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Goal setting is key to having any success in life, be that health and wellbeing, business or personal.
In the past I would have used the acronym SMART which stands for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Reasonable/Relevant, and Timely. This is still a good method to use and follow but now I set FAST goals.
FAST goals stand for Frequent, Ambitious, Specific and Transparent and it is wildly used by major business corporations.
But how can we use this technique to set our own goals?
Frequent
Normally when we set a goal we write it down once in a book or keep it in our mind. Instead we should look at our goal more frequently.
Frequently reviewing or discussing your goals allows you to keep focus and keeps it fresh in the mind.
Writing your goal down daily is one way you can embed it into your subconscious mind so that you start to work on it without even realising you are doing so. Discussing it with an accountability partner is one way to keep it in the forefront of your mind and will help you take action.
Do these daily actions and it will help you track your progress and receive feedback from yourself and others on how you are doing and what you need to do to improve.
Ambitious
Why have ordinary when you can have extraordinary? Having an ambitious goal that is difficult but still possible to achieve is one way of setting yourself up for a challenge. You may have to ‘think outside the box’ or push yourself that little bit further to achieve your goal. In doing so, you will think of new innovative ways and increase your knowledge in certain areas as you reach for a goal outside your comfort zone.
Specific
Be very specific with your ambitious goal. Don’t say you want to lose loads of weight or earn lots of money. By putting a specific target on your ambitious goals, this will give you a measurable and tangible way of evaluating your goal, how much you have progressed and how much you still have to achieve.
Transparent
Putting your goals out there for someone or everyone to see can be a great way of giving you that motivation of reaching them. Using social media to keep yourself accountable or have a group of people that share a similar goal to you will help keep you disciplined and on track. It will also give others an opportunity to see if your goals align to what you really want. If you need to make changes this can be quickly done by you and with the help of others.
Use FAST now
We still have over a month to the New Year so don’t wait to set your goals then. Try using the FAST goal setting technique for something that you want to achieve in the run up to Christmas. It could be anything personal or business related and it is a great way to test the process before we make our 2021 plans.
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