The Art of Setting Goal

Achieve Your Goal Successfully

By Julie Goh (14 Dec 2022)

The tradition of setting New Year resolutions is very similar as the setting Company’s annual goals. The only difference is that when you abandon your New Year resolution, the repercussion would not be as bad as when you abandon your Company’s goals.

The idea of a New Year resolution is a promise you make to yourself to start doing something good or to stop doing something bad. For example, you might resolute to start eating more healthy food or exercise more or to stop spending so much time watching Netflix.

A company’s annual goal is to improve the business from what it is currently; be it to expand the market or increase the revenue.

In both cases, everything looks absolutely great on paper….until you actually try to do it.

Setting Goals Is A Process

Setting goals should not be done on a whim. There should be a process. Goals need to be SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-bound).

If your resolution is to lose weight, what action have you done to ensure you would not to distracted from achieving this goal? Perhaps, sell your car and buy a bicycle? Or maybe, throw out all the junk food you have in your house and have a standing order for healthy food to be delivered to you every day? Goals are easier to achieved when you remove all the distractions and obstacles.

Similarly, when you set your company goals, do you know what the obstacles or roadblocks are that will prevent you from achieving your goals? How did you do with last year’s goals? Have you done a post mortem on what went wrong and have since identified and rectified the hiccups?

Don’t Be Greedy – Take Progressive Steps

Do not set too many goals to be achieved simultaneously or set a goal that is unrealistic. Goals should be set in a progressive manner.

If you aim to lose 10kg in 6 months, aim to lose 2kg in 2 months first. Achieve that, then move to the next stage – lose another 2 kg… until you lose the whole 10kg.

Give yourself (or your employee) a pat on the shoulder when you hit your target at each stage. When you hit your mini target at each stage, it will give you the confidence and motivation to continue, until your final goal is reached.

When you set progressive goals, you will not be so overwhelmed. Being overwhelmed might cause you to give up. It is also easier to quickly recognise when things are not heading in the right direction and quickly move to resolve whatever is obstructing the progress.

Identify the Resources Required

It would not make sense to set a goal when you do not have the resources to achieve it. This is an example of unrealistic and unachievable goal.

· If you want to achieve a higher revenue, do you have the talent to help you achieve this?

· If not, are you providing any upskilling to your employees to attain the desired expertise and skills?

· What action have you taken to get your employees excited and motivated to help you achieve your goals? Don’t just hold someone accountable for failing to achieve the set goals. Get people excited about it first ahead of time.

· What investment have you done to automate time-consuming processing so that time could be spend on more revenue generating activities? If too much work is done manually, there won’t be much time for anytime else.

A lot of goals are abandoned or not achieved for the sole reason that they have not been properly planned. You cannot just shout out your goals for the year and then expect results. You need preparations, progress checking, adjustment (if needed) and MOTIVATION! Without motivation, there is no push, no commitment.

Be it your personal or the company’s goal, the principle is still the same. You cannot set your goals today and expect execution to start tomorrow without doing some groundwork first.

The author is an award-winning HR Sifu with Kakitangan.com, who has made significant improvements in how HR operates in multiple retail and high-volume/fast-paced companies. Complimentary consultation sessions with HR Sifu are available for all paying Kakitangan.com customers.

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