Learn English – “Aim” vs “Goal” whats the difference

word-choice

Is there any difference between "Aim" and "Goal"?
I often seen while filling the Resume or Bio-data, there were two fields as:

Aim:
Goals:

Best Answer

In general, aim, goal, objective can be considered synonyms, but consider these Google Books results:

long-term aim 197,000; short-term aim 32,500
long-term goal 255,000; short-term goal 471,000
long-term objective 115,000; short-term objective 161,000

I think what that tells us is that aims tend to be more general, vague, non-specific, long-term, compared to goals, which are more likely to be specific, short-term targets (objectives are somewhere in between, or more accurately, they simply have no relationship with this distinction).

Thus, you're more likely to have a long-term strategic aim/objective which is broken down into component goals in pursuit of that aim, rather than a goal which is achieved by meeting several subsidiary aims. But this distinction is nowhere near a "rule", and few would see anything odd in reversing the usages.

In the context of a resume or curriculum vitae, I'd probably use objective, if for no other reason than it sounds a bit more formal/professional.

EDIT: Regarding the point about goals being more associated with short-term aims, I think it's worth pointing out that a goal in ball/puck game contexts (soccer, say) is just one step towards the aim / objective (to win the game). A bit like Winning the battle not the war.

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