WHITEBOARD EXERCISES

Make Progress With Goals

We recommend completing these sections on a desktop, printing your sheets and/or saving your work as PDFs.

A Well-Stated Goal

Sometimes entrepreneurs can confuse motion with progress. We need a well-stated goal that the team can get behind that will push us. Objectives set us on a mission, and key results help us measure our progress.

PREPARE TO TACKLE YOUR GOALS

Your goal is the combination of your objective and your expected key results. Follow the instructions below to get started.

Write your objective. Describe what you want to achieve, the reason you’re doing what you’re doing.

Our objective is to:

Write your expected key results. What results (outcomes) do you need to see from your efforts (output) to know that you are making progress?

We will know we are making progress when:

Explain why this is important to your business. How does meeting this objective help you and your team make progress?

This is important to the business because:

Objectives as Measured by Key Results

Put your objective and your expected key results together in one sentence. Be succinct, and make sure that what you write is Specific, Measurable, Achievable (realistic), Relevant, and Time-Based (SMART). For example:

Improve our sales pipeline as measured by a 15% increase in our weekly demo requests.

 

We will...
As measured by….

REFLECTION

Take a moment to reflect on the SMART goal you wrote. Is it specific enough to create focus, yet ambiguous enough to enable autonomy for your team? If yes, great. If no, then rework it. Just make sure it’s SMART. Repeat as necessary.

WEEKLY OKRs

Your last week’s results will often dictate next week’s objectives. Think back on last week’s objective and key result. What did you expect would happen for the week? What was the actual result? Based on the difference between the expected and actual result, what advice would you give yourself as you set your next goal?

 

Last Week’s Results

 

Objective
Expected Key Result
Actual Result
Gap
Reactions and Learnings
Advice for this week:

Goal Setting

Let’s now use the Goal Setting Canvas. This will help you prioritize tasks that will move you through this week and into next. Take a look at the canvas guide below and use the instructions to complete the blank canvas that follows.

Goal Setting Canvas (Example)

Objective for the week of (date):

Actual Results:

The Gap:

(rewrite objective here)

(complete at end of first week):

(list the difference between expected and actual results here at end of first week)

Expected Results:

(rewrite expected results from page ___ here)

Task / Output + Priority

Responsible

Due

1. Your first or most pressing task to complete goes here.

Who will work on this?.

Put the due date for this task here.

2. Your second most pressing task goes here.

Who will work on this?

Put the due date for this task here. It may come before or after task no.1

3. Your third most pressing task goes here.

Who will work on this?

Put the due date for this task here. It may come before or after task no.1

Now it’s your turn.

Complete the following goal setting canvas:

Objective for the week of (date):

Actual Results:

The Gap:

Expected Results:

Task / Output + Priority

Responsible

Due
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