Why setting goals is important?

All businesses share a primary goal: Success. Goal setting and aligning and tracking those goals through actions and results are critical to greater business execution and, as a result, greater success. Most organizations see a dramatic increase in employee and business performance when they effectively set goals and closely tie them to the company’s overall strategy.

How to Set Goals

Whether writing long- or short-term goals, the most widely-used framework for setting goals is S-M-A-R-T. All goals should be:

• Specific. Well-defined to inform employees exactly what is expected, when, and how much. With specific goals, managers can easily measure progress toward goal completion.
• Measurable. Provide milestones to track progress and motivate employees toward achievement.
• Attainable. Success needs to be achievable with effort by an average employee, not too high or too low.
• Relevant. You should focus on the greatest impact to the overall company strategy.
• Time-bound. Establish enough time to achieve the goal, but not too much time to undermine performance. Goals without deadlines tend to be overtaken by the day-to-day crises.

Involve the Team

it can be advantageous to have other team members and resources involved in the goal setting process. It is one thing to set them on your own. It is another to have everyone involved and debating the key goals to set, why one goal is more important than another and so on. Not only do you set your goals, but when people participate you get a higher level of buy in to the plan than when you just foist goals on someone. And if you are saying to yourself, “it is just me”, it is still important to set goals and to involve any other resources that might be at your disposal (part-timers, advisors, board members).