based

So in other words you need to state what you want, make sure you have any hope of achieving it and put a time limit on getting a result. Having goals that you can’t pin down won’t work. This means instead of saying I want to earn lots of money by the time I am thirty five there needs to be detail in your plan. For example I want to earn £50,000 by the age of 35. In order to achieve that I need to pass my accountancy qualification at the end of the year which enables me to apply for jobs in that salary bracket.

Why Personal Goal Setting is Important

It is always possible for you to achieve results without having a plan but this is a hit and miss approach. Setting goals enables you to hone your skills, decide what is achievable and then laser target what you want. Personal goal setting can help you to reach levels of success that would be almost impossible to achieve without this approach. Set the right goals for yourself and suddenly life becomes a hell of a lot easier both financially and personally.

Need help building your confidence and creating objectives and targets for the next year or ten? For more information about our coaching programs simply fill out the form below for more information.