Get the System

backBack

How To Set The Right Goals For Your Associate To Be Successful

By Patrick Thean

dateTue, Aug 23, 2011 @ 06:45 AM

So how do you set the right goals and get someone to be accountable to those goals?  There are two reasons for someone to perform poorly.  The first reason is that the manager did a poor job setting expectations and coaching the person to success, and the second is that the person is the
wrong person for the job.
Why customers shouldn’t always come first
Here are a couple of suggestions to help you be a great manager and work with your associate to set the right goals:
  • Start by spending the necessary time with the right person to set up the right goals with the right success criteria.  Allow the person to provide you with their thoughts on what success should look like.  Then set the Red Yellow Green (RYG)  criteria together.   You should be able to push for stronger success criteria if you think it is too weak.
  • SMART Goals.  I am sure you have heard of SMART Goals.  If you can Red Yellow Green (RYG) a goal, you have pretty much achieved making it SMART.  Here is my RYG method:
    • Green  = Goal.  Pick a goal that is indeed achievable
    • Red = unacceptable performance
    • Yellow is in between R and G
    • SuperGreen = this is the high bar - the stretch goal

Working Hard-1


Final thought:  Be careful not to set goals that are not achievable.  Many entrepreneurs tend to set Stretch goals as the goal, thereby making it unachievable and demoralizing to the person in question.  That is what I suggest you use SuperGreen for - to set the stretch goal.  Make sure that your Green goal is achievable and motivating.


That's Execution Lesson #115:  How to set the right goals for your associate to be successful.  Please share any stories of when this has worked for you, or how it may in the future.

 

Patrick Thean

 

Photo Credit: iStock by Getty Images