If you have ever worked in a big company environment, particularly in a management position, you are familiar with the idea of building goals and their significance to any organization that practices management by objectives.
Even if you have never been in a position requiring you to outline specific, measurable goals, you may not realize that each single day you have done so. Possibilities are, by not knowing you were really setting goals, you managed to achieve them with a lot less research than accomplished thru formal goal setting.