Setting goals at work is essential for organizational impact and strong results. Clear goals help you prioritize tasks, stay focused, and measure progress. In other words, they drive team success. Unfortunately, goal-setting can be laborious and unwieldy, and when workplace challenges arise—like shifting priorities or uncertainty—it can feel like an insurmountable task.
The good news is that goal-setting doesn’t have to be complicated! In fact, setting goals can simplify your work by helping you get clear on what’s most important.
Ready to set strategic goals and lead an all-star team to achieve them? Sign up for our Manage to Ambitious Outcomes and Build an Empowered Team training packages! Gain the confidence, strategies, and hands-on experience you need to define clear roles and goals, make effective decisions, and give quality feedback.
What Is Goal-Setting?
Goal-setting is the process of identifying objectives and creating a plan to achieve them. Strong goals provide direction, motivation, and a roadmap for success.
Why is Setting Goals Important?
Setting goals is important because it:
- Helps you get stronger results. Research shows that employees who set clear goals are 42% more likely to succeed than those who don’t!
- Keeps teams focused and aligned. With a clear “North Star,” it’s easier to stay the course.
- Improves decision-making. With clear goals that align with your long-term mission and strategy, decisions about where to spend your time, money, and other resources are easier to make.
- Creates shared accountability. Measuring and tracking progress is a helpful way to boost accountability.
To put it simply, goal-setting not only gets better outcomes, but it also builds clarity, accountability, and alignment across teams.
How to Set Goals at Work: A Step-by-Step Guide
Setting goals at work isn’t just writing down what you hope to accomplish—it’s about creating a clear picture of success and an actionable plan to achieve it. Effective goal-setting helps you and your team stay focused, measure progress, and adapt to challenges along the way.
Here’s a step-by-step guide to setting goals that drive meaningful results (while keeping equity and inclusion at the forefront).
1. State the headlines
Before diving into the details, figure out the headlines. What does your team need to accomplish this year to make meaningful progress toward fulfilling your mission?
Ask yourself:
- What are the top priorities we/I need to accomplish?
- How do these goals align with our mission and values?
- What key results will indicate success?
Tip: Don’t start with a blank slate! Unless you’re setting goals for the very first time, you probably have something to work with as a jumping off point, such as your strategic plan, organizational or team goals, or your job description. Whether you’re setting organizational, team, or individual goals, refer to last year’s goals as your starting point.
Example: Stating the Headlines
Let’s say one of your goals as the Director of Talent was, “Fill all open positions by December 31.” If you achieved the goal this year, you could update it with “Complete all new staff onboarding by March 31, with no gaps in satisfaction across race/ethnicity or level of hire.” If you had “Get at least 10 media mentions in Tier 1 publications” as a goal and this is an effort you want to continue in the coming year, keep it as-is or update it to “Increase the number of Tier 1 media mentions to XX.”
2. Use the SMARTIE Framework for set and achieve goals
Once you’ve identified the headlines, it’s time to make your goals SMARTIE.
SMARTIE stands for:
- Strategic – Aligned with long-term success.
- Measurable – Clear benchmarks to track progress.
- Ambitious – Bold enough to make an impact.
- Realistic – Achievable given resources and constraints.
- Time-Bound – Defined deadlines for accountability.
- Inclusive – Ensures diverse voices and perspectives are considered.
- Equitable – Addresses disparities and creates opportunities for marginalized groups.
You might be wondering, how are “SMARTIE” goals different from other frameworks for goal-setting, like “SMART”?
Why are SMARTIE goals better than SMART goals?
When you work in a SMARTIE framework, an objective like “Increase leadership training participation by 15%” might become: “Increase leadership training participation by 15% while ensuring at least 50% of participants come from underrepresented backgrounds and have access to mentorship opportunities.”
By integrating inclusion and equity into goal-setting, organizations ensure that their commitments to equity and social justice aren’t just ideals—they’re actionable steps that create real impact. You can read more about the SMARTIE framework by referring to our SMARTIE Goals Worksheet and our article on embedding inclusion and equity in your goals.
3. Write a messy first draft
Many managers get stuck trying to craft precise goals on the first try. Let your first draft be messy and incomplete!
Prioritize & break down goals into actionable steps
Identify the 3-5 most important goals you need to achieve. Your goals will fall into a few broad categories, such as: programs (campaigns, student learning, projects, coalition work), people (hiring, staff development, leadership), fundraising and finances, and infrastructure (culture, internal systems, policies, and processes). Force yourself to prioritize by asking: What is the one thing we need to accomplish in this category to be successful?
Embrace placeholders
Don’t worry about the exact numbers just yet; describe them qualitatively at first, using placeholders for numbers until you get a better sense of the results you need.
For example, one qualitative outcome might be to get more small-dollar donations to complement your big donor fundraising as a way to diversify your funding streams and build community engagement. Your draft goal might be: “Increase the number of small-dollar donations to build more community engagement and manage risk with big donor funding.” You may later fill in the “increase the number of” with specifics, such as “Double the number of small-donor donations” or “Raise $XX from small donors.”
4. Ask for input.
Once you’ve drafted your goals, it’s time to get input. Like swimming in open water, there are some things you shouldn’t do on your own. Seeking perspective from other people will help make your team and organizational goals sharper. Getting input from your manager will ensure alignment about your individual goals.
Before finalizing your goals, seek perspective in any (or all) of the following ways:
- Talk to people who will be on the MOCHAs for accomplishing them—especially owners and helpers.
- Get feedback from people who will be directly impacted by the outcomes of your goals.
- Check in with your manager or team lead about whether your goals make sense within the broader context of the work and organization.
For example, let’s say you are the leader of a team and your goal is to train at least 2,500 people (of which 40% identify as BIPOC) through your leadership development programs by the end of the year. Here are the people you might have checked in with before finalizing this goal:
- The training logistics lead to talk through potential obstacles and their mitigations, especially if 2,500 represents a significant increase in participants.
- The owner of outreach and recruitment to talk through tactics that could help you reach the 40% BIPOC number.
- Trainers, about the potential increase in workload and capacity needs.
5. Make sure your goals cascade, connect, and add up.
Every organizational goal should “cascade” to the team and individual levels of the organization so that each piece of the work and results is accounted for and owned by someone. Conversely, every individual should be able to trace their goals to at least one organizational priority or goal. As the leader of the team or organization, ask yourself: Do the component parts add up to the sum total we are aiming to achieve?
For example, if you have an organizational goal of training at least 2,500 people (of which 40% identify as BIPOC) through your leadership development program, one way this goal might cascade is that your program team will own developing and delivering content while your operations team will own training logistics. If you get to the individual level, you might have each trainer own a specific number of trainings per year with target numbers for registration.
6. Finalize your goals.
Once you’ve drafted your goals, sought input, and checked to make sure that they cascade, connect, and add up, it’s time to finalize them. Replace those placeholders with real numbers and do a final SMARTIE check to ensure you’ve outlined clear, actionable steps for how to set and achieve goals that matter to your organization. Ask yourself:
- Will achieving this goal represent significant progress towards our mission?
- Does this goal or its tactics mitigate potential inequities in the outcomes and/or process? Does it advance equity and inclusion in the outcomes and/or process?
- Did I get input from people who will be impacted by the process or the outcomes? If not, who do I still need to consult with?
- Are the measures of success for this goal clear?
- Is there a deadline for this goal?
- Do we currently (or plan to) have the capacity, systems, and processes needed to achieve this goal?
- (For individual goals) Can I connect each of my goals to an organizational or team goal?
7. Make a plan to track progress and adjust goals as needed.
Goals are useless if you don’t keep them top of mind. Use them as a North Star to guide your actions and make course corrections. Set up regular (monthly or quarterly) stepbacks to track progress, identify and remove roadblocks, and keep your team motivated.
A few strategies to track your goals effectively are:
- Add it to your check-ins. Keep your annual goals at the top of your weekly check-in document for easy reference.
- Do monthly reviews. Review data monthly to track progress and success.
- Schedule quarterly evaluations. Assess impact and realign with broader goals.
Ready to Set and Achieve Goals That Matter?
Effective goal-setting is more than just making a to-do list—it’s about creating a clear vision, taking intentional steps, and staying adaptable as challenges arise. By aligning your efforts with your organization’s mission and fostering equity and inclusion, you ensure that your goals have a lasting impact. Now it’s time to take action!
Check out some other important resources for setting goals:
- From SMART to SMARTIE: How to Embed Inclusion and Equity In Your Goals
- SMARTIE Goals Worksheet
- Goal Tracking Tool
- Goal-Setting Worksheet
- Goals Stepback Worksheet
- Goals Bank
- Frequently Asked Questions about Setting and Using Goals
The Management Center is a 501c3 organization that helps leaders working for social change build equitable, sustainable, and results-driven organizations via trainings coaching, and online resources and tools.