Objectives For Growth

Managers can help their employees set objectives to grow their business. Promoting professional development and building the capacity of the staff members is at the heart of business growth.

 Effectively Set a Clear Objective

As a manager, you should determine a clear, tangible, and measurable goal for the employee to accomplish. For example, by the end of the month, the employee will complete the online certification course, increase sales by 5%, or use the most updated software in daily operations. Thus, if the month ends without producing the certification, or increasing the sales, then the employee didn’t achieve the objective. The feedback will be focused on how to help the employee accomplish the task. By contrast,  asking the employee to achieve professional growth, improve sales or be better at technology,  are not clear objectives.

Tips to Further Enhance the Technique

• Set a time to meet with your employee and guide him or her to come up with the objective. Make sure that the objective meeting is at least two weeks ahead of the intended performance date to allow the mentee enough time to prepare. Make sure the meeting place is comfortable and not intimidating.  For example, use a round table where both of you are seated equally rather than you as the manager sets at the head of the table.
• Incorporate the mentee’s interest into the objective, so that he/she strives to meet the goal. For example, ask the mentee what motives him or her to use a certain pitch to increase sales, then guide them on how to incorporate it as part of the objective.
• Leave room for creativity; determine the goal not how it should be achieved. Let your employee figure out the “how”.

Actions to Avoid

• Overwhelming the mentee with too many objectives.
• Setting a goal that is beyond the mentee’s capacity.
• Meeting with the mentee again to change the objective.

A Frequently Asked Question

What if the employee failed to meet the objective?

If your mentee didn’t do well at all, it means that the objective was not realistic. Set an objective using the “I +1” criteria; the employee’s current performance level plus one step to improve. So that the objective is accomplishable. However, it challenges the employee to seek professional growth. Oftentimes, supervisors set an objective using the “I+10” to set objectives and then they complain about their employee incompetence.