What is goal setting?
Goal-setting is the process of taking active steps to achieve your desired outcome. Maybe your dream is to become a teacher, musician or physical therapist. Each one of these dreams involves setting and reaching small (and big!) goals. Each of these major goals can be broken down into smaller, more attainable goals that will propel you towards success.
There are three types of goals- process, performance, and outcome goals.
Process, performance, and outcome goals have a linear relationship. This is important because if you achieve your process goals, you give yourself a good chance to achieve your performance goals. Similarly, when you achieve your performance goals, you have a better chance of achieving your outcome goal.
1. The Vision
Before there’s a goal, there has to be a larger vision, or what I like to call a “formation.” Think about how the Bible says in Jeremiah 1:5 that God formed us in our mother’s womb. Who has He formed you to be? What kind of person do you want to become as you learn and grow in your life? That’s the big picture you should always keep in mind, even before you set your goals. The why behind your goals will really drive you and keep you motivated.
2. The Goals
Goals are what you set in order to help you work toward the vision. All goals should be SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-sensitive. It doesn’t matter if your time limit for your goal is a month, a year, or a decade, as long as it’s in line with your God-given vision.
3. The Habits
Maintaining that goal once you’ve already hit it is a real challenge—that’s why habits are important. You have to create some smaller, consistent habits that help you achieve your goals. That way, once you reach your goal, you’ve already established a pattern that will help you stick with it over time. That’s how lives change, you guys.
Think of it this way: Habits are kind of like the compound interest of self-improvement. Invest your time and energy now, and you’ll get a big payoff later.
General Goal Setting Tips
Set all three types of goals- process, performance, and outcome – but focus on executing your smaller process goals to give you the best chance for success!
Long term dreams - Short term goals
As A
Person
Parent
Husband
Son
Daughter
Business Owner
Student
Employee
Friend
This years goals
Start Date - Target Date
Why this goal is important to me
How Will I achieve this goal?
Strengths to help me achieve this goal
Obsicals that may arise
How I plan to respond to obsicals
What Will Be Different When I Achieve This Goal
Next Best Steps
Downloadable Work Sheets
Goal-setting is the process of taking active steps to achieve your desired outcome. Maybe your dream is to become a teacher, musician or physical therapist. Each one of these dreams involves setting and reaching small (and big!) goals. Each of these major goals can be broken down into smaller, more attainable goals that will propel you towards success.
There are three types of goals- process, performance, and outcome goals.
- Process goals are specific actions or ‘processes’ of performing. For example, aiming to study for 2 hours after dinner every day . Process goals are 100% controllable by the individual.
- Performance goals are based on personal standard. For example, aiming to achieve a 3.5 GPA. Personal goals are mostly controllable.
- Outcome goals are based on winning. For a college student, this could look like landing a job in your field or landing job at a particular place of employment you wanted. Outcome goals are very difficult to control because of other outside influences.
Process, performance, and outcome goals have a linear relationship. This is important because if you achieve your process goals, you give yourself a good chance to achieve your performance goals. Similarly, when you achieve your performance goals, you have a better chance of achieving your outcome goal.
1. The Vision
Before there’s a goal, there has to be a larger vision, or what I like to call a “formation.” Think about how the Bible says in Jeremiah 1:5 that God formed us in our mother’s womb. Who has He formed you to be? What kind of person do you want to become as you learn and grow in your life? That’s the big picture you should always keep in mind, even before you set your goals. The why behind your goals will really drive you and keep you motivated.
2. The Goals
Goals are what you set in order to help you work toward the vision. All goals should be SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-sensitive. It doesn’t matter if your time limit for your goal is a month, a year, or a decade, as long as it’s in line with your God-given vision.
3. The Habits
Maintaining that goal once you’ve already hit it is a real challenge—that’s why habits are important. You have to create some smaller, consistent habits that help you achieve your goals. That way, once you reach your goal, you’ve already established a pattern that will help you stick with it over time. That’s how lives change, you guys.
Think of it this way: Habits are kind of like the compound interest of self-improvement. Invest your time and energy now, and you’ll get a big payoff later.
General Goal Setting Tips
- set both short- and long-term goals
- set SMART goals
- set goals that motivate you
- write your goals down and put them in a place you can see
- adjust your goals as necessary
- Recognize and reward yourself when you meet a goal
Set all three types of goals- process, performance, and outcome – but focus on executing your smaller process goals to give you the best chance for success!
- specific – highly detailed statement on what you want to accomplish (use who, what, where, how etc.)
- Measurable- how will you demonstrate and evaluate how your goal has been met?
- Attainable- they can be achieved by your own hard work and dedication- make sure your goals are within your ability to achieve
- Relevant- how does your goals align with your objectives?
- Time based- set 1 or more target dates- these are the “by whens” to guide your goal to successful and timely completion (include deadlines, frequency and dates)
Long term dreams - Short term goals
- Creating a 20 year vision for your life and deciding first steps towards it
- Set goals in 7 different areas of life over multiple time-frames (social, family, health, career, finances, learning, character)
- Set goals related to each of the roles you find yourself playing in life (friend, colleague, brother, father, son etc...)
- Set some things you'd like to achieve this year
- Choosing your top 3 things to focus on right now
- Your main goal right now - to go through your main goal in great detail
- Your social life - goals to enhance the connections in your life (goals may include to surprise a friend with a thoughtful gift, or to show you're thinking of a loved one, to find love, to go on holiday with someone to strengthen your connection, doing something fun or something new with someone, doing more of what you love to do with someone who also loves it)
- Your family (do you want to expand your family, have children, help someone in your family achieve something, help your family become closer, support a family member in some way)
- Your health (do you want to exercise more, lose weight, take up a sport, eat healthier, improve your nutritional awareness or balance, improve your psychological health, increase your strength)
- Your career (would you like to start a new career, get a promotion, create a new income stream, look for new directions, start a business, expand your current business)
- Your finances (Is it time to save money, pay off debts, expand your capital, spend less, invest, create new sources of income)
- Your learning (are you keen to learn something new, deeper your knowledge of a particular topic, go back to university and master some topic, read quality books intended to improve your life in some way, take a course to improve some area of your life, do some self-initiated work based learning)
- Your character (how about a focus on strengthening your character. is it time to work with a counsellor, or a life or transformational coach, would you like to enhance the gratitude in your life, or your grit in tough situations, or increase your awareness of your character strengths and use them more often, the possibilities are endless).
As A
Person
Parent
Husband
Son
Daughter
Business Owner
Student
Employee
Friend
This years goals
- what 5 things are most important for you to focus on this year
- when you imagine you'll see some positive result in each goal
- what action steps you could potentially take that will cause progress towards your top 5 goals
- what 3 things are most important for you to focus on you right now
- when you'd like to see some positive result by in each area
- what action steps you'd like to take first towards your 3 goals
- you can also bring into the limelight the qualities or strengths relevant to each goal that you have. i.e. is your kindness going to support you in reaching this goal? or perhaps your social intelligence? Or you're leadership ability?
Start Date - Target Date
Why this goal is important to me
How Will I achieve this goal?
Strengths to help me achieve this goal
Obsicals that may arise
How I plan to respond to obsicals
What Will Be Different When I Achieve This Goal
Next Best Steps
Downloadable Work Sheets
Last edited:
