Can Smart Goals Make You Wealthy?

The smart goals formula is a great way of helping you achieve success.

I once went with two friends to see a motivational speaker who told us to make a goals about how much money we wanted in earn in the next year.

In the car on my way home from the talk one of my friends asked us to say how much money we wanted to earn. He said £500,000, my other friend said £250,000 – and I laughed thinking that the whole exercise was just picking a figure out of thin air. I had no idea how much money I would earn during the year.

After 12 months I found out that neither of my friends had earned anything like the figure they had quoted. I did not earn much money in that year.

So, what stopped me and my friends earning a lot of money? Where had they gone wrong? What is stopping you earning your desired amount of money?

The answer is to have SMART goals. SMART goals are:

• Specific – Exactly what is it you want?
• Measureable – How do you measure how near you are to the completion of your goal?
• Actionable – What actions do you need to take to achieve your goal?
• Realistic – How realistic is your goal?
• Time – How long will your goal take?

How do you apply the SMART goal principle to making money?

Specific

You must state how much money that you need. Statements like:

• Enough to buy a good car.
• Enough to retire on
• More that I have now

are too vague. My friends’ statement were very specific – £250,000 and $500,000.

Measurable

This is easy in the case of money. If your goal is £50,000 then when you reach £25,00 you are obviously half way there.

Actionable

This is the one which my friends failed to grasp. You cannot just attract money by visualizing it. People influenced by the law of attraction often make the mistake of thinking that visualization alone can produce results. Visualization can only be a part of the process.

You need to have an action plan. If I want to get from town A to town B I need a route from where I am now to town B. Similarly for money to arrive in your bank account you need a plan of how it gets there. This could include such things as:

• Taking a course to learn new skills which will get you a better job
• Setting up your own business
• Investing in property
• Taking out a savings plan
• Investing in the stock market

Whatever way you choose to make money you need to at least write down the first 3 actions that you need to take. For example these could be:

• 1. Research courses  2. Enroll in class 3. Attend first flass
• 1. Research business types 2.Work out how much capital is needed to start  your business 3. Research products or services you want to sell
• 1.Research savings plans that give the best interest rate 2. Work out how much you can afford to invest 3. work out how long you need to keep the savings plan for you to reach your financial goal
• 1. Research the property market in your area 2. Check on property auction sites 3. Look at best way to raise money need to buy property

Then start the first step!

Once the first 3 steps are clear then mapping out all the other steps needed to reach your goal will become clear.

Realistic

My friend’s goal to make £500,000 in a year was perhaps not realistic, especially as he had no real idea of the action steps needed to achieve this goal. If had set the goal to achieve £500,000 in  say, 5 years, and hen worked on the actions needed,  then this was probably more realistic.

Create a specific goal, create the action steps needed to achieve the goal – and then you will have an idea if the goal is realistic. If the goal is not realistic then you may need to modify it.

Time

How long will it take to reach your financial target?  I’ve already said that my friend’s time scale was too short. Make sure that the time needed to reach your goal is realistic.

Using the SMART goal formula is a great way to help you achieve your goals. Apply the formula to your finances and there will be a great chance of success.

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