As we all know, successful businesses put themselves through an annual exercise of setting goals and plans for the year ahead. Yet few individuals do this for themselves. Fewer then one percent of adults have clearly stated goals – and those who do earn as much as ten times more money than those who don’t!

Effective Goal Setting is really a series of several activities strung together. To insure success, you must create your 12-month vision, choose SMART goals that correlate with your vision, make a plan of action, manage your time well, review your goals daily, visualize your goals continually and lastly, have an accountability partner.

Let’s take these 7 steps one at a time:

Create Your 12-Month Vision: What do you want life to look like on December 31, 2009? How much money did you earn? What vacations did you take? How many new tenant rep assignments did you land? Any investment sales? How about growing your own portfolio? Did you keep your health in check? Did your family get enough of your time? Did you honor your spiritual side? Be very specific with what your ideal life is like in 12-months from now so that when you choose your goals they correlate to something real and meaningful!

Choose SMART Goals: Earning more money is not a SMART goal (earning just $100 more means you met this goal). Earning $550,000 is better. But earning $550,000 net to me is even better — it’s SMART. SMART stands for: Specific, Measurable, Action Oriented, Reachable, and Timed. Choose a handful of goals that will support your 12-month vision. Make sure they are measurable so that you have a means to track them. This way, you will know if you are headed in the right direction.

Make a Plan of Action: OK, you have a vision and SMART goals to support your vision. Now you need a plan for achieving your goals. Try breaking your goals down into monthly, weekly and even daily bite-sized pieces. This requires a time commitment on your end. You must dedicate time each morning to planning. Plan what action steps are required to attain those goals and then IMPLEMENT. Planning without implementation will not serve you well.

Manage Your Time Well: Ah, here comes the catch-22. You will not accomplish your goals if you do not block time in your schedule to work on them. Daily, weekly, monthly. Try grading yourself on your progress every 30 days or so, so you will be alerted if there are any danger signs. Again, you must set time aside to work on your goals — it’s essential.

Review Your Goals Daily: In Napoleon Hill’s book, Think and Grow Rich, he recommends writing your goals on an index card and taking it with you everywhere. In the car, at home, at work. The point here is to review them daily, then take action steps towards completion. For example, if you want to run a marathon successfully and without injury or pain, you must follow a daily training program. Chances are close to 100% you will complete the marathon if you follow the daily training schedule. Get it?

Visualize Your Goals Continually: What is life like when you’ve achieved your goals? What does it feel like to go golfing at your new vacation house on the 9th tee? Can’t you just smell the freshly cut grass? See the occasional golf ball rolling into your yard so that you can pocket it for your own game later that morning? This is you telling your brain to assist you with manifesting your goals. Of course, you mustn’t forget to take action!

Get an Accountability Partner: Now the secret is to have a system of accountability, get the support you need. This can be an hour in your calendar every week, a buddy, a monthly team meeting, or a coach. The point is . . . JUST DO IT! This is the difference between success and meritocracy. Remember to set monthly goals to support your annual goals and weekly goals to support your monthly goals, even daily goals to support your weekly goals.

Good luck with goal setting. I promise you won’t be disappointed if you follow my SMART goals system. If you get stuck, give me a call! I can help you get through it.

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