All You Need to Know about Corporate Goal Setting

Corporate goal setting is an integral part of business planning. It is a very effective technique to increase individual as well as organizational productivity and efficiency. It acts as a powerful source of motivation and brings out the best in everyone. It plays a key role in the long-term success of an organization. The First Step – Mission and Vision Define the mission and vision of your organization. Write a statement that clearly defines your fundamental purpose, core objective, long-term views, and your values. The goals you set for your organization usually stem from your mission and vision. So, this is the first step in corporate goal setting. The Second Step – Goal Setting First, you should draft a set of organizational goals. These goals should clearly define the targets that your organization wants to achieve both in the near future and in the long term. Once you are done, you should move on to departmental or divisional goals. You should assign a set of specific goals to each department/division/section in your organization. You should then break departmental goals into individual goals and allocate a set of tasks to each employee in your workforce. These goals can vary greatly depending on each employee’s core competency, potential, and his role in the organization. You can follow the SMART strategy for corporate goal setting. Your goals should be specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and timely. Specific – Your goals should be well-defined and very specific. Instead of telling your employees to increase the sales or reduce rate of breakdowns, you can give specific goals like ‘increase sales by 20%’ and ‘reduce rate of breakdowns from 10% to 6%’. Measurable – Your goals should be quantifiable. You can use a wide range of metrics like the amount of profit generated, number of new customers added, number of sales queries, and the number of units shipped to know how close you are to reaching your goals. Achievable and Realistic – One of the important things you need to remember when it comes to corporate goal setting is that your goals should be realistic. Too often, people make the mistake of setting goals that are virtually impossible to achieve. Such goals not only force people to burn out, but also bring down the overall morale of the workforce. So, based on your organization’s strengths and market conditions, you should set goals that are difficult but achievable. Timely – Your goals should have a time frame. You should give each department and individual a specific amount of time to achieve their goals. It is very important to remember that corporate goal setting, if planned poorly, can have a very bad, negative effect on your organization. You should not, for example, set one-dimensional goals that force your employees to sacrifice quality for the sake of profitability. From Ford to Enron, a number of large organizations have paid the price for making such mistakes in the past. You should aim to set goals that encourage your employees to improve organizational productivity, efficiency, and profitability without ignoring sound business practices. The Third Step – Ensuring Your Goals Are Actively Pursued You should make it very clear to your employees that there will be incentives for performance and consequences for non-performance. Your employees should be made accountable for their actions. This is a very important part of corporate goal setting. You should schedule meetings on a regular basis to review the progress made, dissect the shortcomings, and amend the action plan if necessary. If you feel that your employees lack the necessary skills/training to meet their goals, you should encourage them to take classes and learn new skills. Summary Corporate goal setting is basically the process of setting goals that are designed to help your organization fulfill its mission. The goals you set should focus on achieving individual and organizational excellence. It is the best way to ensure the long-term success of your organization.