It’s the time of year when hopes are high and people are ready for change.  It’s a chance for a do-over.   A second chance to try again.  To do all those things you wanted to last year.  The problem is that when it comes to goal setting most people try to take on way more than they can handle.  Less is more when it comes to goals.     

The first step in achieving goals is to be purposeful and intentional about what you are working toward.   Make your goals bite-sized and relevant.  Focus on a few actions that matter.  Refer to your core company initiatives and tie your individual goals back to those larger goals for your professional goals.  It’s better to focus your efforts on a few major goals that will actually get accomplished than a dozen minor tasks.

Studies at MIT, Stanford, and the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke in the USA show that human beings are hard-wired to do just one thing at a time with excellence.  In fact, the more we multi-task we strengthen the neurological circuits that control that function and weaken the circuits needed for deep thinking and problem solving.  Two skills that are extremely important in the workplace.

To make your goal setting process more manageable, and thus more likely to achieve, start with no more than 3 one year goals in a specific area, then break those into 3 quarterly goals.  Setting big annual goals and stopping there is a recipe for failure.  Things move way too fast in the business world and chances are your annual goals will be outdated within a month or two.  For goals to be beneficial, you need to take it a step further and establish new goals to support the larger goal every quarter.  This gives opportunity for revising along the way rather than tossing them aside because they are out of date.

Often, when I recommend this frequency of goal setting I see a veil of stress cover the faces of the management teams I’m training.  They think they need to establish the goals for everyone on their team but that isn’t the case.  The manager’s role is not to set goals for their staff but rather to guide them through the process.  The reason for this is simple:  people put more effort into their own ideas rather than other people’s ideas.  Putting this in the hands of the employees also helps make the connection between individual efforts and organization goals which leads to increased buy-in and engagement.

To recap, the ideal number of goals is 3 per quarter that support the company’s annual goals.  If you are interested in learning more about Goals Training for your organization, click here to submit a contact form.

By Liz Uram, owner of The Coach & Mentor Group