How To Set Yourself Up For Achieving Your Goals

How are you going with the goals you set yourself at the beginning of 2022?  Did you even set yourself any goals for the year?  If you didn’t, then don’t worry you are likely to be amongst the majority (sorry couldn’t find any reliable statistics on this).

Even if you did set goals at the beginning of the year, then according to the data I could find, only 8% actually achieve them (University of Scranton).

The benefits of setting goals 

Setting up habits to support you achieving your goals goes back in history to Aristotle who once said, “excellence is an art won by training and habituation.”

Edward Locke and Gary Latham (1990) are leaders in goal-setting theory.   University of Toronto psychologist Gary Latham and University of Maryland psychologist Edwin Locke have studied goal-setting theory for decades. What their research has found is that setting big goals leads to the greatest outcomes.   According to their research, goals not only affect behaviour as well as job performance, but they also help mobilise energy which leads to a higher effort overall. Higher effort leads to an increase in persistent effort.

Goals help motivate us to develop strategies that will enable us to perform at the required goal level.

Accomplishing the goal can either lead to satisfaction and further motivation or frustration and lower motivation if the goal is not accomplished.

Their research indicated that people normally adjust their level of effort to the difficulty of the goal.  So the harder the goal, the harder people work to achieve it.  The goals have to be specific and challenging in order for improved performance.   How motivated you are depends on your self-belief; how much belief you have in yourself that you can achieve it.

 The Science of Goal Setting

The Flow Collective, led by Steven Kotler and Rian Doris, have dug deeper into the science behind goals.  In his book, The Art of the Impossible, Steven has a whole chapter on goal setting.  He advocates for modifying the SMART acronym commonly used for goal setting and removing the A for attainable.

Steven talks about breaking your goals down into 3 levels:

• High Hard Goals — these goals are the big targets you are aiming for. Setting high hard goals increases focus and persistence. 
• Chunked Goals — these are the goals that you slice and dice into annual, quarterly, monthly, and weekly goal markers to stay on track. 
• Clear Goals — tiny steps that add up to big results. 

By thinking big or setting ‘High Hard’ goals, Steven states you increase your focus and persistence.  He then recommends you start from the High Hard Goal and work backwards (a similar approach is used in Project Management when planning out the detailed tasks and milestones for a project).

By reverse engineering your goals you ‘chunk’ them down to manageable actions on a weekly, even daily basis.  When these goals are aligned with your passions and purpose then you are unstoppable.

According to Steven, clear goals are one of the most effective ‘flow triggers’.  To achieve flow you need to focus.  Setting clear goals generates a flow state as they direct where and when you put your attention. (setting the goal of writing this blog today focused my attention).

From a neuroscience perspective, every time you tick off a goal you get a little bit of dopamine (the hormone which drives us to seek and repeat pleasurable activities).

The greater danger for most of us isn’t that our aim is too high and miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it.

Michelangelo

When has goal setting worked?

From personal experience,  I have set goals most of my life.  To be honest I’ve not always written them down, or applied the science I now know, on how to be even more successful in achieving them.  Nonetheless I have successfully achieved most of the goals I made.  Here are some examples;

• Moving to another country to experience a new way of life.
• Setting up and running my own business where I work with people across the world.
• Providing my children with a wide range of life experiences and travel before they leave home.
• Completing a half-ironman triathlon.

In my goal example below (completing a half-ironman) - I used the SMART framework.  When I look at my current goals I’m going to take the advice from Steven and remove the ‘Attainable’ and set an overarching High Hard goal.

• Specific: I want to successfully finish my first half ironman triathlon
• Measurable: I want to finish in under 7 hours and run across the finish line.
• Attainable: I can work with a triathlon coach who will make sure I stay on track and build my fitness gradually and without injury.
• Relevant: Training for and competing in a half ironman will improve my fitness and give me confidence.
• Time-bound: I have entered the triathlon and have 8 months to be fit and prepared.

Smart goal: To increase my fitness and confidence and complete my first half ironman in under 7 hours, I will engage a triathlon coach who will design a suitable training and nutrition programme to keep me on track and prevent injury.

Setting your next goals

In the ‘Unleash Your Inner Superpowers’ program we start the first week looking at goal setting.  Over the remaining 7 weeks we will be regularly reviewing the progress of each person and learn what they need to do differently or enhance what is working well.

I have created a goal setting worksheet - which does include the SMART framework.  If you’d like a copy then you can download it FREE here.

If you are thinking of training for a half-ironman or any distance triathlon and live in Perth, I would highly recommend contacting Corrie at Valetudo

Charlotte Mawle is the Founder of Charlotte Mawle Coaching and Mentoring, delivering personal transformation programs and Founder and Co-director of Change Optimised, specialists in organisational change and transformation.