~by Haley Lynn Gray~
One of the more interesting conversations I have — with my children and with people who work for me — is about goals.
What surprises me every time is the contrast. My children can tell you precisely what they’re aiming at: a rank, a badge, a place on a team, a particular grade. Ask the same question at work and you frequently get something vague, or nothing at all.
I’d have expected the opposite. Adults have more experience and more at stake. Yet somewhere between childhood and a career, a lot of people stop naming what they want.
Why children are better at this
Partly because the structures around them do it constantly. School, sport and Scouts all have visible levels, clear criteria and a next thing to aim for.
Nobody provides that for adults. Once you leave education, the levels stop being marked — and unless you name your own, you drift. Wandering while hoping the destination reveals itself is a waste of time, and it’s what most people do by default.
Why it matters if you employ people
Ask your team what they’re working towards. The answers will tell you a great deal:
Someone with a clear goal is much easier to manage. You can connect their work to something they actually want.
Someone with no goal is usually a retention risk. Not because they’re leaving — because they’re drifting, and drifting people accept the first offer that arrives with a direction attached.
And their goal may not be promotion. Plenty of good people want to be excellent at what they currently do, with more flexibility, not a management job. Assuming everyone wants the ladder is how you push out your best specialists.
Make them specific enough to fail
A goal you can’t fail at isn’t a goal. “Grow the business” cannot be assessed; “add twelve retainer clients by December” can.
The discomfort of a goal that might not be met is the whole point — it’s what makes you change behaviour rather than simply feel ambitious.
And put the work for it in the calendar. A goal without scheduled time is a wish with better vocabulary.
Write them down
Dull, and it works. Written goals get reviewed; remembered ones get quietly revised downward whenever they become inconvenient.
Keep them somewhere you’ll see them, look at them monthly, and be willing to change them deliberately rather than by drift.
And ask the people around you
Your employees. Your children. Your partner. “What are you working towards at the moment?” is a genuinely interesting question, and most people are never asked it.
You’ll learn something about them. Frequently you’ll also find you can help — which is one of the cheapest good things available to anyone who leads.
