Friday, January 1
Dear journal, this is the year! My resolutions are to jog every morning and cut ALL sugar from my diet.
Monday, January 4
Dear journal, my big plan to get up early and go for my inaugural jog, followed by a complete ban on sugar, was better when I was picturing it in my head. I was a dynamo in my head; it seemed completely doable. When the alarm rang, however, the actual effort was far less appealing. It was cold out, it was early, I had to go back to work after a week and a half off. To be honest, I went into my usual (and completely illogical) reasons for putting off the goal until the following Monday. You’ll notice, of course, that I did not say the following day. Oh no, I go big or go home when it comes to putting off diet and exercise.
Here’s how it went in my brain: I really can’t be expected to come off such a disorienting vacation week of nonstop chaos, cabernet, and cheese straight into exercising at the crack of dawn and relying on only fruits, veggies and a little lean protein to power my day. Plus, my son doesn’t start back to school until tomorrow.
Why do they start back from break on a Tuesday instead of a Monday anyway? Monday is the logical first day for everything, like dieting and exercise. You can see where this is going.
Basically, I need to soft launch this goal throughout the week and do just one or two jogs, especially since my birthday is Wednesday and, let’s face it, I have to have cake if someone bakes me a cake (no one did). At this point, we’re looking at Thursday, which is practically the weekend, and since it’s my birthday week, I should get one more weekend of indulgence, right? It’s a gift to myself really. This is a pretty accurate transcription of the thoughts in my head at 5:45 am on a cold Monday morning.
Resolutions. Fun, noble, important. In theory anyway. My plan to work out more (every year) is important for health, heart and well-being. Some years I stick to it, other years, not so much. The resolution to be more organized and use my new journal is great, until I forget. At work, our goals are necessary. They keep us organized, grounded and on track. We have things to do, skills to learn, projects to finish. Goal setting is a must, and accountability is key. Of course, setting the goal is easy. The hard part is putting in the effort to accomplish the goal.
So here are a few tips for keeping your team committed to their goals.
Goals should be attainable, and certainly some should be a real stretch. Nothing great happens without reaching for it. But, there is a difference between a challenging stretch goal and something unrealistic. Unrealistic goals do more harm than good. For example, I know I can give up sugar, for the most part, but to say forever isn’t realistic. It’s not impossible, but it’s also not in alignment with my particular lifestyle. I want to cut way down, but that doesn’t mean I can’t add a teaspoon of flavored creamer to my coffee as a treat or have a frozen yogurt with my son after a soccer game or (dare I say) a piece of cake on my birthday.
The same is true for your team’s goals. If your top sales rep sets a goal to close every deal, it’s not realistic. It sounds great, but there are factors outside the rep’s control. How about setting goals to increase the close ratio or increase the average revenue on a new order.
There’s a reason it’s hard for me to exercise at home -- because I have no one to keep me honest. Having another person to exercise with creates a bond, makes it more fun and frankly shames me into getting it done. I like group classes for the same reason. I’ll never leave a group class early (so embarrassing!), but I will cut a run short for no real reason except that no one is there to stop me. Accountability partners are a great way to keep employees working towards their goals. It builds connection, improves communication and gives you, the manager, more time to focus on other things. The partners can do the regular check-ins, and you can intervene only if things are not progressing as they should.
There are different types of accountability partnerships. In some peer-to-peer partnerships, it might be just a matter of the partners setting up regular check-ins, which don’t always have to be face-to-face meetings. The partners can outline the specific actions they plan to take to achieve goals and then track progress with each other. Also, the partners don’t necessarily need to be doing the same job or have the same personality type. In fact, pairing people up that do different jobs and have different traits can elevate the partnership. Pairing an extrovert with an introvert is a great way to get the introvert talking more; the extrovert will never tire of asking questions. The extrovert will see a more introspective style in action and get a glimpse of other ways to tackle goals. Also, the differing perspectives that come from having different jobs can be helpful for expanding the partners points of view.
It’s important to track progress. First, it provides a sense of accomplishment. Second, it keeps us organized and on a logical track to completion. By taking a big goal and breaking it into the steps needed to get there, it doesn’t feel so daunting. Plus, how do you know where to go next if you don’t know where you’ve been?
Every personality type needs to feel progress. For systematic, structured employees, it provides a stabilizing effect to avoid being overwhelmed by something big. And detailed analytics love a checklist. For fast-paced, big-picture employees, a checklist of action steps helps the individual stay on course and prevent distraction. Visionaries love a challenge, so it can be far too easy to take on more goals before finishing others.
In our last webinar, we talked about setting up online group challenges with elements of gamification and a leaderboard (which is also a great way to track progress). There’s no reason accountability can’t be fun. Click here for our handout on setting up an online challenge for your team.
So, whether you are tackling a personal resolution or setting up business goals for the year, think about ways to promote accountability while energizing your team and creating strong social connections.
