statement is a giant step forward; in it, you articulate the purpose of your company by defining the business that you’re in. But the definition is just the beginning. When the world was recently consumed with the COVID-19 pandemic and the need for an effective vaccine was paramount, stating the nature of the mission was the easy part. But actually figuring out, step by step, how to get there and then get the jab into billions of arms was the real trick. It involved carefully formulated goals and objectives by the multitude of actors involved in the effort.
You don’t have to be planning how to fight a pandemic to know that goals and objectives are important. If you’ve ever planned a vacation trip by car, you know that choosing the destination is essential (and often painful, especially if the kids want to go to Disney World, and you want to refresh your knowledge of the bar scene in Key West). But the real work starts when you begin to work out an itinerary, carefully setting up mileage goals and sightseeing objectives so that your summer getaway doesn’t turn into another National Lampoon sequel. Goals and objectives are vital to successful business planning.
We know you’re eager to get going with your business plan. But spare us a few moments up front to introduce some important ideas that you can take advantage of when you begin setting your own goals and objectives.
Why bother?
Who needs goals, anyway? You may be the type who plans a trip by filling the SUV with gas, stopping at the ATM for cash, and flipping a coin as you head out of town and reach the first intersection. Ah, life, adventure, the thrill of the unknown! Why waste time trying to decipher a map when you’re just out for the ride? Maybe your approach is fine for a quick getaway break, but for a company, failing to set business goals can lead to more serious consequences — real serious.
Planning blunders have been partly blamed for fiascoes involving certain infamous product introductions, including the Ford Edsel in the 1950s, New Coke in the 1980s, and the Apple Newton PDA in the ’90s.
Motorola ultimately lost more than $5 billion on Iridium, its ill-planned low Earth orbit mobile telephone satellite system. By 2000 the venture was bankrupt.
In 2004 Google launched Orkut and in 2011 it introduced Google +. These online services were designed to give this innovative firm entry into the highly lucrative social media platform market. But by 2014 Orkut was gone, and in 2019 Google + was pulled, unable to compete against established incumbents like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.
Goals versus objectives
After you complete a mission statement, your business goals lay out a basic itinerary for achieving your mission. Goals are broad business results that your company absolutely commits to attaining.
Goals are typically stated in terms of general business intentions. You may define your company’s goals by using phrases such as “becoming the market leader” or “being the low-cost provider of choice.” These aims clearly focus the company’s activities without being so narrowly defined that they stifle creativity or limit flexibility.
In working toward set goals, your company must be willing to come up with the resources — the money and the people — required to attain the intended results. The goals that you set for your company should ultimately dictate your business choices throughout your organization and may take years to achieve. Goals should forge an unbreakable link between your company’s actions and its mission.
Objectives never stand alone. They flow directly from your mission and your values and vision (see Chapter 3), and outside the context of their larger goals, they have little meaning. In fact, objectives can be downright confusing.
The goal “Improve employee morale,” for example, is much too general without specific objectives to back it up. And you can misinterpret the objective “Reduce employee grievances by 35 percent over the coming year” if you state it by itself. (One way to achieve this objective is to terminate some employees and terrorize the rest of the workforce.) When you take the goal and objective together, however, their meanings become clear.
