10 Tragic Goal Setting Mistakes
Firstly, I just wanted to tell you I’ve almost finished my latest ebook and it should be going to the designer as soon as I get it edited*
It’s a basic introduction to meditation written in my usual style.
If you want a copy, sign up for my newsletter in the box on the left and it will be delivered fresh to your inbox.
Speaking of which, if you aren’t signed up you are missing the chance to get my in-depth look at goal setting for free too because that’s sent to every one of my subscribers.
In the meantime and after a week in which I’ve twice talked to clients who were struggling with their goals, I thought I’d share with you some of the major reasons people don’t hit their goals so you can avoid making the same mistakes.
1. Not Understanding The Big Picture
Let’s presume you have a goal of becoming an attorney. Why do you want to be an attorney? It’s easy to say for the money because lawyers do earn a lot of money, but why do you want the money?
Yeh you’ve guessed it, we’re drilling down to ensure your goal is value based rather than material based.
A job that you’re doing for money alone will suck the life out of you very quickly.
Keep asking the question what does this goal give me? And if you can’t come up with values that are crucial to you, then it’s the wrong goal.
If you don’t know what your values are and why they are absolutely crucial to your happiness click here.
2. Setting Other People’s Goals
I’ve spoken about this a number of times yet still I see clients who are working toward goals that are not their own.
Lovely though it is to set off on a career path that you think will make your parents proud, it’s also very, very dumb. Unless that is, you want as badly as you think your parents do too.
When thinking about your goals, remove other people from the equation at the beginning so you can isolate what you want.
Of course family members and friends will have to be taken into consideration, but they shouldn’t be influencing you to do something you don’t really want to do.
3. Not Writing Them Down.
Forget the bogus self development story about the Yale study on goal setting that suggested the 2% of students who had written goals out performed the 98% that didn’t, because it never happened.
However, that doesn’t in any way mean there isn’t value to writing your goals down, because there is.
Firstly, to write a goal down you have to crystallize it. A goal/dream floating around your head is usually fuzzy and vague, but writing it down forces you to clarify it.
Also, writing uses a different part of your brain than to just pondering and this has the effect of the goal being more ‘real’ to you.
And finally you have something to refer back to and measure your progress with.
4. Having No End Date
Goals have to have a timeline otherwise they almost always slip.
You’re probably a busy person and as such you will spend a lot of your time to reacting to situations and fire-fighting rather than being proactive.
If you have a goal to finish some project that’s important to you and you don’t insert an end date, then trust me it will slip as you react to other things that hit your inbox.
You are way better extending a goal deadline than never having one in the first place.
5. Not Getting Leverage
There was a TED talk relatively recently that gained a lot of traction and comments from people who loved it. The reason it crated so much interest is because it suggested you should not tell other people about your goals.
The speaker (and I’m deliberately not naming him for reasons that will become clear) suggested that once you tell people your goal you can then switch off to them and you’re less likely to achieve them.
That unconsciously you mind thinks “OK, that’s done and dusted, what’s next?”
That can happen, but the odds are it won’t, because it’s only a small amount of people that are wired up like that.
In my opinion the speaker was trying to deliberately be controversial by breaking conventional (and scientifically proven) wisdom.
If you know for sure that telling other people about your goals will discourage you or give you a sense that you have accomplished them, then I agree, don’t do it.
However, most people like to be consistent and demonstrate commitment and therefore telling as many people as possible can be very helpful in keeping you on track.
Not to mention that somebody may be able to help achieve your goal if they know about it.
My book on meditation was a ballache and quite honestly if I’d not promised my newsletter readers I’d write it I would have quit when I realized how overwhelming the topic was.
If you want to understand the psychology on this check out the awesome Influence by Robert Cialdini (al).
6. Not Understanding Your Environment
Even though I said you shouldn’t be setting other peoples goals, you also shouldn’t be going to the opposite extreme and not considering those people around you who are important to you.
A goal of cycling round the world would be quite a cool goal, right?
Sure it would, but not so much if you have a partner, three kids under the age of 5 and a mortgage.
Obvious?
Yeh you’d think so, but that is an actual goal a client discussed with me.
I don’t want to put people off big goals at this stage because there can often be work arounds, but do consider all factors.
7. Making Goals That Are Too Vague
This is something I see almost weekly from clients and I don’t even do that much goal setting!
There’s a reason the S part of SMARTER method of goal setting means specific, and that’s because non-specific goals never get hit.
And the reason they never get his is because how can you tell you’ve hit it if you were never sure what it was?
Earning more money, getting more blog subscribers and being fitter are not goals, they are wishes.
8. Not Setting Sub-Goals
If you’re in the Big Hairy Audacious Goal territory like myself and John are with our 1,000,000 book How To Be Rich and Happy giveaway, then you want to be setting sub-goals.
Massive goals can be demoralizing if you aren’t flying toward them at the speed of light and that can cause you to quit early.
Set incremental goals so you can track your progress, motivate yourself more easily and enjoy the process. Speaking of which….
9. Setting All Or Nothing Goals
If you’re not enjoying the process of moving toward your goals, they’re the wrong goals. Or at the very least you are leaving yourself open for huge disappointment.
Imagine how the athlete who spends 8 years training for the Olympics and then gets injured the week before feels.
Now imagine how much worse those feelings would be if she’d hated all the training she’d had to do because it was all about the gold medal.
And this isn’t just related to sports either.
Borrowing the example from before. If you want to become an attorney, you’d better like law school and working insanely long hours for years on end otherwise you’re in for a crap load of misery.
You have no idea how long you’ll live for and every day is precious, so set goals that will be for the large part, fun.
10. Making Goals Too Realistic & Being Too Attached to the Result
I know the first ‘R’ in the Smarter method stands for realistic, but I’m not sure how useful that is.
The greatest achievements of all time were all considered unrealistic at some stage or other so don’t be too realistic.
I often see clients reining in their goals for fear of being disappointed if they don’t hit them. It’s ok not to hit some of your goals as long as you have fun trying and you did your best.
However, if you have attached your self worth and future happiness to hitting a goal then you’re playing Russian roulette, except there is only one empty chamber and not 5.
So what do you reckon?
Have I missed any common mistakes out?
I’m especially interested in hearing if you failed on a goal for a reason that in hindsight was obvious.
Many people don’t build the bridge between their goals and the activities that bring them into everyday life. It’s a sticking point and can only be solved by creating daily or weekly routines that involve goal-related tasks or actions.
Great article!
Thanks Jeff and I largely agree although I personally only have one goal and its a big one. However, if truth be known I may go a few days without doing anything on it.
That pretty well sums it up Tim. “Not getting leverage” has got me in the past…you can make escape routes for yourself, need to plug them.
be good to yourself
David
Agreed and that’s why it’s cool to have a blog sometimes!
Tim, you’ve picked some key points here. Though I come at things from a business angle, there’s a lot of overlap between what we think are rational business decisions and the personal choices we make. Big Picture, other people’s goals and environment are things that really need more effort, both at work and home. When it comes to writing them down I think mapping really helps. Plotting the links between the means, ways and ends is great for refining your initial ideas into something that will work.
I agree that mapping can be incredibly useful for a lot of people, especially in a group setting, so thanks for adding that.
Hey Tim. Thanks, very useful tips.
I fail goals when I overcomplicate them. This is at odds with the technique of setting subgoals. In reality, I have to be careful to strike a fine balance between the two.
The core of this problem is that my number one Value is Fun, which in my broad definition also includes spontaneity.
So, if I build up systems and structures with the goal of helping me to be more effective, I do also have to be mindful that I don’t drain the fun and enjoyment out of the tasks too. It’s a fine balancing act.
As one example, last year I started a project called Life Quest. The idea of it was to make everyday more chores more enjoyable by building in some videogame themes, such as earning experience points, going on quests and purchasing new equipment.
I built up a fairly complex system for managing all of this which in theory should have helped me move towards my goals. But it reality, it was such a chore to manage day-to-day that it totally killed all the fun it was supposed to generate.
I think it can be the same for people who love their hobby and then decide to take it on full time. Often the change involved in moving away from doing something because you WANT to do it, towards doing something because you HAVE to do it, totally kills the fun.
For example, it’s a common occurrence in the videogame industry that young people with a passion for games become videogame testers. But then when they are forced to play games to death to find all the bugs, the enjoyment evaporates.
However, I’m aware that I do need SOME goals to help keep me focussed and motivated.
What I try to do these days is think about what are the minimum sub-goals that I have to take in order to achieve my goal. I try not to fill in too much detail in advance (being prescriptive), and I try not to add in other unnecessary restrictions such as exactly what time of day a task must be done.
The other very important factor is that I make sure I take action early. For me, there’s no point spending weeks planning, draining all the fun and life out of a project, only to see it sink to the bottom of the sea because I no longer see any fun in it.
The other advantage of taking action early is that you get great feedback immediately about what works and what doesn’t. This then allow me to be flexible with my lightweight goals and adjust them on the fly as I see fit.
In summary, I guess I’d advise people to not get married to a system of doing things. Remember that it’s only a tool that’s supposed to be useful. If it ceases to be useful or it’s dragging you down, ditch it and try something else that works for you.
Of course, if you’re the kind of person that LOVES complicated systems and you find that these motivate you to produce excellent work, then good for you!
Really I think we all need to be much more aware of what really motivates us individually. Then we can build our own personal motivation systems that are tailored to our own needs. This seems to be a far more sensible approach than trying to stick to a “one size fits” system designed by somebody else.
How do you find out what motivates you? Buy Tim’s book, “Aligning With Your Cores Values”, or hire him as a coach. Simple!!!
Definitely wise words at the end there my rodent friend!
And you’re pretty much right with everything. I was being very generally because we’re all at least somewhat different and like most things in self development there is no one-size fits all.
Thanks Tim! :)
A great guide on how to setting the “Right” goal! Emm.. My goal is attached with 3rd party and hard to get them out of my life. Because I put them in, I feel great and boost my motivation to work harder for the goal!
Regards,
Dennis.
Very tough when other people are attached to your goal as it never truly becomes totally within your control.
Tim … will edit/proofread for you if you still need someone. Just let me know. Working on trimming down my values to only 8 (or 10) — I thing some of mine overlap or can be combined to a broader “heading”. Thanks again, Tim, for putting great stuff out there for us.
Thanks Debi and I do have someone already.
In terms of your values, it’s ok having 9, 10 or even 15 if you want. It’s just that form I use doesn’t allow that many and that’s purely to keep the process from taking forever.
Thanks–great reminders on goal setting.
The mistake I tend to make: setting too damn many goals.
If I could just pick ONE and really settle in I might make more progress. On the other hand, if I got all focused and productive in one area, life might be a little less interesting than it is when I’m all over the place.
Hmm. Must ponder.
That’s a good one Jan, many people set too many goals and then get overwhelmed.
How about setting a goal to only set 5 goals? ;-)