Do Brittany’s goals meet the SMART goal criteria? If not, which aspects of SMART goal planning is she missing with respect to her goal of paying off her credit card? How about with respect to her retirement goal? What advice do you have for Brittany that would help her make her goals SMART?

Brittany Hartman, 22, graduated with her Marketing diploma a year ago. Almost immediately, she found a job as a salesperson for a technology company. After bonuses, she was making about $3500 per month. Although Brittany was able to get by, she never really considered the impact of her daily spending habits on her cash flow. Now she has some financial goals and she needs help. Whenever she can, Brittany uses her credit card to make purchases. Although the balance on her credit card is a little high (the balance is $8000 and climbing), Brittany has little trouble making the minimum monthly payment of $250. Brittany would like to see the credit card balance go down. Eventually, she would like to pay it off completely. Brittany’s other goal is to save $4000 a year so that she can retire 35 years from now. She indicates that she would like to start saving in five years. She feels that delaying the start of her retirement will not have a big impact on the final amount of retirement savings she will accumulate.