Tactic 2 How To Set An Ambitious Goal And Make It Achievable

If you’re working in a short timeframe, it’s important to remain focused on a longer-term goal. This tactic is useful if you aren’t sure that you are going to setup a single project or don’t have a clear brief to work to.

Effective goals will normally define an outcome rather than an output. For example, the following is a better goal:

“residents having enough confidence and trust to self-serve online rather than picking up the phone”.

Than “A website that tells residents everything they need to know so that they don’t pick up the phone or write to us.”

Because:

  • It refers to an outcome (self-serve online) rather than an output (a website)
  • It reflects why people will change behaviour (confidence and trust) rather than just what they will do differently (picking up the phone)
  • It avoids guessing what the solution might look like

If you’re working on a project with a clear brief, it may be better to agree a vision statement.

Make it achievable

Once you’ve set the goal

  1. What questions do we want to answer in this sprint?
  2. To meet our long term goal, what has to be true?
  3. Imagine at the end of the project, we've failed. What caused that?

Rephrase assumptions and obstacles as questions.

Written on February 26, 2017


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