Catchball and Setting Objectives - Cultivated Management
Hi,
Hope you are having a good week and all is well with you.
This week's newsletter is powerful.
As a manager we have to align people around work. A common way of doing this is through the process of setting goals (or objectives). Goals can be very powerful, but they can also lead to the wrong behaviour.
Setting the wrong goals often has the opposite effect of what you're trying to achieve. So here are some steps to set effective goals.
1. Make sure they align to the purpose of your team
Ensure your goals align to the purpose of your team, not around the implementation, some other team's goals or what your manager tells you your goals are. You may need to be brave to push back but it's important your goals are aligned to your team's purpose.
For example. If your team's purpose is to ensure customers are supported then your goals should support this. Your goals shouldn't be aligned around something that detract you from fulfilling your purpose.
2. Make sure you have measures around your purpose.
If you know your purpose then you must know how to measure it. Right?
If not, work out how to measure your team's purpose.
For example, if you are a development team your goal is to release features that customers want. So some simple measures might be; how many customers adopt the new feature, how many live issues are generated because of the feature, how long did the feature take to build, are all aspects of the feature being used and did your company realise some revenue because of the features?
If your measure is simply something like lines of code, or number of features delivered, you're likely measuring the activity rather than the purpose. Why does your team exist? How can you measure it?
3. Make sure your goals are based around improving the measures.
Seems obvious to say this but ensure all goals that are set are aimed at moving your measures in the right direction.
There is little point in setting objectives that don't relate to increasing your measures against your purpose.
4. Make sure your goals can be changed.
Goals as experiments. They are things we're going to try that will move our measures in the right direction. As such, they may be wrong. So we must be able to change them, delete them, drop them and be open to accepting you got them totally wrong.
5. Make sure no financial reward is attached to them
If you drive financial rewards against objectives you'll likely break part 4 - Make sure your goals can change. How do you reward people based on them running experiments?
You may find people resists changing goals if it may affect their rewards. Rewards for achieving objectives may make sense in some departments or industries but it often drives all of the wrong behaviours.
6. Make sure goals and objectives are in line with where the work flows
Work rarely sticks to functional boundaries.
Functional teams are usually a result of structuring a business based on accountancy and reporting ease rather than ensuring a smooth flow of work.
Work flows across boundaries so objectives must be set at a work level. Set them at a functional department level and you run the risk of teams having competing goals. Work often gets broken down and rebuilt to meet the functional goals rather than simply flowing work through the bigger system.
7. Catchball goals
Catchballing is a communication term associated with the surfacing and passing around of information. Take an objective or goal and raise awareness about it to all involved. Ideally this will be across functions, but it may not be.
Float the objective, measures and alignment to purpose to those involved in delivering the objective and get feedback. Ideally you'll do this in an open forum and a discussion will be healthy and constructive. You'll iron out the wrinkles, clarify expectations, gain traction from those delivering and clarify this realistic nature of the goal.
If you don't do this don't be surprised if people resist, show little enthusiasm, reject your objectives or do the bare minimum.
If people are involved in delivering the objectives but they don't have the objective assigned to them, then don't be surprised if delivery slows or is tricky. They likely have another goal or objective that will be more important than yours, especially so if money is associated with it.
8. Document, communicate and track
Documenting goals is not the same as communicating them. Communication involves the other person acknowledging the message. If you did the catchball exercise this will likely have already happened. If not, ensure you communicate clearly and simply. Clarity of communication is the key to management success. Track the goals, measures and objectives. After all, they are experiments and you need to find out the results. If they are not experiments and you already know the results then are they really objectives? They are just work. Adjust your goals as you go. Always be trying to move your measures in a direction that makes sense.
9. Succeed
Go forth and succeed.
10. Let me know how you get on.
Until next time..have a great weekend
Rob..