Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Setting SMART Business Goals

By Theo McLanahan


There are countless articles in magazines and books written to encourage people like you to set business goals. No doubt you have specific goals set out for your business. The best goals will be SMART. That means they are specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and time related.

If your goals are specific, they will be set up with a specific time frame in mind and a deadline of when they must be accomplished. They will also be clearly written out so you know exactly what you want to do. For example, if your goal is to earn income working from home, you could make it more specific by saying you want to earn a steady income of $500 within the next two months. Your goal will be easier to reach that way.

It is important to have Measurable Goals, as they will help you track your progress. If a goal is not measurable, it will be very hard to define when you have actually achieved it. In the example above, by defining how much income you want to earn and giving it a time frame, you will know instantly when those sixty days are over if you have achieved the goal.

Attainable goals mean that they are within your reach. These goals will not be farfetched fantasies. That doesn't mean, however, that attainable goals are just easy things to do. These kinds of goals require a lot of effort to accomplish. Your goal to learn how to make your own websites would not be attainable if you expect to construct a portal site by next week.

Learning how to use web design software and then developing a small website is an attainable goal related to web design. If you pressure yourself to reach goals that are not reasonably attainable you will only frustrate yourself and that will lead to the bad habit of procrastination due to being afraid of failing.

Your goals need to be realistic as well. In the first mentioned example of earning $500 a month in the next two months, this goal could be made quite unrealistic if it was changed to earning $500 within the next week.

Owning a profitable at-home business is not always an instantaneous process; it requires hard work and effort. Setting mini or stair-step goals for yourself will be more beneficial than aiming for one enormous one.

You may have noticed that the example goals were Time Related. There is an old saying that "a goal without a deadline is just a wish". Having a defined time line will keep you motivated. If you have an open-ended goal, it will be easier to procrastinate, and therefore, harder to accomplish. However, knowing you need to accomplish something in a set period of time will spur you into action.

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