6 Tips for Setting Meaningful Goals

Happy New Year! 

This is the time of year when many of us make resolutions or set goals. Lose weight. Learn a new skill. Build our networks. Save a certain amount of money. I am wired for quality improvement, so I still do this every year. Though, I could benefit from following some of my own advice, which I’m about to share.

Our organizations often set goals this time of year, too. While the Board and Executives set the overarching strategy, and those goals are often generated through a facilitated process, your organization’s work should be guided by goals at every level. They often take the form of individual annual performance or learning goals, operational plans, annual plans, scorecard targets, outcome targets, and so on.

I’d like to offer a few tips to help your organizations set meaningful, measurable, and manageable goals for 2018.

Look Back

Before you set your goals, look back. This seems obvious, but most organizations don’t set aside time for intentional reflection and review. Examine the previous quarter or year. Reflect on completed projects. Debrief with your team or department. What worked? What didn’t work? How far have we come on last year’s goals? What slowed us down? What unexpected challenges popped up? Do we need to continue those efforts or change our focus? Don’t just plow ahead, piling new goals on top of unfulfilled ones. Take the time to reflect on past experiences, tease out lessons learned, and intentionally carry that learning forward to inform your next set of goals and strategies.

Look Forward

Before you set your goals, look forward. Where do you want to be at the end of the year? Plan backward from that ultimate goal. What do you need to know or do to get where you want to be? Also, consider what’s coming down the pike and how you might prepare or plan for it. What are funders doing? Do you anticipate any growth, transition, or turnover? Are there any major events or projects already planned that will impact your capacity to pursue other goals?

Take Stock

Before you set your goals, take stock. We often set goals based on what’s top of mind at that moment. This might not represent what’s most important, though. Especially when we are setting goals for improvement, it’s important to scan the organization and look for signs improvement is needed and then prioritize them.

Here are some common indicators that something could be improved. Look for:

• Sources of frustration
• Bottlenecks and backlogs
• Errors
• Shortfalls

And though you might identify several improvement projects and goals, it’s important to prioritize them, and tackle them in a strategic order. Consider these questions when setting priorities:

• How many people does the problem impact?
• How often does the problem occur?
• Will it be an easy win or a slow slog?
• Will it require a lot of resources (time, money, technology) to address?
• Do we have buy-in and support to tackle it?
• If we solved this problem, would that solve others too?

You might consider starting with some easy wins in order to build momentum and buy-in before tackling the big hairy audacious goals.

Meaningful & Measurable Goals

Once you’ve identified goals that reflect your learning and prior progress, that anticipate future needs and changes, and that reflect what the immediate and real needs are within your organization, your next step is to set goals in which your team will invest their best thinking, valuable time, and limited energy.

1. Involve the right people. People are often less motivated toward goals that are set for them. Those whose efforts will determine the success or failure on a goal are the ones who should be involved in setting the goal.
2. Communicate the why. Connect to WIIFM (“what’s in it for me?”). For people to fully connect with and invest in goals, they have to have a clear and compelling vision of what success will look like and what value it will add to the things they care about. Communicate why your goals are important, what impact their achievement will have, and how it will improve the work experiences and results of your team.
3. Define success in measurable terms. Once you’ve defined success, next answer the question “How will we know?” Whether you’re counting clients, donations, errors, or complaints, find a measurable indicator of progress toward your goal and continually gather and reflect on that data. Real-time feedback enhances investment and motivation in goal-directed efforts.
4. Follow through. Need I say more?