So in the first part I reviewed the acronym SMARTER. If you haven’t read that, this part won’t make sense so if you’d like to review just go here.
For those of you up to date, we had used this framework to create an example goal saying that if what I was excited about was to finish a 1000 word flash fiction we could set a goal of:
X words (measurable and achievable) of first draft fiction (specific), every Y frequency for Z months (time-bound) which I will track using scrivener graphs (recordable).
But how do you determine X, Y and Z?
And as I said in the last post, you could just guesstimate, And that’s a fine way to go, but it can lead to highly unachievable goals in the same way that you should not shop for food when you are hungry – you will overestimate what’s possible!
But if you want a more scientific approach, you can take advantage of quality improvement science methods here. So I apologize as the next step is math. Don’t worry, it’s not much, and it’s not hard. But it is important for this approach.
For X your interval-target, it is always helpful to have what quality improvement experts refer to as their ‘pilot data’. Meaning data you collect before the actual experiment. This will help you keep your goal Achievable. So in our example, the first step would be knowing how much you can comfortably write in a day. If you had word count logged you could look at past performance. If not, you would just start logging it going forward for your next few writing sessions.
Z is then determined by dividing your total goal by your increments, so if you decided you could write 100 words, and your total goal was 3000 words, straightforward math determines 3000/100 = 30 sessions.
If you have no pilot data, you are instead forced to do the reverse, and divide your total goal by the number of writing sessions but this again may lead to unachievable goals. Pilot data helps both goal setting and knowing if your overall goal is reasonable. If you have trouble knowing your exact levels, it is always better to set up easier targets than too difficult. The latter will lead to disillusionment.
But how do you determine the frequency, Y? Think about your schedule and over what time scale it is regular. This is the time scale you should set your goals over. Some people have regular daily schedules. They can write every day. Some people can write only on specific days, say Wednesdays and Fridays. They would be better setting their targets to be weekly targets. Some know they’ll have a total of 15 days in a month they can write but where in the month may change. These people should have monthly goals, not daily or weekly. That doesn’t mean you have to set different total goals: 100 words every day, is the same target as 700 words a week, or 2800 every 4 weeks. The only difference between these goals is not the total word count, but the time-scale is tailored to a specific schedule regularity).
Anyway, that is one way of doing it. If you were not such a fan of this, I have another approach that should be coming out as a guest blog on the SFWA blog soon and I will link to it when it does come out. Till then, happy writing! And as always, if you have any thoughts, questions, or suggestions feel free to share them in the comments below.
Gideon P. Smith 