After a few months into the new year, it’s easy to turn your back on your New Year’s resolutions. However, in order for your business to accomplish its goals this year, you must persevere. In order to make a real and lasting change, you have to understand where the weaknesses are in your company so you can actively plan how to change them in the future. 

Recognize Weak Spots

The first step in creating goals for your organization is assessing the company’s strengths and weaknesses. Understanding where frailties are and how they affect productivity in the office. Now, not all organizations have the same strengths, nor do they have the same weaknesses. That’s why it’s important to take time to evaluate your own. Take example from other industry professionals, but any change or analysis has to be adjusted to fit your company ethics and culture.

Anything from optimizing a website, to increasing employee engagement, to leadership interaction among the team - and anything in between - can be areas for improvement. Leadership is a hot topic for development as Millennials are beginning to enter leadership positions. Gwen Morgan (@gwenmorgan), contributor to FastCompany and EntMagazine , said:

“But how does an individual get a glimpse into the areas that need shoring up in order to develop maximum leadership potential? If you don’t have access to sophisticated feedback and mentoring programs at your company, you can do some sleuthing and data-mining on your own to get more insight.” 

Get SMART

The ever popular system is popular for a reason. SMART goals are easy ways to set, maintain, and reach goals effectively. Use Specific language to explain how and when you plan to reach the goal. That goal has to be Manageable, however. If the objective isn’t measurable, it’ll be difficult for the team to stay on task and engaged until the deadline. The goals can’t be too big that they are difficult or impossible to achieve, so make them reasonable enough so the team can Attain the objectives. These goals need to be meaningful to all of your employees, so make them Relevant to not only the organization but the team as well. Set a hard deadline so the goals are clearly time-based; however, set that Time frame so it is doable rather than stressful.

According to Leadership IQ, only 15% of employees feel SMART goals are useful. However, it’s probable that the goals set weren’t actually smart. These goals can only effectively be used when the company leadership closely examines what the original issues were and critically think about how to fix them. Quick fixes are not blanket solutions, nor are SMART goals cookie cutter objectives. 

Why the change is necessary

Children function better in an atmosphere that is structured. No, I am not saying that your employees are like your children and they most certainly shouldn't be treated as such. However, growth is best fostered within an environment that has a sense of formal structure. A team that has this type of base is more likely to grow in a unified direction. That's what goals do for your organization. Clear and consistent goals over a given period of time trends towards higher productivity rates within your employees. Take a large, quarter-end project for example. Setting a stream of consistent goals for a larger end goal is more likely to be motivating than one massive and daunting goal at the end of the quarter. Immediate and realistic goals reduce diminishing returns (for each unit invested, less is produced).

SMART goals help to ensure your employees are growing both personally and in line with what your organization needs for healthy development. Without goals in place, fixing problem areas or departments in the organization can become a muddled mess. SMART goals help to keep the entire team aligned to help accomplish the necessary change. 

Bio: Sean Pomeroy, CEO

Sean has worked in the Human Resources industry since he graduated from Radford University with a Bachelors in Psychology and a Master of Arts in Industrial/Organizational Psychology. After working in HR as a generalist for a government contracting company, he moved to the HR Technology arena and began assisting companies in the selection and implementation of HR software.

While selling other companies software solutions, Sean worked with Michael Warden to design over a dozen applications for different organizations and industries over the years. Sean now focuses on the vision for the company, business development, and continues involvement in the software design of ATS and LMS: Cyber Recruiter and Cyber Train.

Tweet me at @VisSoft