LIMERICK, IRELAND (IrishClimbingCoaching) – Since Neal has started people thinking about their goals for the year, I thought it a good time to go a bit more in-depth into developing and planning your goals so they are as effective as possible. So, why set goals? There are many reasons, they add direction to your training, they provide markers of improvement, they keep you motivated if planned correctly. These are just a few. Does it work? Short answer – Yes, very well and not just in sport (e.g. see Locke, 1996).
People often set very general goals and leave it at that. E.g. ‘I want to improve my climbing’ (for anyone interested, these are known as subjective goals) this is good, as the individual has obviously had a think about roughly what they want to achieve. However, in order for you to use your goal setting effectively and also to give you the best possible chance of achieving them, we need to delve a little deeper. We need to develop objective goals, these are more specific and ‘guided’ goals. These can be broken down into 3 broad categories:
- Outcome Goals – These are goals that focus specifically on the outcome of a task, often a competitive task e.g., Win the the Irish Bouldering League, or as Neal mentioned, become the first Irish climber to climb 8c+.
- Performance Goals – These are goals that are generally measured against previous personal performances e.g., climb my first 5a. And are generally more specific in their outcome e.g. get 5 moves further on your current project route.
- Process Goals – These goals focus on specific tasks, such as certain areas of technique e.g., keep my centre of gravity over my feet.
Next, these goals need to be further refined and so we apply the acronym MASTER
Measurable – Goals need to be measurable, otherwise, how would you know if/when you reach them.
Attainable – The goals need to be challenging but not unrealistic.
Specific – There’s no point in just saying ‘I want to climb harder’.
Timed – A point in time must be applied to each goal as a guide to when it should be achieved by.
Engaging – If the goal doesn’t interest YOU, you’re far less likely to achieve it.
Revisable – If the goal is looking unlikely, it is changeable.
So, now lets take a look at our goal of climbing 8c+ again and apply these few simple principles.
Now our Outcome Goal becomes ‘Become the first Irish Climber to climb 8c+, by climbing XXX route in Rodellar, Spain, by the 30th of June 2008′ ( No pressure Neal 
)
A Performance Goal on the road to climbing 8c+ may be ‘On-Sight 5 8a+’s of XXX style by the 15th of May 2008′.
A Process Goal may be ‘Keep right leg flagged out on the crux move of said route on every subsequent attempt’. A bit more vague on the ‘Timed’ aspect, but still a good goal.
On top of using MASTER and setting Outcome, Performance and Process goals, what else needs to be considered?
- Develop short, medium and long term goals as required. This is advantageous as the reaching the short-term goals provides a good motivation boost and also helps to keep you on track, however, by setting too many goals, things can become confused and less effective. 3 goals in each category is a good number, but better to start out with fewer until you get used to the goal setting process.
Short terms goals could just be for the current training session/days climbing or for the next week or two, mid term goals could extend from weeks to months and long term goals may extend for a number of months, possibly even years. Think about goals for Olympic athletes, they may realistically extend for 4 or even 8 years!
- Record your goals – this is where keeping a training diary really helps, it allows for later review and it’s there in black and white.
- Making your goals public has been shown to increase commitment to the task in question (Locke, 1996).
So, in summary, without the waffle:
- Define your more general, subjective goals.
- Set Outcome, Performance and Process Goals.
- Use the MASTER acronym to guide your goal setting.
- Develop short, medium and long-term goals, but not too many.
- Record your goals on paper.
- If you’re comfortable, make your goals public.
As an example of some of my own goals for the next while:
For those of you who don’t know me I had surgery on my shoulder recently which I am recovering from and so most of my goals at the moment are focused around this.
My main Outcome goal at the moment is…. To get my shoulder back to full functional strength by the 3rd week of March, it’s not a classic Outcome goal, but it is the overriding one at the moment.
My Performance Goals are:
1) Improve one specific aspect of my shoulder flexibility (External Rotation) to 90% of the ‘good’ shoulder’s range, by my next Physio appointment (4 weeks time).
2) To improve my internal and external rotation strength to 90% of the ‘good’ side by my next physio appointment (4 weeks time). At the moment it’s at 80%.
I consider these to be mid-term goals at the moment.
My process goals are:
1) Maintain good scapular (shoulder blade) position throughout all of my exercises in today’s session.
2) Complete 4 sets of 6 reps of bicep curls with green Theraband (the elastic stuff). 3) Don’t snag and snap this length of Theraband….it’s getting expensive!!
I understand that my current goals may not be the best examples, as there’s a bit of jargon in there, but the information above should point you in the right direction. The bottom line is that goals, whether you acknowledge you’re making them or not, are one of the foundations of success. Get your head around it now and you’ll be well set up.
Reference: Locke, E. (1996). Motivation through conscious goal setting. Applied and Preventative Psychology, 5(2), 117-124.