Goal Setting for Teens

Whether it works or not, whether you believe or not is irrelevant. Their was one study that all the famous self help gurus would recite about a study in 1953 at Yale. The story goes like this: In 1953, researchers surveyed the graduating seniors at Yale to find out how many had specific goals, written down, for their future. 3% was the response. The same researchers went back twenty years later, polled the surviving members of the class and found that: the 3% that had set goals, and written them down, had accumulated more wealth then the other 97% combined!
Some claim this story as the truth, and some claim it to be made up, a myth created by the gurus to show unbiased proof that it does work. True or false, if you talk to successful people in their industry, you will probably find some had set goals, and some did not.
The one true thing about setting a goal, and writing it down is this: It sets your mind and body down the right path to accomplish the said goal. It’s easier to develop an action plan, when you know where you want to end up. Just like going on a trip to somewhere that you have never been before. If you just get in your car and start driving and hope you’ll arrive at your destination, well you may make it or not, but a destination that would take 8 hours to get to, may end up taking you 15 or 20 hours. Same goes for your plan to succeed in your chosen business. Why take twice as long if you don’t have to?
Once you have an end goal set, just work backwards to get your monthly or weekly goals or actions that you will have to take to reach it. If you set a yearly goal of $100,000 in sales, and you sell ABC Widget for $50 each, then work back to find your monthly, weekly, daily and even hourly actions that you will need to take in order to reach $100,000 in sales. $8333 per month, $1923.00/week, $274.00/day, $34.00/hour. Now if you’ve never made $100,000 before, it may seem a little daunting, but if you work back and see that you only have to average $34/hour, not even 1 ABC Widget per hour, then your mind is more easily convinced, and proceeds on the path to achievement. What the mind can conceive, it can achieve!
Although there may not be any hard proof, such as the Yale study of 1953, setting goals, and writing them down, will help you accomplish almost anything you want. Having a plan and doing the daily actions on a consistant basis, will lead you to success, in whatever end goal you are setting.

There is one thing common in all successful businessmen, top-class athletes and achievers belonging to every field and that is – they all have clear-cut defined goals to achieve. Goal-setting motivates you to channelize your energies more efficiently and put in focused efforts to achieve that goal. It spurs you to acquire the necessary knowledge and makes you plan your resources and time for their optimum utilization so that you make the best of your life.
Goals can be divided into either short term or long term goals. Clearly defining and achieving them one by one gives you a measure of achievement and a certain satisfaction to carry on enthusiastically. Your progress chart enables you to take stock of the situation and see how close you are to realization of that goal. This infuses a lot of encouragement in your efforts and removes the feeling of the never-ending grind in the direction of your goal. Self-awareness of capabilities as you achieve your goals step by step does wonders for your competence levels and self-confidence.
You must really decide what you want to achieve in your personal life to get into basics of goal-setting. Then you can classify your goals into short term goals and long term ones. Further sub-dividing them into small and achievable targets spurs you on to achieve them one by one and work towards your lifetime final goals. You will waste no time to tackle the goal-posts once your list is ready.
A good manageable list will have daily and weekly sets of goals. By this, you will always ensure that you move forward towards your lifetime goals. Fulfilling a certain goal daily will certainly give you a great feeling of accomplishment.
Some pointers follow for you to help you in making and achieving goals.
Your attitude has a very important role to play in this task. Question yourself and find out whether some part of your mind is holding you back from achieving your simplest goals. Is some behavior of yours being the stumbling block that throws your plans helter-skelter? Don’t waste time in tackling this issue. If need be, take the help of your psychiatrist or doctor or to put your emotions back on track.
Sound time management practice makes careers. Bad time management is often the cause of many a failed careers. Making a successful career requires a lot of input from the individual. Find out how much of yourself you are prepared to put into your career.
Get the required education or specialization in your field. It is the key that opens the doors of success towards your goals. Include your family in your plans. You can also give a thought as to when you want parenthood and whether you would relate well to your family members.
As far as your financial goals are concerned, you must know how much you would like to earn. The create stages and plans to reach your full earning potential.
If you are physically gifted, your goals can be sports related like inclusion in the Association of National Basketball or may be National Football League. Your priority here is to determine your physical capability, and overcome any limitation with proper planning.
Incorporating a time for relaxation is a must in whatever schedule you chart for yourself. Remember the saying ‘All work and no play …..’!
Start by listing your ‘Things-to-do’ every day. Achieving your daily goals meticulously day by day, month by month and year by year will easily lead you into achieving your 5 year plan and then into your lifetime goals very smoothly and when you look back you will wonder at your achievements with pride and fulfillment.

Many scholar articles and government websites have been talking about goal setting intervention in different public sector organizations as a crucial matter recently. Government and state personal agencies are concerned with the high retirement rates and are getting prepared for the highly developed twenty first century and are developing and recruiting potential workforce.
The major focus of this goal setting intervention in different pubic sector organizations is ensuring that the organization operates effectively and competitively irrespective of change of leaders and heads. This usually happens in social organizations where client growth is the main aim. This involves systematically identifying, developing and assessing leadership in an organization in order to make sure that all the important positions in the organization are always kept filled. Planning a goal setting intervention, along with managerial decisions, resource allocations and daily operations helps establish improved performance targets that such agencies offer.
The initial step in such an intervention is getting to know the customer’s feelings.This is the most vital factor that is responsible for driving the goal setting intervention into action with performance measurement in government agencies and establishments.
The biggest question being asked today is whether goal setting intervention can apply to even federal government agencies. As surprising as it is, it actually does cover the federal government. As a matter of fact, as of today, 300 million customers claim satisfaction because of it. All the agencies that are part of a public sector organization need to have their goals set via the President’s Executive Order 12862, also called the “Setting Customer Service Standard” that requires all agencies to provide customer service equaling all business quality processes.
But the problems that the federal government has to face are not restricted to the public sector alone. It is, in fact, a mixture of both, which makes it all the more harder to achieve the fundamental performance improvements than before.
There are a few factors that affect the management efforts and the goal setting intervention. Some of the vital ones are stakeholders concerns, corporate resources and customer needs. Here are some important success factors used in goal setting when it comes to public organizations:
• The stakeholders must be involved in the process so that the program can improve effectively.
• The performance should be closely observed and measured and should be used as a yardstick to compare other business needs and organization performances.
• The organization’s objectives should be systematically linked to the improvement goals as well as the core business culture. This helps achieve a clear picture of the outcomes that need to be brought about at different milestones.
• Educational training programs must support all daily decision making activities and improve goals at operational level.
• The goals that are set must be realistic and ambitious and should form the basis for the mission, current performance levels and customer needs that can challenge the entire organization into achieving great improvements in their performance.
Goal setting intervention when it comes to public sector organizations should not be treated lightly and needs careful consideration. To prevent all possible negative consequences it is necessary that the performance goals be kept positive and realistic while simultaneously should not be set too modestly as this can cause the organization to find it difficult to move out of the current work process that will become impossible to shake out later on, thereby cutting down on the productivity.