Setting goals and objectives within an organization or team is very different from setting personal goals and working toward achieving them. Both are creative processes that demand discipline, but organizational goal setting requires aligning the work and action of many people and therefore necessitates a distinctive strategy.
I observed long ago in sales organizations that sales people were required to come up with their sales goals at the beginning of each year. However, the outcome often depended largely on external forces they could not control to make those sales (e.g., economy, competitors, size of the salesperson's market, etc.). A conclusion anyone could make when looking at the variability of past sales. How would the distinction between goals and objectives change the outcomes when labeling the exercise differently doesn't change what can or can not be controlled by team members? Often that is the elephant in the room.
I agree with Mikey. Focus on what you can control, e.g., the number of outbound calls you’ll make each day, the number of times you will follow up on prospects, how you will answer and respond to questions, who you will deliver your pitch, etc.
Indeed ... great examples of "process" goals rather than "outcome" goals that company's tend to ask for. Others are interested in your ultimate outcome as managers; but groups and individuals are interested in the process to get there. Great distinction that this field note brought out.
This is great. Just taking time to have a discussion like this with your team seems like a great exercise to get everyone operating in this same framework.
Another discussion that explores a similar nuance in thinking is in choosing goals that are both outcome-oriented along with ones that are process-oriented. Maybe this turns into the same discussion without using Drucker's narrow term definitions?
Great, Mikey! Regarding Drucker’s narrow term definition, prior to defining strategic goals, a brand has to settle on their values (as we just heard how valuable to do so, in the Admired Leadership Unlocked webinar with the Celanese folks). And towards doing so, a great way is to settle on archetypes on which to build it upon. 
Archetypes embody the universal stories in journeys all human beings share.
The connection between archetypes and brand reveal how a brand shows up in the world, how it is motivated, and what triggers it.
Archetypes can facilitate the understanding of a brand and why it attracts certain customers.
Archetypes are strange attractors of consciousness. We attract customers when the brand is congruent with an archetype that is either dominant or emerging in their consciousness.
An archetypal approach to branding will help humanize the process of being in business in general, and branding in particular, by enabling greater humanity(!) within all stakeholder relationships .
Agree on your archetypes and your values emerge. Once archetypes and values are established, they provide clarity to our goals.
This from; “Achetypes in Branding” - a great (beautifully designed) toolkit for creatives + strategists, by Margaret Hartwell and Joshua Chen.
Good new years discussion to have with kids too... always mix in the process-oriented resolutions next to the typical audacious goals that are the typical resolutions you hear from children.
Not necessarily less effective for individuals, but it is different.
There is something uniquely motivating to a group who goes thru this exercise together. The organization that hashes thru these definitions and lines out the future for themselves with this kind of dialogue will have been inspired and motivated much more than the team who is handed a finished deck. That power is in the dialogue, in the process of building and deciding on goals and objectives as a team.
You highlight an important reason to always include process goals in your thinking and not just outcome-oriented goals.
I observed long ago in sales organizations that sales people were required to come up with their sales goals at the beginning of each year. However, the outcome often depended largely on external forces they could not control to make those sales (e.g., economy, competitors, size of the salesperson's market, etc.). A conclusion anyone could make when looking at the variability of past sales. How would the distinction between goals and objectives change the outcomes when labeling the exercise differently doesn't change what can or can not be controlled by team members? Often that is the elephant in the room.
I agree with Mikey. Focus on what you can control, e.g., the number of outbound calls you’ll make each day, the number of times you will follow up on prospects, how you will answer and respond to questions, who you will deliver your pitch, etc.
Indeed ... great examples of "process" goals rather than "outcome" goals that company's tend to ask for. Others are interested in your ultimate outcome as managers; but groups and individuals are interested in the process to get there. Great distinction that this field note brought out.
This is great. Just taking time to have a discussion like this with your team seems like a great exercise to get everyone operating in this same framework.
Another discussion that explores a similar nuance in thinking is in choosing goals that are both outcome-oriented along with ones that are process-oriented. Maybe this turns into the same discussion without using Drucker's narrow term definitions?
Great, Mikey! Regarding Drucker’s narrow term definition, prior to defining strategic goals, a brand has to settle on their values (as we just heard how valuable to do so, in the Admired Leadership Unlocked webinar with the Celanese folks). And towards doing so, a great way is to settle on archetypes on which to build it upon. 
Archetypes embody the universal stories in journeys all human beings share.
The connection between archetypes and brand reveal how a brand shows up in the world, how it is motivated, and what triggers it.
Archetypes can facilitate the understanding of a brand and why it attracts certain customers.
Archetypes are strange attractors of consciousness. We attract customers when the brand is congruent with an archetype that is either dominant or emerging in their consciousness.
An archetypal approach to branding will help humanize the process of being in business in general, and branding in particular, by enabling greater humanity(!) within all stakeholder relationships .
Agree on your archetypes and your values emerge. Once archetypes and values are established, they provide clarity to our goals.
This from; “Achetypes in Branding” - a great (beautifully designed) toolkit for creatives + strategists, by Margaret Hartwell and Joshua Chen.
I think this is why certain pop-cultural figures, especially in sports, seem to emerge in the western consciousness almost effortlessly.
They fit an archetype. So we are drawn to see their story arc fall in place.
Seeing that story arc play out is somehow deeply embedded in us.
Good new years discussion to have with kids too... always mix in the process-oriented resolutions next to the typical audacious goals that are the typical resolutions you hear from children.
You made a point to distinguish this discussion for organizational thinking rather than for individuals at the beginning of this entry.
Is this because it is less effective for individuals to make this distinction?
Not necessarily less effective for individuals, but it is different.
There is something uniquely motivating to a group who goes thru this exercise together. The organization that hashes thru these definitions and lines out the future for themselves with this kind of dialogue will have been inspired and motivated much more than the team who is handed a finished deck. That power is in the dialogue, in the process of building and deciding on goals and objectives as a team.