You have heard of SMART goals – now is the time for MAST goals!
What?
Remember SMART goals? Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-Bound goals were and still appear to be all the rage.
Yet. YET. What kinds of goals are not already pointed to the overarching desires and ends? Sounds like those are just excuses for busy work 😐
Sounds like “Relevant” is also “redundant.”
After this realization, let us consider:
MAST
- Measurable – Quantitative values that ->
- Attainable – Are within a person’s or organization’s means that ->
- Simple – Are as simple as possible (see Occam’s Razor) that ->
- Timed – Are bound by a realistic chunk of time (4 hours, day, week, month, quarter, rarely anything more or less).
So long as the goal-of-goals is seen like an isle on the horizon or guiding star in the sky, MAST goals provide the propulsion to get to that destination. On the chaotic sea of Life, the self can be an orderly ship, the MASTs catching the winds of opportunity 😃
Why?
If one cannot be honest enough with themselves enough to not distract themselves away from their ends, I am of a personal doubt anything will help an excuse-maker not make excuses.
Yet, ends make the means. If SMART can get the important things done, so be it.
However, might I stretch again with a counterproposal of MASTER goals?
MASTER
- Measurable (quantitative)
- Attainable (means exist)
- Specific (i.e. simple)
- Timely (happens ‘soon’)
- Effort (makes everything else easier or extinguished [i.e. no longer required])
- Real (applies tangible results towards a grander goal)
Until personal impulses can be controlled, drives recognized, time and effort itself mastered, MASTER goals provide better questions than a SMART goal.
(Doesn’t calling something “SMART” sound fundamentally patronizing too?)
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Whether using MASTs to reach an end or using MASTERs to keep on track, one thing is clear: SMART goals are old hat.
I encourage you to 1) figure yourself out and what drives you, 2) set goals, 3) use MASTER MAST techniques to cut out the chaff of possible goals, and 4) get after it 😎
Let me jump the gun and wish you the best getting after your own goals right after this article 😉 Cheers to your coming accomplishments!
Jimmy Chattin 