No Objectives / no Success
An athlete wants to finish the next competition as one of the three best. If he reaches rank 3 or better, he is successful. An efficiency target of 3% is agreed in a production. It is achieved when the production costs per unit are at least 3% lower than in the previous year.
It is necessary to define the results to be achieved as objectives in order to be able to judge whether a target has been achieved at all. Objectives are results or states to be realized. Therefore they must be formulated in a measurable or at least verifiable way.
Target contents and target levels must be agreed. On the one hand, an objective should be a challenge for the person taking over and, on the other hand it should be achievable with effort. Target setting “from above” causes a defensive attitude in the person whose goal is being set and is hardly accepted.
Objectives should primarily be formulated for a planned year. This makes them easier to coordinate with the annual planning and it can be monitored during the course of the year to see how far the achievement of objectives has already progressed. Corporate policy, strategic and medium-term objectives form the basis for agreeing on annual objectives. The latter are also to be formulated as conditions or results to be achieved.