It’s that time of year. You spent most of last fall arm-wrestling over this year’s budget. The executive team has gone to the mountain and tweaked the strategy. Now you have to actually make the strategy come to life by setting strategic objectives for the year.

I’ve been around some organizations where objectives weren’t really that important. Objectives are only created because Human Resources requires it and we manage the way we manage. Business as usual. Does your organization fit into that bucket?

I don’t like to do something just because “it’s the way we’ve always done it even though it serves no purpose” and I know you don’t either.

The process of setting objectives throughout the organizati0n can be an extremely powerful leadership tool and while actually meeting objectives a great deal of culture setting can occur.

We have introduced an entire process in a video lesson within Emerging Leadership Circle called Setting Objectives so you can look for details there. There is one specific point however to make about setting objectives that we find often gets missed.

If we in fact really use objectives as a leadership tool designed to get us to the growth targets called for by the strategy then we have to be thinking like a change leader.

Whether we are setting objectives for growth or even for targeted shrinkage we are basically saying that this year must be different than last year. So, we are, in effect, saying that behavior of individual people must be different than last year.

What are the chances of that behavior changing if these changes aren’t explicitly included in each person’s objectives, in the objectives of their managers, and coached at every opportunity?

In other words what are the chances that at the end of this year you will actually meet your strategic targets?

Learn more in Setting Objectives and keep us posted on how your areas of responsibility produce as a result.

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