Creating and aligning your Goals
Goals can help drive your business in the right direction - but you have to set them right first. This guide explains how.
)
Mapping existing Goals
Most organizations already have high-level Goals in place, and we recommend using those as your Goals in TheyDo. This allows you to start connecting the existing strategy to your Opportunities and Solutions, which helps to align teams and leadership across the organization.
Goals might be found in business plans, strategic documents, or OKR overviews (where the 'Objectives' will often correspond with the Goals in Theydo).
Setting new goals
Setting new goals is particularly important when the organization is undergoing strategic shifts, entering new markets, or launching new products/services.
Keep the following tips in mind when you're setting new Goals:
Base Goals on real Insights: New Goals should ideally stem from existing goals, market trends, customer feedback, and competitive analysis. You can also review the existing Opportunities and Solutions to inspire new Goals.
Include customer-centric Goals: While financial and business Goals are essential to capture, be mindful of including customer-centric Goals as well. These can be related to customer satisfaction, issue resolution rate, etc. Because Goals play an important part in the prioritization of Opportunities and Solutions, including customer-centric goals ensures that initiatives focusing on improving customer experience are picked up as well.
Make Goals SMART: This stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. Making goals SMART ensures that they are clear, trackable and within reach.
Keep Goals high-level: Goals function as the overarching 'umbrellas' that link many Opportunities and Solutions together. Therefore we recommend keeping them at a high-level and limiting their number to 3 to 5. These high-level Goals should collectively cover all the objectives your organization aims to achieve.
Align Goals with stakeholders: Make sure that your Goals align with key stakeholders. These may include leadership, customers, employees, shareholders, or even the local community. These stakeholders can offer valuable insights into what the organization's goals should be, and getting their buy-in can lead to better implementation of those goals. Communicate with stakeholders regularly to understand their needs and expectations.
Prioritize your Goals: Not all Goals can be pursued simultaneously. You'll need to prioritize them based on factors like their potential impact on the organization, the resources required, and their relevance to current strategic initiatives.
Once you have your Goals in place, it's time to start linking them to your Opportunities and Solutions, after which you can start reporting on them.