Goal Setting

On a recent management course, about goal setting.  

Asked one of the employee to volunteer, Told him “Stand here and your task is to 
throw as many screwed-up pieces of paper as you can into that
waste bin close to his feet. 

CAR INSURANCE QUOTES 

The employee stood up and, rather embarrassingly, screwed a few
pieces of paper up and threw them in the bin. 

After one minute, asked “Had enough?”, to which
the person said “Yes thanks!” and gratefully returned to
his chair. 

The person had managed to screw-up and bin 12 pieces of paper.

A second volunteer was requested. This manager, a lady, was given
her task.

“Your task is to throw as many pieces of screwed-up paper as
possible into this bin in one minute, and your target to beat is
12, The lady went about the task with enthusiasm and scored 15.

Then asked for a third volunteer. Addressing this person,
and said, “OK, you’ve seen what the others achieved. Do you
think you can beat them in one minute?”

“No problem!” said the third volunteer, and he began when the
trainer started the stopwatch.

He managed 21 pieces in the same time as the other two.

The first volunteer objected to this. “That’s not fair…you
didn’t give ME those rules!”

The second volunteer also voiced her opinion. “Yes, it isn’t
fair, because you didn’t give ME any choices, other than to
beat one target.”

Then I had asked the third volunteer for his opinion.

“It was very fair”, he said. “I knew what I had to do and
by when, and I got a say in what target I thought I could meet. I
saw what was possible, set myself a higher target and knew that I

could achieve it. And I did!” 

In goal-setting, we very often just set the target and expect
team members to achieve it. But how many of us are asked to
achieve a task without being involved in the big picture, or
fully understanding ‘the rules’? Or we see any insurance or compensation

in the whole idea. What might our team be
capable of if they were allowed to set targets they thought were
stretching and achievable? How much more ownership would they
experience if they were involved in the goal-setting up front?
Goat setting is your insurance to better compensation.