Get your act together with SMART goals

Here’s a little not-so-secret secret: we all miss the mark sometimes.

Sure, we’re all trying our best. We all have things we want to accomplish with our lives. We have a goal we’re chasing, and we’re determined to achieve it. We think about how great it would be if we could just get it done. We’d feel good about ourselves. We’d be proud of ourselves.

And with all of that wholesome determination bubbling up inside us, how could we ever lose? So how frustrating is it when, after all that wholesome daydreaming, we come up short?

And more importantly, how on earth does that even happen?

We’ve all started with the best of intentions only to lose momentum later on. Even with a solid plan and initial progress, we often find ourselves off track a few months (or weeks, or days, or hours) down the line.

More often than not, when we miss the mark, it’s despite us truly putting in our best efforts, and certainly despite our best hopes. Our effort is not the issue. Neither is our capacity to dream. But that might be part of the problem.

It’s easy to dream. Heck, it’s fun to dream. It’s one of the best ways you can spend your time.

But making those dreams come true is a different matter entirely. To make it all a reality, many more things need to happen. And those things aren’t exactly easy. You’re going to have to do things that aren’t just occasionally difficult, but something even more offensive: they’re boring. But it’s all worth doing. Dreams are even nicer when they come true.

The whole process starts with one thing. Setting a goal.

It’s sitting down and writing down what you want, and resolving to go after it. For some, that’s all they need. After articulating that goal, the rest seems to fall into place. For many, it’s not so simple.

How you design those goals is as enormously important to the process as the choosing of the goal itself. You can’t just write down “I want to be a millionaire.” That’s not a goal—that’s a dream.

The truth is, the problem often lies in the goal itself. A poorly defined goal can set us up for failure from the start, building in obstacles that make success unlikely.

Luckily for you, productivity experts and goal gurus have spent time working out the kinks with familiar approaches to goal setting, avoiding familiar pitfalls. And they’ve figured out a system to help you not trip yourself up. And like all the best systems, this one comes equipped with a cute and handy acronym.

This is the SMART goal system.

What are SMART goals?

SMART goals are a widely accepted framework for setting effective goals. The original source for the system and the aforementioned handy acronym are somewhat disputed, but they’re often attributed to an expert in time and work management named Peter Drucker.

Here’s the breakdown of his S.M.A.R.T. system:

• Specific: Your goal is clear and well-defined, with no room for misinterpretation.
• Measurable: You have a way to track progress and measure success, so you know exactly how you’re doing.
• Achievable: Your goal is realistic and attainable—not just a pie-in-the-sky dream.
• Relevant: Your goal aligns with your values, skills, and long-term objectives, so you’re motivated to achieve it in a timely manner.
• Timely: You have a specific timeline, with clear start and end dates, which helps you stay focused and on track.

Using SMART goals can help you avoid common pitfalls like setting loose, arbitrary targets, neglecting to involve other people in the process, or skipping over crucial steps entirely. But it’s not just about what’s in your goal—it’s also about how you describe it. The words you use to explain your goal can make all the difference in achieving success.

Here are some examples. And because sometimes we need it to be spelled out in super simple terms, we’ve tried to make things foolproof. We’ve included an example of a “bad” version of a goal, and an improved but still unideal “unclear” version of the goal, before outlining the “SMART” version.

The words we use matter

Using the SMART goal framework is a great start, but a bunch of corporate-sounding vocab is not going to be a perfect instant guarantee of success. The language you use to describe your goal can make all the difference. Language has the power to shape our actions, and the words you choose can either motivate or demotivate you.

One common pitfall people run into is focusing on negative goals and negative ways of looking at processes, which if you can believe it, can hinder your progress. Research shows that negativity can cause people to avoid challenges. To stay motivated and achieve your SMART goals, use positive language. Here are some specific tips:

1. Replace “should” with “will”—”will” is a commitment, while “should” is a non-starter.
   Example: “By the end of the week, I will finish and send the final website design to my client.”
2. Change “soon” to a specific time—give your goals a deadline to make them more effective.
   Example: “I will send 10 cold emails to prospective clients by 4 pm on Wednesday.”
3. Switch “need to” to “want to”—framing your goal in a positive way can boost motivation.
   Example: “I want to wake up at 6:30 am each morning so I can go to the gym before work.”
4. Replace “quit” with “stop”—”stop” has a more positive connotation than “quit”.
   Example: “For the next 3 weeks, I will stop eating lunch at my desk and take a proper break.”
5. Change “never” to a specific action—replace negative language with a positive replacement action.
   Example: “I will add a 15-minute buffer between my meeting slots each day so I won’t be late for the Monday stand-up meeting again.”

By using positive language and framing your goals in a motivating way, you’ll be even more likely to achieve success and stay on track with your SMART goals.

5 examples of SMART goals for better workdays

We often treat workplace goals like big logistical puzzles to be solved and locked away in a filing cabinet, but the truth is, our biggest productivity obstacles—motivation, procrastination, and focus—are deeply emotional. It’s time to rethink our approach.

Simply scheduling tasks on our calendars isn’t enough; we need to inspire ourselves to make the most of our time. The right goals can do just that.

Here are some examples of SMART goals that can help you stay motivated and inspired throughout the day:

1. Prioritizing Meaningful Work

With only 2 hours and 48 minutes of truly productive work time available to us each day, it’s crucial to maximize our focus. Setting a goal around prioritizing meaningful work can help.

Bad goal: “I want to make more time for my most important tasks.”

Unclear goal: “I want to spend 2 hours each morning on my most important tasks.”

SMART goal: “Every day this week, I will work on our website redesign from 8:30 – 10:30 am without interruption.”

Why this works: This goal sets a clear timeline, expectations, and a positive tone, making it easy to stay motivated. You know what, when, and why you’re working on your task.

2. Building Your Professional Network

Building a strong network is crucial for your career, but it can feel daunting. Setting clear guidelines makes it manageable.

Bad goal: “I want to build a better professional network.”

Unclear goal: “I want to use LinkedIn connections to explore career opportunities.”

SMART goal: “I will schedule 2 hours on Thursday afternoon to personally email 10 LinkedIn connections and ask for 15 minutes to discuss their career path and my next steps.”

Why this works: This SMART goal answers all the key questions, making a big goal feel achievable. It’s positive, motivating, and turns networking into a concrete task.

3. Reducing Email and Communication Time

Bad goal: “I should stop checking my email so much during the workday.”

Unclear goal: “I will only check my email and Slack messages a couple of times each workday.”

SMART goal: “I will check and answer my emails and Slack messages from 10:30–11 am and then again from 3–3:30 pm. My inbox and chat windows will be closed outside of those times.”

Why this works: This SMART goal clearly outlines when and how you’ll check your messages, ensuring you stay on track and avoid mindless scrolling.

4. Learning a New Workplace Skill

Bad goal: “I want to learn how to code.”

Unclear goal: “I will spend time each day practicing basic HTML to build a personal website.”

SMART goal: “Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 6:30–8:30 pm, I will work towards the Responsive Web Design certificate course on freeCodeCamp.”

Why this works: This SMART goal leaves no room for confusion. You know what skill you want to learn, how you’ll learn it, and when and where that will happen.

5. Leaving Work at Work

Bad goal: “I’m going to quit looking at work projects once I leave for the day.”

Unclear goal: “I want to stop checking work emails and spending time on work projects after the end of the workday.”

SMART goal: “I will set a RescueTime Alert to notify me when I’ve spent more than 20 minutes on work tasks outside of the workday to help build a habit of leaving work at work.”

Why this works: Clarity is key. This SMART goal includes a specific process and reasoning, ensuring you stay motivated and productive in the long term.

It’s all important

All this detailed writing, all this clarification of all the little corners of each goal, might sound like a lot of effort.

It may feel like being too fussy about things that don’t matter compared to rolling up your sleeves and just doing the work. Make no mistake, that’s important. Both those things matter very much.

But we need a direction to point our energy into. Something that tells us what’s important to focus on. We need to tame the wild beast—or, at least, put some blinders on it so it doesn’t get distracted by the shiny object of the day. Otherwise, you know yourself: you’ll spend the day organizing the silverware drawer, or writing one paragraph of your novel, or doing nothing because your goal was vague enough that procrastination feels like work.

It may seem like a lot of effort, but it’s the key to achieving success, simple as that. And the more thought and consideration you put into your goals, the more likely you are to reach them. Don’t just go through the motions of setting goals—set yourself up for success by doing what the experts told us: using empowering language, focusing on the positive instead of the negative that frames everything in a cynical light, and keeping your goals SMART. That will inspire and motivate you to take action. That will get things done.