Ep 15 – Why to have Goals at work?

“Setting goals is the first step in turning the invisible into the visible.” ~ Tony Robbins

But you must be wondering, why am I addressing this topic? There is an entire HR team in every organisation that is dedicated to creating this process internally. While role-specific organization goals are taken care of for everyone, what about having your own goals at work?

In my years in the corporate, I have always found that years can pass very quickly if you are not mindful.

Have you too experienced that? Where you have been so busy, that you did not realize how a year went by without you even starting to work on your goals- the things you wanted to achieve for yourself and the company. The processes you wanted to improve, the skills that you wanted to build for your team, the internal or the external network you wanted to expand, the team you wanted to mentor, the growth you wanted to see in your numbers much beyond what the organization set for you.

It’s that one step- choosing a goal, and sticking to it, that changes everything.

Personally, I have never set much regard to organization KPIs as I felt there is so much more you can do in your role beyond just meeting that. But what I realized is that a lot of work in the corporate happened on the fly. And before you know it, you are fire-fighting to salvage a situation rather than work towards your goals.

Of course, fire-fighting is important, but if you end up doing that all year long, you would begin to stagnate, and feel annoyed with the fact that you are not going anywhere.

“You are busy all the time, but yielding little or no results worth showing.”

So, how can you do justice to the time you spend at work?

For meaningful work to happen you need to steer your efforts in a well thought out direction.

1- Goal Setting: What is the big picture? What do you want to achieve in the next 1 year? Pull out all those wish list projects that could make a difference to your role in the company and add that to the big picture. Break this down to the goals for the next 6 months, the next 3 months and so on. Drill this down further and further until you and your team members have clarity on what you need to achieve every day to make the big goal happen.

2- Consciously Prioritizing: This is one of the most crucial steps. You need to consciously prioritize your goals amidst your daily routine. This is much tougher than it sounds. Your daily routine includes hundreds of phone calls, emails, paperwork, and administrative work that is often time bound. These bits of activities are potent enough to wipe out years in the corporate. For you to work towards your goal you need to consciously prioritize these efforts and make time for them despite your crazy schedules.

The simple hack I used was, using the first hour of my morning on a minimum of 2-3 days a week for the most important goal I set. I started half an hour or one-hour early depending on the context to accommodate this without affecting my daily work. Make that effort to consciously prioritize it.

3- Measure and Re-align: Periodically, set aside time to review your progress on these goals, a monthly check-in with your team to check if they are on track. Realign your goals to match your current reality in the organization and ensure that you put in efforts in the right direction.

This has become all the more difficult today as we grapple with trying to be productive while coordinating the desired action virtually.

But things will not change unless you do.

Start small. Begin with yourself if you are not ready to experiment with your team. Just follow these 3 things –

1- Set a clear vision and a timeline to get there

2- Consciously make time to put in efforts towards these goals, and

3- Check-in frequently to track progress and measure growth.

Slowly you will be more purposeful in your actions within the organization and will become much more relevant.