Unless You Track Your Progress, Setting Goals Is a Waste of Effort The single most common reason people don't reach their goals is they forgot they set them in the first place.
By Alexander Maasik Edited by Dan Bova
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I've always carried a notebook with me at work and on business trips. I usually jot down notes from meetings or random thoughts I have on how to improve our company. Recently, I found some of my old notebooks and I started flipping through the pages.
Despite the awful handwriting, their were actually some interesting ideas written down. I found some great goals and objectives for the past years, that I had never gotten around to implementing. I could have done most of these things and probably be more successful than I am now.
What went wrong?
Related: To Keep Your Goals on Track, Focus on Values and Principles
Do you know what your team is doing?
Boardview writes that "two thirds of senior managers can't name their firms' top priorities" and "more than 80% of small business owners don't keep track of business goals."
So the problem is that while companies probably have some sort of goals (even if they are just "making money."), the progress towards those goals is not measured. I have seen this behavior at many companies I've worked with. Starry-eyed managers excitedly pitch a goal in an attempt to motivate their employees to get on board. This great initiative is then almost instantly forgotten, and three months later no one will even remember it at all. This is part of a wider problem of companies not prioritizing goal setting.
The easiest way to make sure you have serious goals that you can follow is inform everyone in your company (starting with the senior management) of those goals. Then you'll need a goal tracking system that makes sure you measure your progress regularly.
Related: 6 Apps That Help You Stick to Your Goals
Own your goals.
Once you've written down a company or a team goal, two questions arise. Who is responsible for the goal (accountability), and how do you review the results (performance review)?
As for accountability, at my work we set impactful, quarterly objectives for each of our teams. We make sure each team goal is assigned to specific person who is responsible for achieving it.
These goals are not usually met 100 percent as they are designed not to. They are designed to force me and my employees to try new things, experiment and break old habits. It's reaching for the moon and landing among the stars.
Step two: tracking goals with meetings.
You must track your progress towards said goal week by week. This is called continuous performance review. I review our team's Key Results or KPIs every week. At our weekly status meeting, we start by discussing each Key Result and the progress towards our end goal.
Weekly status meetings are used in most companies. But you have to be careful with them as they can become pointless very easily if you haven't set clear goals first.
If your company is not focused on goals, you are wasting time and money. You should never just chat about your work without knowing how that work aligns with your company's goals and vision.
Related: 15 Time Management Tips for Achieving Your Goals
Having an impact every day.
Christina Wodtke, author of "Radical Focus", has said that success is not checking a box. It's having an impact. Working towards your goals is something you need to do every day and every hour. Only then can you make an impact. Instead of weekly meetings, you can take in one step further with status reporting.
I like the Plans, Progress, Problems (PPP) approach. With it, you set 3 - 5 impactful plans for yourself every week that you focus on. What makes this great is that you can link each of those to one of your goals to make sure every big task you work on, actually moves you towards your goals. And the reports you get out of it, can be the basis of your weekly status meetings, making it easier to keep yourself and others focused.
A weekly review of your progress is vital for the long term success of goal setting. Many people can relate to a situation where you set goals and decide on a deadline that seems so far away. Then, a week before the time is up, you finally remember your goal and panic sets in. This is not the way to do it.
Great ideas should not be left to rot in a notebook. They should be written down, discussed with your team, improved and executed every day. Doing so will ensure that your best ideas are never forgotten and lost. Instead, they bring you satisfaction and success.
