Designing Great Team Goals: Benefits, Key Steps, and Examples

Shared goals unite people, turning them from a group of individuals into a strong and efficient team. So, building a strong team begins with setting great team goals. 

Every leader should guide their team in setting strong goals focused on clear outcomes. But why are team goals so crucial to motivation, productivity, and organizational success? Moreover, how do you establish the right ones? In this article, we’ll answer those questions and share some examples of great team goals. 

Key Takeaways

• Team goals are key to building a strong team.
• Many benefits of creating team goals are backed by research, including the claims that team goals are more than the sum of individual goals; that goals setting increases productivity;  that shared goals increase team cohesion; that team goals increase individual employee engagement.
• There are eight best practises for setting effective team goals: set cascading goals; involve employees in the goal-setting process; leaders should provide direction during team goal-setting activities; team goals should be broken down into short-, medium- and long-term goals; SMART goals are a good to choice to clearly define KPIs; design an action plan to clearly define who will do what and when; clearly define what ‘Success’ means in terms of team goals; adapt team goals as needed.
• We recommend following six steps to create team goals: team discussion; identification of important points; turn ideas into goals; clarify what each goal means; create KPIs; implement cascading goals; 
• Choosing the right type of goals means deciding between performance and skills-based goals. Employee development can be included in team goals. 
• Setting, tracking and monitoring goals is much easier with a performance management suite that includes goals tracking software, such as the platform developed by Primalogik. 

Table of Contents

1. Benefits of Setting Team Goals 
2. 8 Best Practices for Setting Team Goals
3. How to Set Team Goals in 6 Steps
4. Team Goals Examples: Choosing the Right Goals
5. How to Track, Monitor, and Support Progress on Team Goals
6. Primalogik’s Goal Tracking Software Helps You Create and Manage Team Goals

Benefits of Setting Team Goals 

Various sources assert the positive effects of team goals on performance, individual morale, and more. Since effective teams are key to thriving organizations, the importance of team goals to organizational success cannot be underestimated.  

For example:

• According to Peter Hawkins, thought leader and author of  Leadership Team Coaching, team goals are more than the sum of group members’ individual goals—they can only be achieved by working collectively. Setting team goals expands what your team can accomplish together. 
• According to dozens of studies by Latham and Locke, setting goals increases performance and productivity anywhere from 11 to 25 percent. “When employee goals are aligned with organizational priorities and help employees meet changing needs, coordinate with peers and hold themselves accountable, employee performance increases by up to 22%,” Gartner has found.
• Robert N. Lussier and Christopher F. Achua explain in Leadership: Theory, Application, and Skill Development that shared goals increase team cohesion, which in turn strengthens psychological safety among group members. Trust and collaboration rise when people work toward shared goals, they write. People become more interdependent, turning to one another for support, information, and resources.  The Dartmouth College Humans Resources Department also asserts that mutual understanding of objectives fuels strong collaboration. 
• Last but not least, a study published in the National Library of Medicine states that a correlation exists between team goals and employee engagement at the team level. Similarly, according to employee engagement theory, by creating an environment where employees feel their unique selves are valued and supported, setting collective goals helps people “harness their full selves” to their work, which is central to engagement. 

8 Best Practices for Setting Team Goals

Despite all the evidence to support the importance of team goals, it’s important to remember that these goals must be outlined and put into place correctly in order for them to have the desired impact.

Let’s take a look at 8 best practices for setting excellent goals that your team can achieve. 

1. Set Cascading Goals

Align team goals with company objectives. All team goals should further the organization’s mission and vision. Start by reviewing the mission and vision. Then look at your company-level goals, as well as any department-level goals. Then, as a team, consider how you can best contribute to achieving them.

2. Decide on Goals Collectively

Brainstorming goals as a team will bring more innovative ideas than one person could generate alone. This also boosts group cohesion and morale. Plus, it increases investment in achieving the goals. Despite these benefits, just 15% of organizations involve teams in goal-setting, says Gartner. This represents a missed opportunity that you can use to enhance engagement, motivation, and performance. 

3. Leadership Should Provide Context and Direction

Leaders should always provide direction when brainstorming goals within a team. Discuss business strategy and how it applies to your team’s work. Managers who effectively provide this context can increase the percentage of high performers by 26%, Gartner found.

4. Create Short, Medium, and Long-Term Goals

Break goals into short-term, medium-term, and long-term priorities. Short-term goals are ones that you can accomplish in the quarter (or even within a month or two). They’re often the easiest to visualize, since they have very clear, actionable steps. Medium-term goals might be achieved within six months to a year. Long-term goals might be achieved over the course of a year, or even several years.

5. Create SMART Goals

Ensure goals are challenging yet attainable. By implementing SMART goals (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound), you can define clear expectations and metrics for tracking outcomes. SMART goals use numbers to show the change you aim to make. They also specify a clear time frame in which you’ll achieve the goal.

Make sure your SMART goals are also stretch goals. They should expand your abilities as a team and individuals. If you’re not tackling new challenges that feel daunting at times, you need to set more challenging goals.

6. Design an Action Plan

Outline the steps to achieving each SMART goal, and the specific people involved. Consider delegating a different project leader for each goal, to build leadership skills among team members. Assign responsibilities to each person, along with a timeframe for completing each task. Define any necessary support for helping them carry out these steps, too. 

Mapping out the workflow in the form of a chart can clarify project stages. Also discuss key touchpoints for communicating about the project, like daily team check-ins. 

7. Establish Criteria for Success

Agree on standards for work quality as well. Draft criteria for success, specifying any improvements needed. Discuss potential barriers to achieving each goal and how to overcome them. By putting your minds together, you’ll come up with more creative solutions to challenges.

8. Adapt Goals as Needed

Regularly review and adjust goals as circumstances change. In today’s agile business world, goals need to be adaptable. This applies to team goals, but also manager goals and individual goals. If conditions shift, or you meet a current goal, you must be ready to dive in and set new ones.

How to Set Team Goals in 6 Steps

Looking for a clear, step-by-step process for team goal-setting? Follow these six steps to craft highly effective goals that motivate and inspire employees. Remember, the key is to focus on a few clear, actionable priorities that your team can zero in on. 

Step One: Team Discussion

Convene your team to generate ideas for goals. Schedule the meeting for a time when people tend to be energized. You might want to try some goal-setting activities to jump-start the process.

Step Two: Identify Important Points

During the meeting, share any points of information that will aid in drafting relevant objectives. Reflect on the company’s mission, as well as your team mission, to kick off this meeting. If company leadership has adopted new overarching goals, share this information. Or, if you believe you need to adopt a different strategy to meet existing company goals, convey this to your team. 

Step Three: Turn Your Ideas Into Goals

Organize your ideas in order of priority. Can some be combined? Should any be eliminated? Pick your top 3–5 ideas. 

Step Four: Clarify What Each Goal Means

Refine the language, making sure each goal expresses exactly what you intend. Make the wording as clear and concise as possible to avoid ambiguity and confusion.

Step Five: Create KPIs

Create KPIs for each goal. These indicators of success will help you determine when you’ve met a goal. For example, “Build a content calendar featuring two quality weekly posts” could support the goal of improving brand awareness among your target audience. Another way to look at it: Write actionable goals that specify exactly what you’re going to do.

Step Six: Implement Cascading Goals

Based on the overarching goals and KPIs you have defined, establish cascading goals so that everyone can work in the same direction at the organizational, team, and individual levels. Remember, goal alignment is key to keeping everyone on the same page and working in the same direction. After you’ve set team goals, individuals can set personal goals supporting them. Talk in group sessions as well as one-on-one about individual goals. This will boost motivation and accountability for personally contributing to team-level goals.

Team Goals Examples: Choosing the Right Goals

What types of team goals are the most effective? How can you decide which ones to focus on?

Team goals tend to focus on performance goals, but personal development goals can also come into play. An effective performance management strategy will combine multiple priorities so that teams can accomplish what is required while employees can make progress on their professional development.

What skills does your team need to cultivate? Pinpoint any gaps that exist, or that may emerge as processes and technologies evolve. Then, decide on which individuals will pursue training in these areas.

Here are a few examples of strong team goals, in different areas of focus. 

• Increase sales volume by 15% this quarter.
• Boost leads by 20% this quarter.
• Implement a mentorship program that ensures each employee has a mentor.
• Reduce production time for product X by 20%.
• Increase organic website traffic by 25%.
• Improve the conversion rate for leads to 60%.
• Boost customer loyalty by 35%.

When setting metrics, make sure they’re challenging but realistic. Remember that you can consider improving sales or processes quarter after quarter. So, start with a manageable improvement for the current quarter. 

How to Track, Monitor, and Support Progress on Team Goals

Tracking team goals can be tricky. The first step is to implement a performance management software suite, so that managers have a space in which to define, assign and track team progress on personalized goals.  

This software also allows you to share daily feedback with employees on their progress to help them stay on track. As you reach current goals and OKRs, discuss how you can push yourselves even further!

Remember to talk with each team member about progress toward personal goals during weekly one-on-ones.

It’s also a good idea to hold weekly team meetings where you can check in about efforts toward team goals. During these team meetings, discuss hurdles, roadblocks, and milestones. Look at the percentage of each goal completed—seeing one’s own progress can be extremely motivational! Then discuss what remains to be done. 

Performance reviews and 360 reviews offer further opportunities to address the topic of team goals, and help team members set and achieve personal goals. 

Primalogik’s Goal Tracking Software Helps You Create and Manage Team Goals

By setting strong team goals, you’ll ramp up engagement and group morale. In turn, your team can achieve more ambitious results together, month after month.

At Primalogik, we believe that happy employees perform better. Our award-winning goal tracking software allows you to set cascading goals, personalized goals, and both individual and team goals of every type. It also allows managers to input team goals, measure KPIs, and analyse historic successes (or failures) for better visibility on team development.

Interested in learning more? Request a demo today!