Stretch goals help employees enhance their capabilities and grow their confidence. And when employees set great stretch goals, it benefits the whole organization. Companies will equip themselves to promote internally as they encourage employees to hone their abilities. And as teams set goals that challenge them, productivity can rise dramatically.
Stretch goals also engage and motivate employees, as Zenger Folkman says. For these reasons, leaders who help employees set stretch goals are known for being far more effective than those who don’t.
In this article, we’ll explore how to help people set stretch goals that push their limits without causing burnout. We’ll also discuss how leaders can prepare themselves to succeed in this effort.
Table of Contents
- What Are Stretch Goals?
- The Risk of Burnout with Stretch Goals
- How to Push Your Team Without Burning Them Out
- The Role of Leadership in Supporting Teams
- How Performance Management Software Can Help
What Are Stretch Goals?
Stretch goals are ambitious, challenging objectives that push people to go beyond their comfort zones. You can set stretch goals for individuals, teams, and whole companies. Stretch goals for a business could include high-level objectives like entering new markets or achieving a 50% revenue increase in a year. For a marketing team, stretch goals could involve growing brand awareness by 40%. For a sales team, they could involve growing the customer base by 45%.
For an individual, a stretch goal could centre on successfully managing product design. Or, it could involve teaching a workshop series that allows the company to deploy a new software.
Stretch goals can be both powerful and risky. They give people a platform on which to grow and apply new skills and knowledge. By building confidence and experience, these goals prepare employees for higher-level responsibilities. At the same time, if you take an overly ambitious approach with stretch goals, it can backfire.
The Risk of Burnout with Stretch Goals
Constantly pursuing ambitious targets takes a psychological toll on both individuals and teams. Following these best practices will support employee well-being as they pursue more challenging objectives.
- Don’t set too many stretch goals, as this can cause burnout. Let individuals focus on one stretch goal at a time. And give them a break afterward rather than immediately jumping into the next one.
- Look for warning signs of burnout, like stress, decreased morale, and productivity drops.
- Avoid setting unclear or unattainable stretch goals, which can exacerbate the risks of burnout. Sometimes people set stretch goals that they don’t expect to fully achieve, which can actually lower morale.
Now, let’s take a more in-depth look at strategies for effectively deploying stretch goals.
How to Push Your Team Without Burning Them Out
To excel in setting stretch goals, a leader must do three things effectively, explain Zenger Folkman:
- Push employees to tackle greater challenges.
- Pull people by inspiring them with a compelling vision and helping them cultivate self-assurance.
- Problem-solve by helping employees learn to find more efficient and innovative ways of approaching challenges.
Many leaders know how to push people but haven’t mastered the second two skills, they note. Rather than feeling excited about achieving a goal, employees are then just trying to avoid negative repercussions. By following the practices we outline here, you’ll challenge and inspire employees while helping them hone their problem-solving abilities.
Set Clear and Aligned Goals
Set strengths-based goals that leverage employees’ core skills and aptitudes. Make sure stretch goals align with the company’s mission and team capabilities, too. Consider how goals of different teams, and individuals on those teams, can be mutually supportive as well. Creating a set of cascading goals will support achievement of overarching organizational goals.
Using performance management software can assist with goal alignment and transparency. We’ll discuss more about this in a moment.
Balance Ambition With Realism
Follow these tips to strike the right balance between ambitious and achievable goals:
- Combine stretch goals with smaller, achievable milestones to maintain momentum. Creating a cadence of moderate and ambitious goals will allow employees to replenish their energy before tackling the next big challenge.
- Capitalize on a recent success. Set stretch goals after employees have achieved a milestone or small win. They’ll be feeling energized and ready to tackle something bigger, priming them for success.
- Set SMART stretch goals, which are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound.
- Make sure stretch goals align with current performance. If an employee is underperforming, a stretch goal should help them get up to speed rather than far exceeding expectations.
- Set “game-changer goals.” These goals have the power to transport people to a new role, enhance their status, or help them efficiently achieve all their other objectives. Creating these highly meaningful goals will prepare employees for the next level of success.
Through these practices, you’ll build up employees’ confidence as they take on stretch goals.
Foster a Supportive Environment
Work to promote a culture that supports the achievement of stretch goals. Here are a few ways to do that:
- Encourage open communication by checking in every day about how projects are going. During one-on-ones, ask good questions like, “What has been your greatest hurdle this week?”
- Provide resources to tackle challenges. Connect employees with the tools they’ll need, or introduce them to peers in other departments who can support their work, for instance.
- Guide employees in recognizing and challenging negative self-talk. It’s typical to experience imposter syndrome when tackling a new challenge. Trust your ability to figure new things out—that’s probably why you were chosen for the assignment in the first place, as Jahna Berry writes in Harvard Business Review.
- Recognize and reward effort, not just outcomes. If a project doesn’t go as hoped, acknowledge the work employees put in and discuss what they could do differently next time.
Through these steps, you’ll help employees grow more comfortable with taking smart risks and trying new things.
Emphasize Collaboration Over Competition
To reduce pressure on individuals, make achieving stretch goals a team effort. Talk with each person about who can support their process of goal-achievement. This could include peers, leaders one or two levels up, direct reports, or even clients who can provide input on their work. For instance, a direct report could assist with everyday tasks, freeing the employee to focus more attention on a big-picture goal. Or, a higher-level leader could act as a mentor.
Leverage Data and Feedback
Regularly track progress toward stretch goals. Seeing the results of their efforts will motivate employees and inform the feedback you share with them. Quantify the percentage of the goal achieved, which can motivate people to continue striving toward it. Evaluate how effectively they’ve completed the steps taken so far.
Then, adjust goals if they become unrealistic or demotivating. For example, if conditions change or you realize the goal was too ambitious, you can modify it. Work with the employee one-on-one to make any changes, so they’ll still feel a strong sense of ownership over the goal.
The Role of Leadership in Supporting Teams
Leaders can support their teams through the process of goal achievement in several ways, as we’ll discuss now.
Leading by Example
Model resilience and adaptability in how you strive to achieve your own goals. During team meetings, share updates on progress toward these goals. Also mention any challenges you faced, how you felt as a result, and what you’ve done to overcome them. As people see your process—and realize you face your own frustrations—they’ll feel more confident in their own resilience and fortitude.
Cultivating Emotional Intelligence
Emotional intelligence will play a crucial role in understanding team dynamics. Becoming more attuned to how others are feeling—and what influences their emotions—will help you better support them. When you notice someone struggling with a particular challenge, you’ll be able to sensitively check in with them about it. Then, you’ll be able to share guidance and encouragement that fits their needs.
Celebrating Progress
Help people feel comfortable with being uncomfortable by fostering a sense of psychological safety. Let them know that it’s okay to make mistakes. When things don’t go as expected, talk with them in a supportive, encouraging way about how to correct course. And when they achieve even small wins, celebrate their progress.
Next, let’s examine how technological solutions can help leaders support their teams as effectively as possible.
How Performance Management Software Can Help
As mentioned, performance management software can centralize goal-setting efforts to ensure clarity and alignment. Leaders can calibrate goals of individuals, teams, and the organization as they review them on such platforms. For instance, Primalogik’s goals management software allows you to easily set and track goals for individuals and entire teams.
Importantly, such software solutions allow you to monitor progress toward goals in real time. Quality performance management tools illustrate the percentage of goals achieved and specific steps completed. As you see employees reach key milestones, you can celebrate them as a team to keep morale high. Or, if you notice an issue, you can correct it before it grows larger.
Through analytics, you can also identify potential bottlenecks or team stress. For example, these tools can show whether employees tend to put off certain tasks. Equipped with this knowledge, you can determine whether they need additional support or encouragement to complete these tasks in a timely manner.
HR can use performance management software to evaluate how people use their time, too. Such tools can reveal whether employees are devoting an appropriate portion of their time to key objectives. HR can then discuss any needs for improvement with employees.
Performance management tools also support the delivery of regular feedback, through both real-time feedback-sharing tools and 360 reviews. They can aid in goal recalibration as well, letting you easily adapt goals as circumstances change.
As leaders throughout your organization help employees set great stretch goals, your whole company will reap the benefits. Their efforts will guide individuals and teams to enhance their capabilities by pushing their own limits. And as you align their stretch goals, you’ll collectively accomplish things that may once have seemed impossible.
Learn how the right tools can assist with goal-setting and alignment — demo our performance management software!
