SMART is an acronym implemented by the business owners to determine their realistic goals. This can be done by a comprehensive breakdown of the framework to ensure the targets have been met within a certain time frame. In this article, we will focus more on this SMART goal acronym to learn how it helps in business growth.
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What are the five SMART goals?
SMART goals acronym stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Time-related. This is an effective process implemented to establish a specific set of criteria for achieving business goals. The above-mentioned five components help you to accomplish your goals by focusing more on the efforts that you put in. Moreover, it makes tracking progress easier by identifying the targets that are missed by eliminating guesswork. The SMART goal acronym not only sets the benchmark to achieve your goals but also guides you through the entire process.
Check out the section below to learn more about it!
How to write SMART goals
Let’s now discuss how this acronym helps you to set your goals.
Starting with the first component of SMART:
Specific
To ensure that your objectives are easily attainable you need to be specific. Dig into the details to get the following questions answered:
- What are the objectives to be accomplished?
- Who is responsible for the set of tasks?
- What steps have to be taken to achieve it?
Researching through these points will help you set realistic goals. Failing to track the specifics in the process of attaining a target will lead your business or company to a major setback.
Measurable
Starting with something specific will help you narrow down your objective to be precise. The next important aspect is to figure out whether the objectives are measurable or not. Quantifying the target is vital as that would help you track your progress effortlessly.
For example, a company wants to build up their marketing strategies, and they found they need that to boost up their sales. Creating targeted social media advertisements would improve their market position. If this is the specific target, quantifying this would help you to attain the goal easily. Track what are the possible social media platforms that can be approached and work accordingly.
Achievable
Goals should be realistic and inevitably attainable. Achievability and attainability ensure that your objectives are within your reach. This puts you in a serious reality check where you can figure out the possible limitations that might impede your goals. Just to achieve your goals, you cannot simply overlook the hurdles that your team members might face. Track those so that you can achieve your targeted goals along with your team members.
For example, you have a small team and they are already burdened with an immense workload. Then probably attaining targeted clients through advertisements on 4 social media platforms would be too much for them. Focus on three out of four social media platforms. This would help in attaining goals much easier by reducing the work pressure.
Realistic
The goal should be realistic and relevant, which should bring about the real benefit ingrained within this specific objective. For this, evaluate first why the goal is significant for you and your company. Identify the key benefit to implement it to make it clear on a bigger aspect.
For example, increasing sales requires more new clients. Advertisement on social media would be an effective way to do so. One can also boost the number of users by introducing mobile apps and optimizing the app store listing. As more people spend much time on mobile this would be a relevant technique to achieve the targeted goal.
Time-related
The final and most vital component of the SMART acronym is time. A goal must have a deadline. This is a vital parameter for measuring the success of your team. Your goals should have time-bound deadlines so that every member of the team is on the track and understand the urgency of the work. For this, you need to set specific deadlines for evaluating target achievements.
For example, if you want to boost your sales through marketing campaigns on social media platforms, then do fix a specific time frame. Check your results within a week and decide accordingly.
Why are SMART goals important?
SMART goals are implemented by the company management to achieve their targeted goal within a specific time frame. Studies have shown that writing down goals helps to achieve the objective much faster. You can monitor and evaluate your performance and success rate. This way, you can bring about changes in your strategies as well. Moreover, implementing SMART goals and writing them down also ensures the credibility of the objective.
How to accomplish your goals?
As you have already got an idea about the SMART goal acronym, let’s now figure out the steps to accomplish your goals.
Write down the goals:
Jotting down the goal serves as a reminder for you and your team members. According to research and studies, it is proven that chances of achieving goals are likely to be 42% more when it is written down.
Evaluate progress regularly:
A rush of excitement is a familiar emotional phenomenon that often fades away as we go deep into something. Nothing is achievable overnight, and hence you need to give sufficient time for improvement. Regular check-ins are a must to track your progress, which helps you evaluate your position. This will ensure that you don’t fall off the track in the middle of something.
Celebrate your accomplishments:
Whether small or big, take out time to celebrate your and your team’s accomplishment. This will motivate your team to perform better and will help to move in the right direction. Trigger a motivation boost by giving yourself a hearty pat on the back after achieving even a small milestone to stay focused.
SMARTER goals – What does this stand for?
The SMART goal acronym has already been discussed earlier. Add two later to this acronym, and let’s find out what SMARTER goals mean.
S: Specific
M: Measurable
A: Achievable
R: Realistic
T: Time-related
E: Evaluate
This component reminds the management to evaluate regularly to check whether everything is aligned or not. The evaluation must be a part of the project schedule to ensure project success.
For example, track your team as well as individual performances. Check the previous result and evaluate the current one to figure out the difference. Make sure the evaluation is done maintaining utmost clarity and transparency, as that would offer a better understanding of your progress.
R: Readjust or Re-Visited
Readjusting the plan during the project is vital. This component helps to keep the project on track.
For example, if you want your team to sell out 50 products a month and 600 annually, give some time and closely monitor their performances. But you found out that they could only sell 30 monthly. In those cases, you might need readjustment of your goals or targets. Bring down the monthly target to 30 and annual to 400 and check the result. These not only boost productivity but also frame you as a fair leader among your team.
Bottom line!
Not all goals are equally important. There may be some vague objectives as well. Know how to set your goals by implementing SMART goals, which provides a bigger picture of your objective. Follow the SMART goal grid and write down your objective to stay focused.
