Aligning Brand Mission with S.M.A.R.T. Goals

Ensuring a goal is a SMART goal means defining a realistic timeline with check-in points, if necessary. Of course, we may not need to check in on a weekly or daily goal. Either it was done or not. But for bigger, long-term goals, or shared goals, it’s always helpful to review results, track progress, and make adjustments.

Rarely do things go as planned and the world changes daily, so regular check-ins make sure nothing is missed. Of course, celebrations for every little milestone are also helpful.

Alignment Begins with Clarity

After 15 years in business, I’ve noticed the biggest hurdle for many independent executives is often picking a single goal. Maybe it’s the pressure that results from so many options or the curse that comes with creativity. Whatever it is for each of us, focus can only begin once we overcome that hurdle. 

Clarity is key to long-term success. We can’t give anything our best effort when we have too many things splitting our time and attention. So, I always start a new project by clearly defining the most important long-term goal. Then it becomes much easier to fill in any gaps. 

Finally, in addition to displaying the goal where the entire team can access it regularly, I also block time on my calendar to dive deeper into that goal while it is fresh in my mind. I schedule at least 30-60 minutes per sitting to simply brainstorm and, depending on the project, I may need several sittings.

Start Now

If you haven’t already, take a moment right now to schedule 1-2 hours within the next week to complete the following steps:

1. Choose a free, cloud-based calendar that works for you. Cloud-based is important so you can automate tasks later. Typically, it’s the easiest one to access from your phone so you can enter events quickly and on the go. 
2. Choose a free, cloud-based PMS or CRM that integrates with your calendar. I typically recommend Asana and HubSpot, respectively. If you have the budget for a paid CRM and need the additional features that come with that, then even better. To learn how, please visit “The 3 Best (And Free) Sales Tools For Independent Executives“
3. Block time in your calendar for tasks related to your goal. Even if you’re not sure exactly what those tasks may be, you need time to figure them out. Seeing your week, month, etc., all in one place allows you to plan around everything from birthdays to professional training.

When it’s time to get specific about those actions, the next step is to ensure the goal is thoroughly defined by making sure it’s a SMART goal.

Then Get SMART About The Goal

The important thing to remember when choosing a goal is that it’s immensely helpful to be passionate about it to easily maintain it long-term. Success cannot come without challenges. Life cannot happen without surprises, so doing something motivational rather than something tolerable will help when pushing through challenges.

Now, not everyone wants their life’s mission to revolve around their work or vice versa. Some of us prefer it. Some of us want to incorporate just one or some of our passions into our work. It’s also okay to make space to test a few different approaches, inevitably not all passions will work out.

Once the long-term goal is defined, drill it down to gain clarity. SMART goals are clearly defined goals that help outline the next steps forward.  They are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Timely. Review the chart for more details on each asset.

For example, say you want to optimize your website for search. While it’s a good goal, it’s not a SMART goal. To make it specific, imagine talking to a newcomer who will be helping you. Ask yourself what questions might they have. It is an existing website? If so, have you already optimized it in any way? Have you done keyword research? Answering these questions may help you get more specific. 

More specifically, now we may know – we want to optimize an existing website for search. Maybe that site loads quickly and maybe we’ve already completed our keyword research. So now we can jump right into optimizing our pages for those keyword terms. Finally, we may get even more specific depending on how much time we have… If we only have an hour or two, maybe we limit our scope to simply optimizing our image titles or compressing each image. 

Suddenly our project is easier to digest. Now we can make it measurable so we can track our progress. How many images do we want to optimize? How much faster do we want our site to be? Either of these questions gets us an answer we can measure. Maybe we want to compress 50 images tomorrow or maybe we want to rename 100 this week. Whatever the goal, it’s much easier to break 100 images into 20 per day once we have a number. 

Then we can ensure this goal is attainable and relevant. Yes, maybe we can rename 20 images each day for a week but will that help us speed up our website enough to reach our goal? Do we actually have time to rename 20 images each day? What else is on our calendar? Taking time to make sure we’ve considered how attainable and relevant a goal is for us is crucial to knowing if it is worth our time. 

If it is, then the final step to ensuring a goal is a SMART goal is defining a realistic timeline with check-in points, if necessary. Of course, we may not need to check in on a weekly or daily goal. Either it was done or not but for bigger or long-term goals, it’s always helpful to review results, track progress, and make adjustments.  Rarely do things go as planned and the world changes daily, so regular check-ins make sure nothing is missed. Of course, celebrations for every little milestone are also helpful.

Finally, Add the Secret Sauce 

A SMART goal can fairly easily be broken down into short-term and immediate goals so what to do and when to do it becomes clear. Breaking the goal down into annual, quarterly, monthly, or weekly steps provides a daily schedule of tactics for the team. It just becomes a matter of who will complete each step and how. 

For example, if the long-term goal is to start a business. A SMART goal answers questions that make it specific, timely, and measurable such as: What kind of business? When will it launch? How much will it gross? And so on. 

Once we have the SMART goal, we outline a few important milestones that get us there. Anything from new skills training, building an audience or launching a website, for example. Each of these can be short-term goals that we break down again into immediate goals. Maybe on Monday we find a training course or maybe we set a deadline to find a developer within the next 2 weeks. Maybe one month from now we want 10,000 followers, so we develop a weekly strategyA strategy is a customized process (or combination of proces... More to build a following each day. 

The possibilities can seem endless, so remember, the goal isn’t to have all of the answers immediately. It’s likely we’ll want to test resources, build habits, or just pace ourselves so this isn’t something that’s done in one sitting. In fact, we revisit our goals and tactics regularly, simply because things change regularly.

So for someone getting started now,  the next step would be to schedule ample time to break things down, do research, or maybe just better define a SMART goal. Just remember to leave space to enjoy the journey – maybe mull it over in nature or optimize the time that would otherwise take away from your goal such as waiting in line or using public transportation. 

Start Now

After completing the Start Now Tip above, come back and follow these steps next:

1. Break SMART goals down into 3 milestones or less. Then block as much time as possible on your calendar for the tasks needed to reach each milestone.
   • Pro tip: Give yourself a minimum of one week to one month more than expected for each milestone to allow for the unexpected.
2. Break each milestone down into 3 steps at a minimum and block the time needed to take those steps within a timeframe that meets your goals.
3. Track team progress, along with necessary resources, for effortless management. This may mean forwarding emails to project managers, automating analytics reports for clients or tracking CRM engagement for salesSales is any set of activities related to selling products a... More teams.

The right way is the way that works best for your team, so do what’s best on your terms or consult a professional for help.

Just Don’t Forget Essential Ingredients

The best sauces have the best ingredients so don’t skimp out. Once your strategyA strategy is a customized process (or combination of proces... More is outlined, begin gathering the resources needed to achieve it. For most people those resources there are, of course, things like money and time but we also need to build supporting habits, knowledge, and teams. 

Drastic, overnight changes rarely work long-term. So start small by building consistent habits that directly support the SMART goal. Maybe begin reading or watching tutorials for an hour each week. Maybe begin using a PMS or CRM. Maybe join a networking group with like-minded individuals.  

Again, there are plenty of ways to get started. So make it comfortable. Start with tools already familiar to the team or test one tool at a time. Just be sure to make room for self-care and fun. It’s a journey to be enjoyed.

Need Help or Training?

One of my favorite parts of my job is helping people align their vision, mission, and goals. I start every client with this process and teach a course on it. So if you need any help at all, please get in touch by using the chatbox below.