--- title: "SMART Goals Practice Exercise for PMs" description: "Write three SMART objectives for a new streaming feature, define a tracking method for each and draft the team brief in this SMART goals practice exercise." canonical_url: "https://builderscamp.com/guides/challenges/setting-powerful-objectives-smart-goals-streaming" date_published: "2026-09-16" date_modified: "2026-09-16" author: "Andre Albuquerque" publisher: "Builders Camp" guide_class: "challenges" --- # SMART goals practice exercise for product managers **TL;DR:** This is Builders Camp's Setting Powerful Objectives practical challenge: write three SMART objectives for a new streaming feature, define a tracking method with a leading and lagging indicator for each, and draft the team brief. It runs about 45 minutes and is rated beginner. ## What is the challenge scenario? Vague goals produce vague results. The exercise states this as its opening premise: SMART objectives force you to be specific about what success looks like, and how you will know when you have achieved it, rather than leaving both open to interpretation after launch. You are asked to pick a streaming feature to work with, either a new recommendations engine, a social sharing feature, or a download for offline feature, and describe its purpose in two sentences before setting any goals. From there the exercise walks through the full loop a real team would need before shipping: specific objectives, a way to track each one, and a brief that gets everyone rowing in the same direction. Builders Camp rates this challenge beginner difficulty and lists it at 45 minutes, the shortest practical challenge in this batch, which makes it a reasonable first exercise if you are new to writing objectives rather than just reading about them. It is also a fair test of whether a goal setting framework has actually stuck, since a vague objective is much easier to spot in your own writing than in a slide someone else presented to you. ## What are you asked to do? Choose one streaming feature and describe its purpose in two sentences. Draft three SMART objectives using the template we will action, metric, by amount, by date, because reason, checking each one against all five SMART criteria, specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time bound, before moving on. For each objective, specify what data you would collect, where it comes from, how often you would check it, and both a leading indicator, an early signal, and a lagging indicator, the actual outcome. Close by drafting a one paragraph brief you would share with your team, explaining the objectives, why they were chosen, and how success will be measured, written so anyone on the team could read it and immediately understand what you are optimizing for. ## What does a strong answer cover? This bootcamp does not publish a rubric for its practical challenge, so check your own draft against the curriculum's own questions instead of a worked solution: - Does each objective pass all five SMART checks, not just the measurable one, before it counts as finished? - Does the tracking plan include both a leading and a lagging indicator, rather than only the outcome metric? - Does the team brief explain why these specific objectives were chosen, not just what they are? - Would someone unfamiliar with this feature understand, from the brief alone, exactly what the team is optimizing for? ## Skills this exercise practises Writing objectives that pass every SMART criterion rather than sounding specific without being testable, choosing leading and lagging indicators for a single goal, and communicating a set of objectives clearly enough for a cross functional team to align around them. ## Which bootcamp does this challenge come from? This is the practical challenge from [Setting Powerful Objectives](https://builderscamp.com/bootcamps/setting-powerful-objectives), Builders Camp's one week bootcamp on connecting objectives to customer value and translating them into measurable results, led by Andre Albuquerque. Completing it counts toward that bootcamp's certificate. The [North Star metric examples](https://builderscamp.com/guides/other/north-star-metric-examples) and [RICE prioritization framework](https://builderscamp.com/guides/other/rice-prioritization-framework) guides both help once these objectives need to compete for engineering time against other priorities, and the [product roadmap template](https://builderscamp.com/guides/templates/product-roadmap-template) is a natural next step for turning the objectives into a sequenced plan. The [product analytics practice exercise](https://builderscamp.com/guides/challenges/product-analytics-activation-cohort-rebuild) elsewhere in this series practises the companion skill of defining metrics that are actually worth tracking. Builders Camp runs live and self paced bootcamps in product management and AI product building. [See the Setting Powerful Objectives bootcamp](https://builderscamp.com/bootcamps/setting-powerful-objectives?utm_source=guide&utm_campaign=setting-powerful-objectives-smart-goals-streaming) for current cohort dates and the full self paced curriculum. ## Frequently asked questions ### What is the SMART template this exercise asks me to use? We will action, metric, by amount, by date, because reason. Filling in each blank forces a vague ambition like improve engagement into something you could actually check off or fail against on a specific date. ### Can I pick any streaming feature, or does it have to be a specific one? You choose: a recommendations engine, a social sharing feature, or a download for offline feature are the three suggested, described in two sentences before you write your objectives, so the goals have a concrete thing to attach to. ### Why does the exercise ask for both a leading and a lagging indicator? A lagging indicator, like the objective's actual outcome, tells you if you succeeded, but usually too late to react. A leading indicator gives an early signal so you can course correct before the lagging number is already decided. ### How specific does the team brief need to be? Specific enough that anyone on the team, not just you, could read one paragraph and immediately understand what the team is optimizing for and why these three objectives were chosen over other options. ### How long does this practical challenge take? Builders Camp lists it at 45 minutes and rates it beginner difficulty, making it one of the shorter exercises in this series, though the tracking method table still takes real thought to fill in properly. ### Does completing this exercise count toward a certificate? Yes. It is the practical challenge for the Setting Powerful Objectives bootcamp, and submitting it counts toward that bootcamp's completion and its LinkedIn integrated certificate. ## Sources - [Builders Camp: Setting Powerful Objectives bootcamp](https://builderscamp.com/bootcamps/setting-powerful-objectives) ## How this guide was made Researched from Builders Camp's bootcamp, track and masterclass material and the sources listed on this page, drafted with AI, and fact-checked against every source cited.