Start with strategy, then set productive goals
Strategy first, then collective goals - As a consultant, I love the act of synthesizing what appear to be disparate pieces into a cohesive strategy. I love evaluating market forces and future trends and imagining the best team to deliver. Once the "fun" strategic choices have been made, the team must put pen to paper and set a goal of five.
This post focuses on goal setting for executive teams.
Goal [ gohl ]
the object of a team's ambition or effort
Now it gets real - Goal setting can put teams in a defensive posture. Being publicly accountable to ourselves and others feels awkward and risky. We want to avoid the discomfort of failing - but at the same time, we understand that leaning into accountability is part of growth.
If you are the leader, avoid the Michael Corleone stance: "it's not personal–it's business." It is pretty personal. Your team members want to understand expectations, achieve their goals, and avoid letting the team down - so press on with empathy.
Three goal-setting pitfalls and how to avoid them:
Mistake #1: Bottoms up goal collection
There are several steps between strategy design and goal setting. A common approach is to roll detailed department goals into one "Frankenstein style" summary. To streamline your work and get buy-in, do it together and start top-down, beginning with the strategy.
Do it together – A focused set of cohesive goals strengthens accountability and agency - keeping leaders answerable to the collective.
Start with a strategy – Leaders must assume a "what's best for the company" posture before shifting into a functional context. To facilitate a top-down conversation, ask: What does our strategy look like in success in year one?
Prioritize the one thing. "If you could do only one thing in the next year, what would it be?" This question forces focus. Gather the answers, and you'll have an initial set of collective goals.
Mistake #2: False precision
I often lead executives to draft goals that will ultimately impact their compensation in my role. Early in my television days, I made the mistake of trying to find a single number to capture the year's results. The ultimate television metric was the Nielsen rating. Ratings tended to provide a false sense of precision – often, the real stories and insights lay a few layers deeper. The actions leaders take to achieve high ratings ran counter to our focused brand strategy. Instead, we set goals that indicated brand success, awareness, and loyalty.
I am a devotee of visualization in all things. More than pretty pictures…Humans process visual data better: "the human brain processes images 60,000 times faster than text, and 90 percent of information transmitted to the brain is visual."
As I honed my craft, I created one-page dashboards collecting just 15 metrics vital to executing our strategy—fifteen metrics to benchmark a $300M business. I am a self-proclaimed geek, and, IMHO, these dashboards were works of art. Each one illustrated four quarters of performance on one vivid page. Think of it as an early Tableau prototype. Visual illustrations helped leadership spot shortfalls, pivot, and reset our plans.
Avoid the false precision of a single number. Instead, set a range of reasonable outcomes with a color key to illustrate a range of results.
Mistake #3: One size fits all
If you are building something new, match your goals to the life stage of the project. Years ago, I changed from working in legacy businesses to working on new products. A staff accountant asked for long-term financial forecasts in a budget meeting for one of my emerging projects. My mind skipped ahead to the hours of reconciling differences from my "crystal ball" estimates.
Match your goals and expectations to the stage of the business idea. If you are in a role that straddles both legacy and new products - get familiar with the different metrics for sustaining new products. Absolute growth, reach, and margin may work for legacy products - but traction or loyalty may be better success indicators for emerging businesses.
I led a team to build a set of brand extensions for Turner Classic Movies. In year one, we set a goal to generate $1 in revenue. $1 may seem like small potatoes for a $350M business - but generating at least $1 in consumer revenue represents so much more. It meant that the team had built and launched something of value.
Need More Resources? Yay books! Every January, there are dozens of new releases focused on goal setting and habit building. Check out these favorites depending on your needs:
If you are overwhelmed and need a less is more approach: The One Thing
If you are a small business or entrepreneur: Traction
If you want some step by step ways to build personal habits: Atomic Habits
As you gather your leaders to set goals, start first with your strategy! As you refine your plans, get visual and match your metrics to the stage of your business.
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