Set Goals All the Time

The Value of This Chapter

What Most Managers Do

Polls have repeatedly shown that most companies do not have effective goals. Our experience has shown that this also is true of most managers.

This leaves the managers, of course, at great professional risk. Their team members are confused, productivity and morale are low, and they and their teams are not viewed as successful. More specifically, these managers have goals that are:

- non-existent for their teams or even themselves.

- not related to the company's vision.

- "in my head," according to the manager.

- not clearly defined or can't be measured.

- clearly not achievable, but are intended as something "aspirational."

- a "slam dunk" — you'd have to be asleep to not attain them

What Winning Managers Do

Our experience has shown repeatedly that virtually everyone likes to have goals. People simply want to have a clear measure of how to achieve success, and achieving goals is a definition of success.

When employees show up each day having to guess what they should be doing, everyone loses — the employees, the manager, the company. When the employees have the correct goals, every day is focused on achieving them. Winning managers know that goals must, at a minimum, be:

- directly related to fulfilling the company's vision.

- challenging.

- reasonable.

- measurable.

- limited in number.

- established and reset frequently.

A True Story

One of our friends, and a former client, is Royal Robbins, a big rock-wall climber who achieved world fame in the 60s and 70s for his ability to go where no one had ever gone before. Royal was the first person to solo many of the biggest rock walls in this country and around the world, including the awesomely forbidding 3,000 foot sheer face of El Capitan, the famous granite monolith in Yosemite National Park.

Royal went on to found, run, and ultimately sell the outstanding outdoor apparel business that still carries his name. He continues to climb those forbidding rock walls, and he often gets the opportunity to tell his climbing and corporate stories to business and social organizations (he's a big supporter of Rotary and the Boy Scouts of America).

One of our favorite Royal Robbins stories concerns his solo climb on El Capitan. It illustrates the determination and the goal-focused attitude that this man drew upon to become the great climber he was, and still is.

During his solo ascent, Royal was a good part of the way up the face of El Capitan when his luck seemed to change. He already had gone farther than anyone previously had, but he had reached an apparent impasse. The barriers seemed overwhelming — the handholds were too small, the footholds too narrow, and the overhangs too imposing. He simply couldn't see a way to progress to the summit.

Royal stopped his efforts at this point and used his time to assess his situation. He figured that he had two real choices.

One was to simply retreat down the wall, and to make another attempt on another day. There certainly was no shame involved in this, because he already had done better than anyone previously had. He had a lot of fun in the process, and the wall would still be there for the next attempt.

The second choice, and the one that Royal took, was merely to see if he could go another 5 feet. He put the vision of achieving the summit out of his mind, and he focused only on the rock wall immediately in front of him.

Royal felt fairly confident that he could climb another 5 feet. And he reasoned that by doing so he certainly would make additional progress. Just as important, though, was the thought that he would have done his ultimate best; he would never question whether he might have gone just a little bit farther.

And this is the way that Royal Robbins became the first solo climber of El Capitan. He did it 5 feet at a time, resetting his goals as he achieved his last. He overcame obstacles that he didn't even know existed and other obstacles that, taken in total, seemed much too overwhelming to overcome.

And this became the way that Royal Robbins lived, and continues to live, his life. What a story.

Company goals come in three flavors

When Royal started to plan his journey to the top of El Capitan, he had a vision in his mind about the outcome of his adventure. He pictured himself, happy and excited, standing on top of the granite monolith, having just become the first to climb, alone, up the 3,000 vertical feet of this famous landmark.

Royal planned this climb very carefully and purposefully, and his vision was created from his desire to be the first to solo El Capitan, as well as from his knowledge of his own skills and determination. Nevertheless, it was a highly ambitious vision — after all, no one had ever done it.

Along the way, Royal quickly discovered that this was, indeed, not just a walk in the park. He wisely broke his climb into bite-sized chunks, setting goals to move just another 5 feet at a time. Thus, he moved toward his vision in 5-feet increments, which he could easily measure by looking back, as well as ahead, to see how far he had progressed.

Highly successful managers use a similar process. They create a clear vision of success for their group or organization, and they set incremental goals that move the group ever closer to that vision. And because everyone contributes in some way to the overall organization, these managers also ensure that everyone has individual goals that contribute to the achievement of the organization's goals.

Thus, we classify business-related goals into three types. All of them are interrelated as well as individually important in achieving success. Here they are:

1. A long-term vision.

2. Near term goals.

3. Goals for each individual.

Some guidance on vision

You've probably heard the word vision used in many ways, because there is no shortage of opinion on what it means. This creates great confusion among business owners and managers, which, in turn, often leads to total inaction. Why bother?

One of our favorite pieces of guidance on vision comes from The Customer Driven Company, by Richard Whiteley:

[Vision is] a vivid picture of an ambitious, desirable future state that is connected to the customer and better in some important way than the current state.

Highly successful managers know that this picture of an ambitious future state must include all of the stakeholders in...