Hello All,

In this article, I will sum up what I have learnt in the course during the week 2 (for those who didn't see my previous posts, I should mention that I decided to wrote articles as a memo of a course that I am taking on Coursera related to Project Management).

So, ready to continue from where we have left last time? :D

This time we will talk about goals and some methods to set them properly.

In the initiation phase, it is important to well-define the goals of your project to get the result expected.
Having goals that are clear for you, your stakeholders and your team is crucial. It helps you and your team to know what to do, it's like having a roadmap, shared with all people involved, to a specific destination.

There is a lot of methods to set goals, one of the most common one is SMART Method (I am sure you know or heard about it before), so what does each letter means?

1.S for Specific: the goal must be specific, not a global or a vague one. For example, saying that you want to lose weight isn't specific, but saying that you want to lose 5kg during 15days, you make it a clear and a specific goal. When setting a goal try to answer these questions: What do I want to accomplish? Why is this a goal? Does it have a specific reason, purpose, or benefit?
2.M for Measurable: You can tell the goal is measurable by asking how much, how many, and how will I know when it's accomplished? Taking the same example about weight, loosing 5kg
make the goal measurable.
3.A for Attainable: what is the purpose of setting goals that are not reachable? goals must be challenging but not so hard to reach, otherwise you lose motivation, and you may give up before attending your goal. For our example, you may decide to exercise 30min during 3days of a week instead of 2hour every day. Break down the goal into smaller parts and see if it makes sense.
4.R for Relevant: does it make sense to try and reach this goal? Think about how the goal lines up with other goals, priorities, and values. Deciding to lose weight, may align with your values: Eat healthy / Avoid food waste / Have a good shape...
5.T for Time-bound: Time-bound means your goal has a deadline. For our example, we assumed that we can achieve the goal in 15days.

Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-bound (SMART) goals are very helpful for ensuring project success.

Another method to define goals for a project is OKRs.

OKRs stands for Objectives and key results, it helps to establish and clarify the goal of an organization/Project/Person.

You can learn more about these two methods on the Internet : when it is appropriate to use one instead of the other, what are the pros and cons of each method and more..., and why not share with us what you learnt in the comment section :)

Thanks for reading and have a nice day