Charting Your Course with SMART Goals

Imagine a stairwell in a large building that is many stories tall. You are at the bottom looking up to the top. It’s a long climb and you can only see as far as the first platform, but you know that all of the other steps are there waiting for you as you climb. Despite how much you’d like to, there is no elevator. You can’t even jump up to the first landing. Every small step is essential in your climb. This is your career as an artist. While we see people online that appear like overnight successes, we often fail to see their journey and all of the steps that they climbed to get to where they are. Now it is your turn.

Start by defining your steps. A useful method for this is developing SMART goals for yourself. A SMART goal is: 

Specific: It has clear and well defined objectives

Measurable: Think about how you will be able to track your progress and know when you have achieved your goal

Achievable: Is this goal realistic? Setting unobtainable goals will make you feel defeated. Realistic goals will pull you forward one small step at a time. 

Relevant: Does this goal move you towards your big picture goal?  Is this something you really want, or is someone else deciding that this goal is important. Reflect on this before setting the goal. 

Time-bound  You have a deadline. A little bit of urgency is going to put you in motion. 

SMART goals are not my creation, but were coined by a man named George T. Dorian back in the 80’s (so they have been around for a little while now). They are none-the-less, helpful in defining our goals and making our plans actionable and measurable. 

Let’s talk about examples. A general undefined goal might be to improve how you are marketing yourself. Let’s make it into a SMART goal. Instead of just wishing and hoping that this will magically happen for me, I am going to make a SMART goal, which is going to help me put a plan into action. 

Specific: I want to reach more people outside of my social media. I want to be on podcasts talking about my art and in magazines

Measurable: I will be in 3 magazines and on 3 podcasts

Achievable: I believe that this is achievable so long as I do enough media outreach to promote my work. This could be achieved by sending press releases and reaching out directly to media sources.

Relevant: This will move me towards my larger goal of meeting X amount of dollars in monthly sales by increasing my brand recognition and establishing me as an expert in my field. 

Time-bound: I will achieve this within one year’s time.

My SMART Goal:

I will increase my brand awareness by appearing in 3 magazines and on 3 podcasts by this time next year. I will do this by sending out press releases and reaching out directly to media sources. 

If I am feeling really driven, I could go even more specific, especially with action steps and my timeline by giving myself a quota to reach on how many media sources I will reach out to and how often.

You can develop as many SMART goals as you’d like, but don’t overwhelm yourself. You are a busy person, after all. I typically have between 3-5 for the year of big things I’d really like to focus on that I feel like are going to move us towards our overarching goals and ideal lifestyle. 

Re-Evaluate Often

I ran across a quote the other day by Rumi that I thought was relevant. 

“As you start to walk on the way, the way appears. Clarity does not come before action. It comes from action”

Rumi

The truth is, you may struggle to make goals because you do not even know what is possible or what it is you want. That is completely normal and ok. I encourage you to set a few, even if they are small. As your experience grows and you learn more about your possibilities and options, your goals are bound to change. You might set the goal of doing a certain type of work, finally have the opportunity to do a little bit of it, and then decide that it is not for you. This isn’t a failure, it is a re-routing. Failure would be wasting your time in the wrong direction. 

Make a habit out of checking in with your goals. Are they still relevant to you? If your knowledge and experience alters your desire for a goal, it might be time to switch things up. In the art world, I have found that sometimes things that appear lucrative are the most exploitative in the end. I cannot stress this enough: Just because you see another artist doing something, does not mean there is any money in it or that it will lead you to achieving your goals. Stay true to your vision of long term success and let that be your guiding light as you adjust your goals. 

To Wrap Up

Walk through life with a bit of intention. Setting SMART goals for yourself is going to help you climb the steps of your art career towards the lifestyle that you’d like to live. In having a clear target (or two or three) you’ll be able to gauge if you are heading in a direction that is right for you, rather than spending all your time and energy on things that will not actually move your forward. Write goals, and re-write goals as you gain experience and perspective. Use your goals as a compass heading, and get going on your journey.