August 24, 2009 – Examiner.com – New York, NY, USA
Perhaps you’ve heard that a goal without a deadline is a daydream. A due date is one of the concrete elements of a 5-part goal-setting process, called SMART goals. Let’s get smart one letter at a time.
S
In my coaching practice, I take a very tactical approach with clients, typically asking them what goal they want to work on. Now, most people like to have options, so I often hear two or three goals. But I press them to select the most important goal for “right now.” Said another way, I ask them to be Specific. So the “S” in SMART is specific. Specific pertains to more than just identifying one goal. It means stating the goal in a detailed way. If a client says, “My goal is to have more customers,” I will ask “What kind of customers?” And we’ll drill down though more probing questions until we have a very specific customer description: “I want more customers who need my Y product/service. Now we’ve put a specific face on the goal.
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Basically SMART is a good start. However, for me as a coach, one of my key focus is whether the ‘coaching goal’ is ‘ecologically congruent’ to what the client/coachee values; and hence has the ‘motivation, will, and committment’ to make the ‘coaching goal’ happens (the usual dilemmna that we coaches encounter with client/coachee not actioning his/her coaching goal before the next coaching session?)
I explore, search, and ‘materialize conversationally or visually’ the ‘coaching goal’ with the client/coachee, so that as much ‘ground’ is covered to cement, so that the probability and outcomes of the coaching goal increases.
Are there any exhilarating ‘goal setting models’ out there beside SMART (or extended versions of SMART)?
Billy C H Teoh
Malaysia.