The OffBeat #13: Measuring and Managing

Throwing it back to Box Tops 4 Education pizza parties

There’s a lot of debate over the workplace truism “What gets measured gets managed” — who said it, how far to take it — but I think the core idea is sound.

Progress results from setting goals, marking traction against those goals, and celebrating when goals are met.

Every business I’ve worked for has handled goal-setting differently. Sometimes goals are shared by teams, sometimes they’re individual. Sometimes there’s a crisp, closely tracked year-round process pinned to a framework like OKRs or SMART goals. Sometimes it’s ad hoc and managers approach it independently. Sometimes annual performance bonus is linked to whether or not goals were hit.

There are pros and cons to all of these approaches. But 15+ years into the working world, my view is that systemic organizational change hinges on clear, shared goals tied in some way to a reward. The reward doesn’t have to be financial, although that’s intuitively effective. It could be public recognition, it could be hierarchical elevation. It could even be the equivalent of a 90s classroom pizza party for collecting the most Box Tops 4 Education (anyone?).

If someone has a goal, that goal is to some degree externally known, and they hit that goal and are subsequently rewarded for doing so, that creates a positive feedback loop — for that person as well as those in their orbit who are aware. I’m not advocating for everyone sharing their goals, nor their success rate, in some public fashion. I’m advocating for a goal management process that includes a) key organizational areas as required goal categories, and b) a universal reward system for those goals being met.

To get more specific: within this framework, I believe super strongly that all managers should have a people development goal and the achievement of that goal should be tied to some reward. And when I say people development, I mean the development of other people — those people whose day-to-day livelihood you’re responsible for as their leader.

A former employer of mine was extremely disciplined about annual target-setting tied to bonus, which again had pros and cons but was undeniably effective in motivating action. If everyone was required to include a people performance-related target within their set of 3-5 annual goals, imagine the cultural change we could have enacted.

Examples of people development goals:

• Completion of a management training or executive coaching program

• Your direct reports hitting their personal development goals; holding them accountable and coaching them on anything from time management to leaning into difficult conversations

• Equitable compensation and career pathing across your team from a DEI perspective

I also believe in the import of leadership among individual contributors, either folks who’ve chosen to pursue career progression without managing people (I greatly respect the self-awareness of this), or employees interested in management who haven’t reached that stage yet. Everyone can show up as a leader whether someone formally reports to them or not. Enlightened leadership is as much about managing yourself, your peers, and your higher-ups as it is about managing down.

Goal-setting is a spicy topic as many of us are knee-deep in 2023 planning. Reply with your thoughts, I love hearing them.

Have a great week,

Allison