Goal Setting and Time Management

No one has clear goals all the time, but everyone can learn how to clarify goals and begin to deal with the most pressing concerns.

Most of us are vague about our goals. We work hard at what we do, but seldom take the time to ask:

• ‘Where am I going?’
• ‘How will I get there?’
• ‘How will I know when I’ve arrived?’

Goal setting not only helps us to accomplish the smaller daily tasks and so reduce unnecessary stress, but it also assists us in setting long-term goals. Goal setting is a way of keeping track of our energy expenditure. It seems rather ineffective to spend time and energy on something that is not worthwhile and which does not have any value to the person concerned. A clear goal can provide a person with feedback about progress or lack of it and, although goals change with time, it provides a starting point.

To know what your goals are, you need to know what your priorities are and these are to a large degree influenced by motivation factors. The goal priority will go further and determine or, at least, influence how much time will be spent on pursuing and attaining the specified goal.

Setting a Goal

In terms of the motivation theories, setting a goal is not only the first very important step to achievement; it is born out of the need the individual experiences. No one person’s goal is exactly the same as another’s because human beings are all different with dissimilar circumstances.

To get things done effectively and achieve satisfactory results, a person must be able to progress from having ideas to taking action. All tasks require some thought as well as action, and both of these require a range of personal skills. Bigger tasks that involve enlisting the aid of others will demand a range of interpersonal skills and, possibly, group co-ordination or leadership skills.

Finally, getting things done involves mobilising positive forces that help an individual to achieve their goals and involves minimising the effect of unhelpful or negative forces. Personal plans should be extremely specific and spell out exactly who is going to do what, when, where and how it will be accomplished. If a person thinks this unnecessary, do bear in mind that most New Year’s resolutions fail to become reality. When one looks at these resolutions, they only specify what needs to be done and almost invariably fails to make it into action. A proper plan is essential if one wants to achieve results.

It is felt that an individual should use all their skills to plan and achieve a goal, know what the end result will be and be able to use some type of measuring device to assess achievement – see illustration below.

PURPOSES Why am I doing this? What is it for? What benefit will I get?	Goal to be ACHIEVED ®	STANDARDS How will I know that the end result is satisfactory? How will I measure my progress towards the set goal? What quantity or quality am I going for?
	END RESULTS What do I want to achieve? What will I end up with? What is my vision? What will I have achieved in one-week/three weeks etc?

It is essential that you become convinced and in agreement with the goal, and be committed, as conviction is essential if you are to have a strong inner drive to succeed.

All things must be mentally accomplished before they are physically achieved. An individual needs to set a goal and be motivated to implement a plan of action.

FACT FILE: “The actual moment of decision cannot be studied. Sometimes you are not even conscious of it. Our primary concern, therefore, must be the whole process by which minds are made up, the mental movements which lead to decisions, in a word thinking.” John Adair in Effective Decision Making, 1985.

Time Management

Many of us have wished at some point, that we had more time at our disposal to be able to do all the things we need to do, and at least some of the things we want to do. There just doesn’t seem to be enough hours in the day for most of us.

Time is one of the most valuable resources we have, and we must use it wisely. We have at our disposal, a fixed amount of time each day – 86,400 seconds each and every day, without fail, and it is entirely up to us to make optimum use of it. For, if we fritter it away, it’s gone forever, never to return.

Effective time-management means not only being able to complete all the work we are required to do on a daily basis, but also being able to spend time with our family and friends, on our favourite leisure pursuits, and hopefully, a little time on ourselves, too. Effective time-management also means we are able to do the things that we value and that will help us achieve our goals in life.

Most of us find that we spend a disproportionately large amount of time doing things that, at the end of the day, are not that important after all, and quite often, the really important and meaningful tasks get forgotten or postponed.

FACT FILE: Research has shown that most often, only 20 per cent of our efforts bring about 80 per cent of our rewards, and that 80 per cent of our work brings about only 20 per cent of our rewards. This is known as the ‘80/20 rule’ or the Pareto Principle.

Setting Goals

Human beings are directed by goals. We are constantly seeking to do things that add value and give meaning to our lives. Without a purpose, we seem to drift aimlessly. After a while, this becomes stressful. In fact, goals (or a lack of them) can cause negative stress in various ways.

• absence of goals deprives us of a clear direction in life, which, as human beings is a fundamental need
• too many goals, on the other hand, make constant demands on our time, often leading to a failure in achieving any of them
• conflicting goals cause a great deal of stress. For instance, wanting to excel at a sport, requiring long hours of practice, but also wanting to spend more time with friends and on leisure pursuits
• working towards goals set for you by someone else, and not being able to pursue your own can cause a great deal of unhappiness. If, for instance, you are expected to earn a great deal of money to provide a luxurious lifestyle for your family, but you would really like to pursue you own goals of working with the poor and homeless, then you are working to fulfil goals that are not your own

Achieving Goals

Setting aside some time specifically for goal-setting will make them tangible, and will make you commit time and effort towards achieving them, rather than procrastinate.

The following steps will help you set and achieve your goals:

• Think of a time scale – the next six months, one-year, three years and five years. Now write down all the things you want out of life during these time periods. Do not worry if you think some of these are just dreams. Write them down anyway, and include things that you want in your personal as well as your professional life.
• Review your list and objectively consider if some of the goals are unrealistic. The goals should be realistically achievable during its particular time scale.
• Rank the goals in order of importance, in both your personal and professional life. Finally, write the goal that you consider most important, at the top of the list. Also, be very specific when describing your goals, e.g. ‘By the end of December XXXX, I will have finished writing my autobiography’, instead of, ‘I want to write my autobiography’.
• Write down clearly the steps you need to take to achieve a goal. Starting with the goal, you have decided to achieve first. When you do this, visualise the end result first, clearly in your mind, as if you have already achieved the goal. This will make it easier for you to set out each step clearly and concisely.
• Identify and acknowledge the foreseeable obstacles and write these down. Then try to find ways how you will overcome these obstacles, realistically. You will also need to allow for some obstacles that you cannot foresee.

Reward Yourself

It is important to reward yourself from time to time as you work towards your goal. This will help sustain your motivation and see you through to the end. Regard it as a treat when you have reached a certain stage in your pursuit of a goal, or at the end, when you have accomplished what you had set out to do.

TUTOR TALK: Identifying your goals and working towards them will give you a sense of purpose in life, and you will gradually find that you are making better use of time. There will, hopefully, be little time for you to feel the effects of negative stress.

Dealing with Time Bandits

Most of us realise, sometimes several times a day, that, despite being well-organised and working through our ‘to-do’ list diligently, a considerable amount of time is lost due to events and circumstances beyond our control. These people and activities are sometimes unscheduled, and they appear as if out of nowhere, deliberately trying to sabotage our effort to achieve all the tasks we had set ourselves to do within a certain time frame.

These unexpected and perhaps unscheduled events can be perceived as thieves of time or time bandits that steal some of that precious resource from us almost on a daily basis.

Time bandits come in various guises, the following being some of the most familiar:

• unexpected visitors
• telephone calls
• interruptions from colleagues
• meetings
• unexpected tasks and priorities established by superiors
• commuting
• seeing clients
• waiting on appointments

It is not always easy to get your priorities right. You may have set your goals and have ensured that they are realistic, specific and attainable. Now, you need to list them in order of importance as well as urgency. A high priority task is both important as well as urgent. A low priority task is neither. In between there are various degrees of urgency and importance.A person who is skilful at prioritising jobs can distinguish between urgency and importance. An extremely urgent task may not be very important at all, but its sheer urgency often compels us to leave whatever else we are doing in order to do it first.We need to prioritise our goals into various categories. These are concerned with our personal and professional life, leisure pursuits, self-development, family, friendships, health and spirituality. The goals in each category need to be prioritised according to urgency and importance, and also the time scale. It may be tempting to commit yourself to something in two months’ time, because it seems a long way away, but, as you approach it, other priorities replace it, and it gets pushed into the background.Time is a precious resource which can be used effectively to achieve all that you want in life. But, if wasted, it can cause a great deal of negative stress and tension. The following guidelines on using time may well help you obtain control of your life and your achievements.

Dos and Don’ts of Time Management

Dos

• Set goals for a certain time frame. These goals should be specific, realistic and attainable.
• Deal with time bandits on a daily basis and be ruthless if you have to, always bearing in mind the goals if you have set yourself.
• Prioritise your tasks, according to their urgency and importance.
• Learn to delegate without feeling guilty. It will free up a considerable amount of time and prevent negative stress.
• Respect time and learn to treat it as a precious commodity, fixed in quantity, with no surplus you could use at a later date. Do not, on any account, squander it.

Don’ts

• Procrastinate. You know that the task will have to be done. The longer you put it off for, the greater will be the stress and tension. You will often find that however unpleasant a task may seem at first, when you actually start doing it, it is not quite so bad.
• Try to do too many things at once. You are human, after all, and you may end up not doing much at all. That would cause a great deal of stress.
• Bite off more than you can chew. Break a task down to small, manageable chunks and complete one chunk at a time.
• Suffer from ‘hurry sickness’. A constant sense of time urgency, always saying ‘I’m late, I’m late’ will cause a great deal of stress and tension. Keep calm and work consistently, keeping a clear head at all times. You will be amazed at how much you can achieve within a limited amount of time.

Finally, it is important that a goal of personal growth be set, so that when a person has set a personal goal and achieved it, he or she feels good about it; it enhances a person’s self-esteem and contributes towards the person becoming a fully functioning, happy individual.

	TUTOR TALK: There are effective ways of dealing with these ruthless thieves of time, and it is necessary to become adept at this skill if you wish to have control over time.