Powerful Leadership Through Coaching

9GROWing by Setting SMART Goals

In the absence of clearly defined goals, we become strangely loyal to performing daily acts of trivia.

—Jim Stuart, consultant practitioner and goal execution expert

Changing one’s own behavior is hard. Changing someone else’s behavior is even harder. I’ve asked audiences all over the world, “Have you ever had goals given to you that you could not influence at least 80%? Have you ever had goals that you could not measure objectively with good data every 30 days? Have you ever had too many goals? Have you ever been given unrealistic, unattainable or unmotivating goals?” Almost everyone laughs and says yes.

A few days before New Year’s Eve, I asked my neighbor, Tim, “What are your New Year’s resolutions?” An engineer, Tim is smart and organized and lives the structured life you’d expect of someone who loves detail and numbers. I thought if I could learn anything about goals and resolutions from anyone, it would be Tim.

“Michael,” he said, “my resolution for this year is the same as last year’s. It worked well for me last year, and I am expecting a second great year of success!”

“Really?” I asked. “What is it?”

“I have a goal that I know I can actually achieve and one that I’ll feel good about. My goal is to eat more cake, especially the corner pieces where you find all the frosting.”

I should mention—ironically—that Tim is very tall and one of the thinnest men I know. Clearly, he also knows something about cake and setting achievable goals that ...