Setting Personal Goals
Senior 2 · Entrepreneurship
Setting Personal Goals
Lesson 2 of 4
16 min
“Own a tailoring workshop with three machines” is a big goal. If it is the only goal you write down, it feels so far away that nothing happens this week. Every large achievement is built from small ones: a long-term goal is reached one short-term goal at a time.
Goals differ mainly in the time they need. This course uses a common rule of thumb:
A long-term goal gives direction; short-term goals give motivation, because you see them completed. Long-term goals are usually vaguer; as you break them down, each level becomes more specific.
This case is written by Ganzaa. Ishimwe is 16 and in S2 in Nyamasheke. His long-term goal is to own a tailoring workshop with three sewing machines by the age of 25.
| Level | Goal | Time frame |
|---|---|---|
| Long-term | Own a registered workshop with three machines | By age 25 (9 years) |
| Medium-term | Finish S3, then a tailoring course at a TVET school | Within 4 years |
| Medium-term | Buy his first machine, costing 180,000 Frw | Within 3 years |
| Short-term | Help at his aunt’s workshop every Saturday this term to learn the machine | This term |
| Short-term | Save 5,000 Frw each month from Saturday work | Every month, starting now |
Why 5,000 Frw? Three years is 3 × 12 = 36 months, and 180,000 ÷ 36 = 5,000 Frw a month. The short-term saving goal is worked out from the medium-term goal, and the medium-term goal serves the long-term one. That is how the ladder holds together.
Tip
Memory hook. Work backwards, act forwards: start at the long-term goal and ask “what must be true before that?” until you reach something you can do this week. Then start doing it.
Solution: (a) short-term (days); (b) long-term (many years of study); (c) medium-term for an S2 student (four years).
Solution: 120,000 ÷ 8 = 15,000 Frw a month.
Solution: The goal is far away and vague, so there is no clear action for today and no sense of progress. Short-term goals give a first step and a quick success that keeps motivation up.
Solution (example): “Raise my biology mark from 60% to 70% by the end of this term by revising for 30 minutes every evening.”
Summary
Sources and credits
The tailoring goal ladder, the worked example and the practice items are written by Ganzaa.
This lesson adapts CC BY-SA material and is shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.
