When is a dream too big? When is it not big enough? When should the dream change? One of the most important roles leaders fulfill is sorting it all out for an organization and/or team pushing for greatness.
“Setting the right targets and goals over the short and long terms is a fine art that requires a delicate blend of unbridled optimism and cold-eyed realism, sometimes bordering on schizophrenia,” says Terry St. Marie, a Portland, Oregon-based consultant and leadership coach. It’s a role he calls being the Chief Calibration Officer. “Someone has to step into the mass of contradictions and calibrate the dreams and goals; that is, adjust them in just the right way for their maximum effectiveness.”
St. Marie says some of the best advice he ever received is to break goals down into bite-sized chunks. “Dream aggressively quantitatively over a long-term horizon, tempered by economic factors at the ‘macro’ level.”
Dream and goal set realistically in a 12- to 24-month window, St. Marie advises. If you hit your goals, raise the bar quickly.
“It is so worth the time and effort to set difficult, but achievable short-term goals, mostly based on facts on the ground. You cannot be afraid to re-do them if they are proving to be way off the mark. But most importantly, when a goal is hit, raise it again immediately. Keep moving the target forward —that’s how the bite-sized chunks analogy really kicks in against the impossible dreams you set.”
Terry St. Marie blogs at TerryStarbucker.com/blog.
