Score a SMART Goal and be the Winner!

Hello World,

A middle aged person walked into the class with very simple clothes on and carrying a bag (precisely 'Jhola'). He simply walks up to the table, takes off his sandals and turned towards class, greeting our beggar generation. Yes, its our beloved Prof. Mandi, with a very unique style of his own. Well, how often you see a professor of that level as Prof. Mandi, coming to teach in sandals and then taking it off and roaming freely bare footed, in whole class. This is one man to be seen for his simplicity and vision.

This time Prof. Mandi had a cube made of straws and a wooden elephant attached to some 3D picture attached to it. That simple looking cube was expansion of the formulas  (a+b)^2 and (a+b)^3, as simple as it could be. Being an engineer, I must confess, I witnessed for the first time the real world implication of a mathematical formula, that too in such simple manner. I wonder if teachers in school start using this model for teaching, life of students would be much more easy.

 Later we came to know about the elephant toy, it was a product of NITIE in house production of 3D printing. The visionary man's answer to costly 3D printing available in the market. Thus again recalling the concept about the organisation, to build business around an idea. But how to tackle various situations which are bound to obstruct our way. Then the magic man gave us the wizard to think beyond normal regulations, think in a SMARTer way.

Today's objective was focused on  building SMART Goals.

Smart in here act as an acronym.Following few snaps will illustrate its complete orientation.

The concept was brought about by George T. Doran in the November 1981 issue of Management Review. In depth detail could be read here.

The above 2 videos explains the concept of setting a SMART Goal to achieve the desired success. Now let me describe the happenings and learning of Prof. Mandi's session.

The magician continued from where he left- Tower building exercise. But this time it has to be done in a group. Before starting building the tower he wanted all of us to write down on paper our perspective.

1. Goal Set
2. Goal Achieved
3. History
4. Potential

People came out with different numbers but not to please Prof. Mandi. We all lacked in some or the other aspect of SMART Goal. Then he explained things mathematically.

1. Goal Set              - Should always be greater than the potential
2. Goal Achieved     - Should be less than or equal to goal set
3. History                 - n/a
4. Potential               - Sky is the limit. Its infinite.

Thus he talks about -

    5. Realistic Goal Set

    6. Realistic Goal Achieved

    7. Performance           - Which depends upon the factor 5th and 6th.

Performance can only be optimized by striking a balance between the realistic goal set and achieved. Any deviance from the two would depreciate the performance. Precisely, performance should always enhance the potential.

Thus this time we came up with a more soothing figure for the tower building activity.

1. Goal Set                 30
2. Goal Achieved        31 (tower collapsed on 32nd block)
3. History                    27
4. Potential                  35

But before falling, the tower achieved what we aimed at, giving some sort of consolatory happiness to the whole lot. Motivated by the happening, one of my mate borrowed all the cube from Prof. Mandi to give it a try at his room. So here we come to sum up our learning about the SMART Goal setting. The below snap would sum up it all.

Looking forward for your valuable suggestions and feedback. Do mentions areas for improvement so that will help me communicate the ideas of that magician to the world in even better way.

Cheers.
Ashutosh