Creating SMART Goals for your Employees
NIRMAL KUMAR
Business Leader | Customer Success | Service Delivery | Mentor | Entrepreneur | Motivational Speaker
SMART goals should be something that is used by both Managers and employees in any business which will enable you to set a benchmark for determining whether you are actually succeeding. Goals should be designed to motivate your employees and making sure it is important to them to be successful and there is value in achieving them.
How to create SMART goals?
If your Goal needs to be Powerful, it needs to be SMART, it needs to be very specific, clear and well defined. Everyone should know if the goal is obtainable, and how and when the task will be accomplished. It means breaking your goal down into measurable elements. All elements that have goals that are attainable, realistic and can be accomplished within a specific time-frame are ones that all employees can put their effort on.
The goal needs to connect into the employee's key responsibilities and be relevant to the mission of the department. Every SMART goals should embrace the end results that need to be accomplished for the task. The complete goal prerequisites to be articulated in a way that makes it easy for everyone to appreciate and know what needs to be done in order to achieve the desired results.
Performance Goals and Development Goals
While setting SMART goals for employees include both Performance Goals and Development Goals, as each goal has its own requirements.
Performance Goals are appropriate to the level of the position and related to job responsibilities and deliverables. These goals also need to address potential advancement, promotion within the company in the future. Development Goals are Learning-oriented and should assist to deliver higher level performance in the employee’s current job and career advancement.
What transpires after SMART goals are created?
Once the SMART goal is created, it is essential for the Managers and employees to derive an action plan to accomplish the goal. The action plan will include specific tasks or steps you will take to accomplish each goal and also allow everyone to see if the goal can be reached within the time indicated in the SMART goal. By writing out the specific steps, and then crossing each one off as you complete it, you'll realize that you are progressing towards your ultimate goal. Managers and employees both can give feedback and learn about different practices while using these action plans.
SMART goals enables and empower your employees to complete the project within specified time frame and makes everyone feel successful by accomplishing admirable results. Empowered employees have the potential to reach high levels of productivity because achieving the SMART goals make them feel they are in control of their jobs.
An interesting post that sparked a general query about setting goals. Goal setting has been discussed and publicised for a long time and encouraging is now foundational in many areas of life. It will be unusual for an individual not to have come across goal setting early in life through education or work. A quick internet search (e.g. https://bit.ly/1rATBgJ, https://bit.ly/1Xf6qtj) will reveal the enormous knowledge base around setting goals. In relation to this knowledge base, your post could be considered as a restatement of what is extensively explored and readily accessible in that knowledge base - this assertion is intended as an possible observation rather than a criticism. The need for restatement seems odd as goal setting is equal to success. That is, we'll be unsuccessful when we don't set goals. For many success equates to money (however, we know there are many different definitions of success). It would be unlikely that anyone would need reminding about goals are they are faced with the constant reinforcement across various media, and putting goal setting into a search engine will give them the information they need. There appears to be a stubborn resistance to goal setting. Despite the long history of promotion and reinforcement around goal setting, the resistance continues as as indicated by the need for your post. I wonder if this seemingly effective resistance to setting goals might be indicating something that is missing. I'd be interested in your views about why there is a continual resistance to goal setting even when it's viewed as so critical to success.