Habit 1 – Concentrate on one goal
| Habit 1 requires you to concentrate your actions on achieving one important goal that has the greatest impact. |
Human beings are genetically hardwired to do one thing at a time with excellence. Science tells us that our human brain can only give full focus to a single object at any given moment.
You cannot give your best effort at driving a car while talking on the mobile phone and eating a burger, let alone juggling multiple important business goals all at once.
This where Habit 1 of effective execution comes in – Concentrating on one important goal that has the greatest impact.
Concentrate on one change at a time that has the greatest impact
This habit requires the asking of this key question, “What is that one area where change will have the greatest impact?”
By answering this question, it will change the way you think. It will clearly identify the focus that would make all the difference and make the greatest impact.
Instead of giving mediocre effort to dozens of meaningless goals, effective execution must start with concentration on one important goal at a time. Without this habit, you are not going to reduce the number of important goals that you are planning to achieve in addition to the day-to-day demands of work and family life.
Concentrating on just one important goal at a time helps build the required discipline.
Focus on the important, not the urgent
In 1954, former U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower said this, “I have two kinds of problems – the urgent ones and the important ones. The urgent ones are not important, and the important ones are never urgent.”
This Eisenhower Principle is said to be how he organised his workload and priorities. Eisenhower identified that great time management means being effective as well as efficient. In other words, spend time doing things that are important and not just the things that seem to be urgent.
Urgent actions will always demand your immediate attention. But these actions are usually associated with fulfilling someone else’s goals, not yours. These are often the ones you tend to focus on that will not lead you to achieve your goals and vision.
Strategy is about choices. Execution is about making hard choices to goal achievement.
Goals must relate to critical success factors
Critical success factors (CSFs) are a set of conditions that must be met or a set of things that must be done to be successful. By understanding the goal that you are trying to achieve, define the set of things that will directly cause the goal to be achieved. Use these direct causes as CSFs for achieving your goal.
A good critical success factor story relates to how British Airways in the 1980s concentrated on one critical success factor that was encapsulated in one goal. The critical success factor was the timely arrival and departure of planes. It sat above all other success factors within a hierarchy.
In the airline business, late planes impact many aspects of the operations:
- Increased cost due to additional airport surcharges and cost of accommodating passengers overnight due to late-night noise restrictions.
- Increased customer dissatisfaction due to missed connecting flights and delays.
- Increased employee dissatisfaction due to constant firefighting and dealing with frustrated customers.
Goals must be SMARTER and FAST
Goals are the measurable milestones that mark the progress towards achieving your vision. They must be SMARTER – specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, time-specific, exciting, and revisable. They must also be FAST — frequently discussed, ambitious, stimulate action, and transparent.
SMARTER and FAST goals help you create healthy but effective success-oriented goals. They move you in the direction that you want to go.
Vague generalisations and wishy-washy goals are not good enough.
Goals are hierarchical and can be cascaded and aligned
Employees in an organisation have individual goals. They collectively support the achievement of the CEO’s personal goals, which can be represented as corporate goals.
Goals sit within a hierarchy, especially for larger organisations. The hierarchy of goals can comprise of strategic goals (purpose, mission and vision), tactical goals, operational goals, recurring goals and immediate goals.
In the example of British Airways, the tactical goal that relates to the critical success factor of timely arrival and departure of planes will focus and drive the efforts of pilots, flight attendants, cleaners, caterers, baggage handlers, front desk staff, etc. These groups of people must cooperate with each other at the operational level to ensure that planes do take off on time while maintaining or improving service standards.
The baggage handlers’ operational goal that relates to timely arrival and departure of planes will be about getting all passenger bags off and on the plane within the given timeframe.
For large organisations like British Airways, its primary or tactical goal can be ‘broken down’ or cascaded as operational, reoccurring or immediate goals for various teams to achieve. By doing so, all teams throughout the organisation can align their own team goals to this one primary goal within a hierarchy of goals to deliver timely arrival and departure of planes.
Goals can drive strategy execution but only when they are aligned with strategic priorities, account for critical interdependencies across silos, and enable course corrections as circumstances change. If these conditions aren’t met, every employee could achieve their individual goals, but the organization as a whole could still fail to execute its strategy. Goal setting is thus a top-down process that must extend to the lowest organisational levels.
Goals must be challenging and exciting
Sometimes, goals are not exciting enough because they are not challenging enough. Consider 2X, 3X or 10X your goals so that they will stretch not break you.
For example, if you are currently earning $5,000 a month, setting a goal to earn an additional $500 may not sound exciting to you. Hence, you can choose to triple or 10x that goal. How about earning $10,000 a month?
Setting big and bold goals can be exciting and life-changing. Do you think to earn an additional $100 will be more life-changing or earning an additional $100,000?
Although you have doubled or tripled your goal, make sure you sincerely believe that you can achieve them.
Your most important goals must be yours, not your spouse’s, not your employer’s. When you let other people determine your definition of success, you are sabotaging your own future.
The formula for writing corporate goals
To [increase/decrease] the [number/percentage] of [an item that relates to your critical success factor] from [current number/percentage] to [future number/percentage] by [day, month and year]
Examples
To increase the percentage of planes departing on time from 80% to 90% by 31 December 20XX.
To decrease the number of customers giving a dissatisfaction score of 5 (out of 5) from 100 to 40 by 30 June 20XX.
The formula for writing personal goals
I will [action] by [month and year] as measured by [measurable outcome].
Examples
I will improve my training facilitation skills by February 20XX as measured by the skills certification issued by ABC.
I will be promoted to a Project Lead at XYZ Company by December 20XX as measured by my PMP Certification and letter of promotion.