Goals Provide Direction
In order for any company's vision to unfold as planned over a period of years and decades, people like you — in coaching positions throughout organizations — have to see your own mini-visions through to successful conclusions.
Your vision is, of course, derivative of the company's way of doing things. It has to be. You can't entertain a competing vision with the company that employs you. However, you need to extrapolate from your company's vision goals for yourself. You then embark, with your employees, in the mutual establishment of their individual goals.
Constant innovation is indispensable for companies that desire growth in the twenty-first century. And that includes employee innovation at all levels of the company. Coaching and mentoring invite employee innovation by both respecting human resources and constantly challenging individuals to find ways to do their jobs better and more efficiently.
Above All Else: Goals Are Realistic
This notion of goal setting sounds a lot simpler than it actually is. You don't just sit around and, off the top of your head, blurt out goals for this and for that. If you want them to be taken seriously, goals must be serious business.
The office scene isn't like the third grade, when Mrs. Victory asked you what you wanted to be when you grew up. Your life goal may be to build a raft, cross the ocean in it, and forge the next Kon-Tiki adventure. That's a nice dream. But the reality is that most people won't take your audacious goal very seriously.
Your goals — and the goals of your employees — should be realistic and attainable. If you espouse goals that are grandiose by nature, you'll promptly destroy your capacity to lead. You'll probably find yourself pounding the pavement, too, looking for another line of work. The discussion of employee performance plans included the job-specific goals that are the key starting points of all plans. These goals essentially summarize what each employee is expected to achieve (via action plans) within an agreed-upon time frame. And they are realistic and attainable.
Individual Goals Are in Concert with Company Goals
Setting goals in all areas of a company is indispensable in today's cutthroat business climate. Goal setting transcends employee performance plans. They establish direction all across the board, and when realized, make the whole organization better in fundamental and demonstrable ways, not to mention the individuals responsible for seeing them through.
We've talked at length about performance goals and, of course, monetary goals, the quintessence of business achievement. But there are goals that revolve around attitudes and behaviors on the job, too. There are goals that focus on overall job satisfaction and others that concentrate on learning new skills. The list of goal-setting possibilities is infinite in scope.
