Unleashing Your Full Potential: Mastering the Art of Goal Setting

Watch the YouTube version of this episode HERE

Do you want to know the best method to set and achieve goals? In this episode, Tyson discusses the importance of setting SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound) goals. 

Goals are only possible if they are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and have a deadline. Many people are not able to reach goals because they are too broad and with that comes impossible ideals in order to achieve it. Goals need to be realistic to you and your lifestyle. If you have a goal to make $1 million in 2 years, think about the actual possibility of that. Think about how much money you make now and what your profit margin needs to be as a business owner to get there. It might include adding or removing a few things to get to that goal.

Tyson breaks down each aspect of SMART goals. The “S” is specific, which means narrowing down your goal to something simple. If someone asks you what your goal is, it should be clear and concise. “M” stands for measurable. A goal needs to be measured or tracked somehow. This could mean every week checking in on the numbers and seeing how things are going. “A” stands for achievable, in which a goal has to be realistic and in your capacity to achieve. If it is not, you need to figure out a way to make it possible. ”R” is relevant, which means the goal needs to align with your mission and what is within your vision. Finally, “T” stands for timebound, which is setting a deadline to finish your goal. Nothing will get done unless a deadline is set. This is not just the case for goals, but for projects. No project just starts and ends as there is work put in with timelines in place to make sure people are held accountable for the work. This applies for individual goals as well.

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Episode Highlights:

• 00:24 The importance of setting SMART goals
• 1:13 The struggle with setting specific goals
• 2:56 The components of SMART goals

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Transcripts: Unleashing Your Full Potential: Mastering the Art of Goal Setting

Speaker 1 (00:00:01) - Run your law firm the right way. The right way. This is the Maximum Lawyer podcast. Podcast. Your hosts, Jim Hacking and Tyson metrics. Let's partner up and maximize your firm. Welcome to the show.

Speaker 2 (00:00:24) - Hey, it's Tyson, and today I'm talking about something that I think most of us have heard about before. It has to do with goal setting. And we're talking about Smart goals. Smart. And I want to talk about them because we sometimes it's a simple thing to talk about. But many times when we're doing goal setting, we don't really think about the smart method. And it really is an effective method. And that's why we want to talk about it. And what brought this up was I was meeting with a leadership team member during our week or our monthly meeting a few weeks ago, and I was asking them about their goals, and we were setting different goals for the next month. So and we wanted to come up with something that got them back on track. And it's really interesting.

Speaker 2 (00:01:13) - You know, that person was unable to really, at least initially. We talked it through and come up with a goal, but they were not initially able to come up with something that was that was specific, right. And measurable. And and I'm going to go through all the other the attainable. And it's got to be relevant and it's got to be time bound all that. Right. So let me go through that. But it's interesting how how many people struggle with that. They really do. And they create these very broad general goals that could never be achieved. Right. Never be achieved. And so what they do is they set themselves up for failure where they can never actually hit those goals. And we see it a lot in the guild. Whenever we're doing hot seats, Jim and I are doing hot seats. And so it's something that it's not, you know, this is not specific to, you know, just lawyers or non-lawyers or, you know, some people over other people. This is a very common thing.

Speaker 2 (00:02:05) - And so if you do struggle with this, don't worry. But it's a common thing that we see on a regular basis where people will say they want to do something. For example, I want to make $1 million right? Then maybe that's something we have heard before. And so maybe that's one of your goals. I mean, is that realistic? I mean, is that even one of those things that you could actually achieve? Okay, maybe it is in a year or two, but is it is it achievable this year? I don't know, you know yourself way better than anybody else does. So it's one of those things that you have to think this through and don't just throw things out there because you saw it on X or on YouTube, right? You don't want to do that. You you need to come up with things that fit within this mold. So let's get to it. Let's get to that anatomy of Smart goals. That way you can start to approach it. The s and I think many people know what it is but it is specific.

Speaker 2 (00:02:56) - All right I want you to have a laser focus on this. It's specific. And it's interesting because if you think about this Albert Einstein quote, I don't know if you've heard it, but it's something along the lines of if you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough. And it's really it's really true. If you think about people that you're asking them about a specific topic, it's very, very easy to identify whenever someone doesn't know what they're talking about because they start talking about generalities. And it's, it's it's the same thing when it comes to your goals. You've got to be specific about them. And so if you if you can't make it specific, you can't narrow it down. You don't really know what your goal is. So start with making it specific, okay? Instead of saying something along the lines of that I want to I want to increase our average fee. Okay, maybe say I want to increase our average fee to $25,000. Right. That's that is a a very specific thing that you could do.

Speaker 2 (00:03:54) - M is for measurable. Right. And this is a very this is probably the one that people they slip up on the most. They come up with a goal that you can't really measure. Okay. And and this is one where it's it can get frustrating. But you and people are like oh it's you know, numbers aren't everything. Well they're not, but if you want to have a goal, you need to be able to measure it in some way. Okay. So it's for measurable. And if you think about what Peter Drucker says about what gets measured, gets managed, it's the same thing. And there is a study on this I can't remember where where I saw it, but it's about the people that that write down their goals and they share them with someone and they, they, they send them actually weekly updates on it or I think it's they send a weekly update to a friend. The it's a 76% success rate compared like a 43% or it's something like that. Those numbers are very similar.

Speaker 2 (00:04:48) - But the point is, is that it's something that they're measuring and they're tracking on a regular basis. So being able to measure it and track it is is really, really important. So tracking it, being able to measure it. And that's one of the things where I wish that it was it was actually measure and track because it's kind of hard to do that whenever it comes to Smart goals. There's only so many letters in the word smart. But if you think of not just measure, but measure and track measuring, it's one thing, but tracking it's another thing. And so if you can keep an eye on it. So let me give you an example of this. I go to the gym regularly and I get measured regularly where they checked my body fat percentage. Because I want to get down to a certain goal. And I'd say about 5 or 6 months ago I had not been for a little bit, and I think it had been four months. I'd been tracking it for four months, and I went in and got measured, and lo and behold, I was I actually increased my body fat percentage by about 3%, which I was extremely frustrated by because I'd been working really hard on getting that down.

Speaker 2 (00:05:47) - And so now I've gotten back to measuring it every single month on a regular basis, tracking it right. So measure and track. It's really, really important. Measuring is one thing, but tracking is the other part of it. So when you think about this part of the goal, measure and track, always be tracking it. Whatever the goal is on a regular basis, it's this is I'd say of the two measuring it is tracking is more important than the measuring part of it. You can't have one without the other, but the tracking of it super important for to actually be effective. All right. So let's talk about the A. And it's got to be achievable. There are so many people what they do is they take and they said these goals that are just there's no way they can achieve them. Not one bit. And it's frustrating for them because they're not going to achieve their goal no matter what they do. They can work super, super hard. And let's say that in Jason Stokes talked about this with me before, where let's say that you you set a goal to earn $5 million in a year.

Speaker 2 (00:06:46) - Okay, great. Wonderful goal. But the reality is, is that if it's not attainable, if it's not achievable, you may even get like $4 million, but you're still going to be disappointed, even though that might be double what you made the year before. Okay. So you've set yourself up for failure from the beginning, even though you've done a really good job and you don't want to do that. And so make sure that you're setting these goals that you can actually hit really important are relevant. It needs to align with your mission. Don't forget about that. Right. Make sure all these all these goals right. Every time you said these goals, you know, daily goals, monthly goals, quarterly goals, all these need to be headed in towards a certain direction. Make sure that they are matched up okay. You've got to know where you're going and make sure that these goals are relevant to what your long term vision is. All right, in the last one, it's time bound. You remember the clock has got to be taking on this.

Speaker 2 (00:07:41) - You got to put some sort of deadline on this, okay. Deadlines are the fuel for the fire on getting the goals achieved okay. And if you don't have this if you don't have it set, it's just not going to happen. For the most part, the studies don't lie. You are far more likely to achieve your goal if you've got a timeline on it. Really important. Set the deadline. You have to set yourself up to win. And if you don't do that by putting a deadline on it, your chances of success are limited. All right, that is all for this episode. Just as a reminder, if you have something you want me to cover on the Saturday show, just make sure that you shoot me a text. (314) 501-9260 and I will do that. Until next time though, remember that consistent action is the blueprint that turns your goals into reality. Take care.

Speaker 1 (00:08:35) - Thanks for listening to the Maximum Lawyer podcast. Stay in contact with your hosts and to access more content. Go to Maximum lawyer.com.

Speaker 1 (00:08:47) - Have a great week and catch you next time.