Goal Setting

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When Goal Setting Does More Harm Than Good

Isn’t Goal Setting Always a Good Thing?

Everyone has read, heard, and seen all varieties of experts extol the many virtues and values of goal setting. For decades, people have developed countless methods and techniques for setting goals, large and small, for everything from shopping lists to important career achievements.

Few contrary articles or positions have been espoused by anyone, expert or otherwise. The common perception is that goal setting is always a positive exercise. Even bad or cloudy goals are better than no goals at all. Goal setting also fits the time honored cliché, “Plan your work and work your plan.”

Many supporters also believe goal setting to be a process as much as a target. They believe the process is just as important as the goal itself. Should the goal setter somehow “lose their way” during the process, arriving at an incorrect target, the learning benefit of the exercise always makes setting goals a positive action.

Setting goals is typically beneficial and using the right process often improves the results. However, like all techniques, there is no perfect solution. Goal setting is not an exception to this rule. There are situations and conditions when goals actually do more harm than good.

When Goal Setting Hurts More Than Helps

Understanding the potential downside of goal setting should help managers avoid some of the pitfalls that sometimes affect teams, departments, and entire companies. If you are an experienced manager, you have probably witnessed some of these situations in the past.

The primary and overriding problem: people or groups sometimes focus totally on the goal while disregarding other important responsibilities and requirements. This usually occurs when management stresses the “goal as everything” at the expense of all else. Thinking they are emphasizing the importance and criticality of goal achievement, management unintentionally fosters the problems created.

Here are two simple and basic examples of this problem in the context of a customer support call center:

• The  major goal  is to handle  25% more inbound customer calls  than the prior year. A noble and ambitious goal to be sure. However, the team concentrates so thoroughly on the goal, they begin giving customers short, incomplete answers to their questions. Customers are becoming unsatisfied and unhappy with the service offered by the call center and the company. As team members become more totally focused on the goal, they continue generating higher call numbers, which only leads to more unhappy customers.
• Conversely, assume the same team receives the goal of giving more complete and useful answers to customers to generate individual  caller satisfaction increases 20% higher  than last year. Without a balanced approach, team members may spend inordinate amounts of time on each call, concentrating solely on generating positive customer reviews. While individual customers may be wonderfully satisfied with the time, dedication, and knowledge of the call center team, the call volume handled decreases to unsatisfactory levels. Callers' waiting time to speak to a representative increases to dangerously high levels. By the time customers get to speak with a support member, they are furious and demanding. Customer relations may reach an all time low.

These are similar but opposite examples of focusing so heavily on the goal that related requirements are dismissed as trivial. Unfortunately, while the goal may be achieved, the “fallout” from neglecting important, related necessities may cause more problems than the goal solves.

Here is a related, but equally serious situation that causes a goal to do more harm than good. Stressing a focus on the goal and little else can generate terrible side effects that can destroy a team or company. Among these dangerous situations are adopting unethical behavior, taking wild risks, generating bad team chemistry, damaging a good corporate culture, and neglecting other important duties.

A classic and often repeated example involves demanding sales goals. If management installs these goals as the most critical item on the company agenda or with threats of personnel changes, individuals often resort to unethical behaviors to achieve their goals. Some may engage in very risky—at times, even illegal—behavior to meet the over-focused goals. The potential harm to the company and its image may be unwittingly caused by management’s dedication to the goal at all costs.

To ensure that your goals are well constructed and helpful, be sure they are SMART: specific, measureable, attainable, realistic, and timely. Using this technique, you can design and implement goals that coordinate both the process  and the desired result. You should avoid the dreaded consequences noted above and keep a high functioning team together on the same page.