Effective goals, particularly for managers, extend beyond future-oriented perspectives. They empower employees to reflect on the past, identifying areas for improvement and learning from their experiences. But there is no secret that managers have a challenging time making goals because they also have in mind what would happen if they don’t achieve them.
Frankly, establishing goals can be tricky. It needs to be carefully thought out whether the goals are reasonable, not too aspirational or not too complicated or otherwise implementing them could demotivate the team. Therefore goals need measures of performance to determine how we are doing in achieving them. Sara London, suggest key questions to assess our goals:
- “Is the goal aligned with your mission, vision, and values?”
- “Does setting this goal add value to efficiency or effectiveness?”
- “Is the goal you are trying to achieve within your control?”
- “Can you take action to achieve it?”
- “How will you measure success?”
- “Can you track progress toward your goal, and how will you know when you’ve achieved your goals?”
Along the same line, she recommends some great goals for managers such as:
Develop collaboration skills
Eliminate blame through a clear track on roles, deadlines, and assigned tasks within the team:
- Do you know what makes you tick? Or how to best work with others? What qualities would you like to improve and what are you good at? A self-analysis, will help you in recognizing them and find the key to how to cooperate appropriately.
- Listening vs hearing: do not just agree when your coworkers are sharing ideas, internalise them! Recognise any strength or flaw point by actively listening to them, and do not force yourself to have all in mind, make notes! Even little details make the difference when proposing an idea.
- Do your coworkers feel safe? If your team cannot communicate whether they are feeling burnout or overloaded, you’re leaving a big gap on the way. Having the confidence to communicate essential aspects will create an environment of comfort and easy exchange of ideas, tasks, feedback, etc.
- Mentoring: Sharing your know-how with others, even if you don’t get anything in return, is like planting a tree – you may not see the benefits right away, but it’ll grow into a fruitful collaboration and you’ll eventually have a forest of success to enjoy!
- Joining team building activities: participating in team building activities is like going to the gym – it may seem like a chore at first, but it’ll definitely strengthen your collaboration muscles and boost your career fitness!
Improvement of conflict resolutions skills
A basic way to do it? Communication! “How do you want me to communicate something you don’t want to hear?” Create an environment where everyone’s voice is heard, directing our energy towards resolving challenges rather than taking things personally.
As Julie Benezet refers, let’s avoid Human Roadblocks
- The Over-Functioner: Status-conscious individual who takes on excessive responsibility. It can be caused by a lack of appreciation for previous work experiences. So? Move on with a better recognition approach.
- The Martyr: also could be due to a feeling of unappreciation due to past experiences, potentially rooted in family history. Then, identifying the problem and understanding how it affects the team is an important initial action.
- The Moi Person: Avoids responsibility, possibly due to negative past work experiences or lack of confidence, or inadequate training. But building a training plan based on what colleagues could also mention about it.
- The Border Guard: This person treats their area as their own and gets defensive if challenged. They don’t care about others’ work or how to work together to make the project successful. They are fearful of losing control and reluctant to share decision-making or collaborate. Helping them to improve their listening skills to comprehend particularly the motivators of their team, might help them to hold their control and cooperate at the same time.
- The Procrastinator: Avoids accountability, likely due to fear of failure or perfectionism. To improve this type of behaviour, due dates must be agreed on and adhered to and the provision of regular check-ins could help in breaking the pattern.
One last aspect, long-term goals are important and significant, but short-term ones are also amazing! There’s nothing like “a quick win to keep you motivated on your journey to success.”
