"Achieving Personal Bests"
Using the "SMART GOALS" Principle
By: Manley Lavender Lavender Consulting & Training Solutions. lavender@rogers.com www.lavenderconsulting.caWhether it is within our professional life, personal life or athletic life, we all want to achieve our very best. As a young child, we all had teachers, parents, coaches and peers encouraging us to write better, speak better and run faster. No matter what the activity was, we all had to start somewhere.
Regardless of our age, we all face challenges while attempting to achieve our goals. As a part of my attempt to sustain my health and my competitive edge, I have been entering triathlon races in Ontario for the past twelve years. In order to achieve relative success in my races, I have adopted the SMART GOALS principles within my training regime. I have found that by sticking with a simple plan, I have been successful in achieving my modest goals. I will briefly describe how the SMART GOALS principles helped me to achieve these goals.
As I mentioned, I have been involved with the Ontario Triathlon race circuit for the past twelve years. From the very beginning, I had very modest goals going into each race. These were as follows:
Start, Finish With Dignity, Obtain Another T-Shirt.
Now of course, I had to be physically prepared for every race in order to enter and achieve my modest goals. This involved continuous training. The SMART GOALS principles allowed me to successfully achieve my athletic Triathlon season goals.
S pecific First, I choose a race schedule that fits my work, family and health schedule. I designated specific days and amounts of time that I would either run, bike or swim.
M easurable The results of each training session and race were measured with increased fitness and results. For example, if I had run my distance of 5 kilometers in 26 minutes, then my goal was to reduce that time by 1 minute.
A ttainable By selecting lengths of distance and time appropriately and increasing my distances slowly, I was always able to attain results.
R ealistic When I first selected to become involved with triathlons, I chose to complete a duathlon. This type of race focused in on my running and biking skills, which by that time I had been able to improve. Later races were selected based on my level of training and degree of difficulty. In this way I was able to be successful
T imely I would always do my training throughout the off season and thus have myself ready for my first race in early summer.
The "SMART GOALS" principle can be applied in many different situations that one can direct to support their own goals. This method can be used in all areas of business personal growth, or athletic achievement. As a small business owner, I have to continue to bring in new clients in order to sustain my growth projections. Here is another example of how I used the SMART GOALS principles to achieve my business goals for 2008:
S pecific Expand my client base in new work sectors. I researched different sectors and selected transportation, daycare and local community colleges.
M easurable My goal was modest and I expected that would have met my goal if I had between 1-2 new clients from each of my identified work sectors in my market region.
A ttainable I ensured that I had the resources to secure new clients and a marketing strategy in place to reach them. My website, newspaper ads and emails directed at these sectors made my company more visible
R ealistic Having researched Health and Safety compliance regulations, I knew that these three sectors required my type of certification.
T imely I allowed sufficient time in order to sustain existing client needs as well as develop new clients.
To summarize in order to be successful, it is important to have a plan that reflects the SMART GOALS principle. As I mentioned earlier, no matter where you are in your life you can always set yourself achievable goals. It is important to remember that we all have the capability in us to achieve success; we just need to fully utilize all of our assets.
Muhammad Ali said it best when he said,
"Champions aren't made in gyms. Champions are made from something they have deep inside them, a desire, a dream, a vision. They have to have the skill and the will. But the will must be stronger than the skill." Make the best of all of your strengths and experiences and strategically plan to become the most successful person you can be.