Formulating effective New Year’s resolutions

Goals are the motivation that drives many successful endeavors. In an attempt to make the New Year successful, 45 percent of Americans in 2015 established one or more resolutions according to data from the University of Scranton’s Journal of Clinical Psychology.

While all had good intentions—last year, most people resolved to lose weight, become organized, or spend less money—the Journal of Clinical Psychology reports that only eight percent of those that set resolutions enjoyed complete success, 49 percent experienced infrequent success whereas the remaining 24 percent faced failure.

In spite of the questionable success rate, goals are an important tool in promoting personal achievement.

The Journal of Clinical Psychology continues, “People who explicitly make resolutions are 10 times more likely to attain their goals than people who don’t explicitly make resolutions.” New Year’s resolutions are prime examples of how goals can have a positive impact on success.

However, the resolutions are only effective if they are set and implemented effectively. The frequency of ineffective or uncommitted goal setting contributes to the doomed fate of the majority of New Year’s resolutions.

Ray Williams cited several explanations for the failure of New Year’s resolutions in an article on Psychology Today. In the article, Timothy Pychyl, a professor of psychology at Carleton University, said resolutions are a “form of ‘cultural procrastination’, an effort to reinvent oneself. People make resolutions as a way of motivating themselves… people aren’t ready to change their habits, particularly bad habits, and that accounts for the high failure rate.”

Williams also provided an explanation from Peter Herman, a psychology professor from the University of Toronto, who sees the “false hope syndrome” in resolutions: the syndrome occurs when a “resolution is significantly unrealistic and out of alignment with their internal view of themselves… When you make positive affirmations about yourself that don’t really work, they can be damaging to your self-esteem.”

The elusiveness of success in the absence of proper goals has been long recognized.

Duncan Haughey, an author for projectsmart.co.uk, explains, “As far back as the late 19th century, renowned American philanthropist Elbert Hubbard realized that many people failed in their endeavors. They failed not because they lacked intelligence or courage, but because they did not organize their energies around a goal.”

Organization of goals centers on refining them. In 1981, George T. Doran, a former Director of Corporate Planning for Washington’s Water Power Company, first coined the idea of SMART goals.

In his article, “There’s a SMART. Way to Write Management’s Goals and Objectives”, Doran introduced the world to his revolutionary mnemonic device that describes qualities of effective and successful goals: S represents specific (clearly and concisely written for one purpose), M represents measurable, (progress is quantifiable), A represents attainable, (within the person’s ability and resources), R represents realistic, (within reach), and T represents timely, (progress is made within time constraints).

Haughey continued, “The SMART approach has changed the way we set and measure goals. It offers clear and simple framework. Its popularity continues to grow, largely because it provides the vital element of organization that Elbert Hubbard saw missing in people who failed in their endeavors over a century ago.”

Students and staff at LRHS often employ the SMART approach to form effective goals that help them become better scholars and better educators; the approach is easily applicable to formulating, refining, and implementing New Year’s resolutions.

Many successful people have experience with SMART goals and goal setting in general. While famous author Geoffrey F. Abert is known for saying “the most important thing about goals is having one”, author Zig Ziglar often spoke of chasing after and achieving goals: “Goals are dreams we convert to plans and take action to fulfill.”