SMART goals
Meanings of the SMART acronym
A SMART goal should be:
- Specific: it must be precise, clear, and understandable. Not "improve quality," but "reduce the number of bugs in production to fewer than 5 per sprint."
- Measurable: it must be quantifiable so you can tell whether it has been achieved. It defines how much, how many, or how often.
- Achievable: it must be realistic and feasible with the available resources. An aspirational goal that the team perceives as unattainable leads to demotivation.
- Relevant: it must be important and aligned with the broader goals of the team or organization. A goal that is achievable but irrelevant is a distraction.
- Time-bound: it must have a clear deadline. Without a time horizon, there is no urgency and no point of evaluation.
Alternative meanings for the SMART acronym
The meaning given to each letter of the acronym can vary. These are the most common meanings and alternatives:
| Letter | Usual meaning | Alternatives |
|---|---|---|
| S | Specific | Strategic and specific |
| M | Measurable | Motivating |
| A | Achievable / attainable | Assignable, Agreed, action-oriented, ambitious, aligned with corporate goals |
| R | Relevant | Realistic |
| T | Time-bound | Trackable, time-oriented, time/cost limited, timely, time-sensitive or timeframe, testable |
Recommendations for using SMART goals
Suitable contexts
- When defining improvement actions at the end of a Sprint Retrospective: a SMART improvement commitment is much more likely to be fulfilled than a vague one.
- When formulating the Sprint Goal: a SMART Sprint Goal guides the prioritization of the team's tasks during the iteration.
- When setting team goals at the quarter or release level.
Contraindicated contexts
- When the goal is to explore unknown territory: exploration does not produce predictable results and cannot be measured in advance. Forcing SMART criteria onto a discovery phase can prematurely close off room for exploration.
- When the team needs creativity: very specific goals can narrow the space of possible solutions during ideation phases.
Common mistake
Writing SMART goals that are formally correct but devoid of ambition. A goal can meet all the SMART criteria and still be irrelevant or too conservative: "reduce meeting time by 5 minutes per sprint" is SMART but does not produce any significant improvement. The "R" for relevant and the ambition dimension are the ones that require the most work in practice.
Resources
🎙️ Episode 7: SMART GoalsScrum Manager Podcast (in Spanish) · Spotify
References
- Doran, George T. (1981). "There's a S.M.A.R.T. Way to Write Management's Goals and Objectives". Management Review, vol. 70, no. 11.
See also
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