I don't think that goals themselves are a bad idea, they give you something to aim for and a sense of completion once you get there. Personally I've found that

I don't think that goals themselves are a bad idea, they give you something to aim for and a sense of completion once you get there. Personally I've found that setting short term goals ( < 1 week away ) has helped keep me on course. That being said, the company I work for requires us to set SMART goals every quarter and account for >= 70% tied to individual bugs. This is a complete nightmare for me because the goals that are defined for us don't conform to SMART at all and everyone ends up fudging their hours to meet the 70% requirement.