Short-term And Long-term Goals

Not only should you set useful goals, you should also set both short-term and long-term goals.

• Short-term goals are ones that you will achieve in the near future (e.g., in a day, within a week, or possibly within a few months).

• Long-term goals are ones that you will achieve over a longer period of time (e.g., one semester, one year, five years, or twenty years).

Long-term goals often are our most meaningful and important goals. One problem, however, is that the achievement of these goals is usually far in the future. As a result, we often have trouble staying focused and maintaining a positive attitude toward reaching these goals. This is why it is helpful to set up what we call enabling goals.

• An enabling goal is a special type of shorter-term goal. It is written to help us achieve a long-term goal. Enabling goals are like stepping stones that help us measure our progress toward reaching longer-term goals.

  For example:

  If one of your long-term goals is to get an electrical engineering degree in five years, you can set up enabling goals for each semester or quarter of college that supports this long-term goal. These goals could include attending classes, participating in professional development and internship opportunities at your school, maintaining a certain grade point average, and staying up-to-date in your readings and assignments.