Hello all! We are in a series about how we can ‘do’ change differently. In this post, I focus on the importance of having clear, holistic goals for the change initiative.

Clear goals

Many change initiative goals contain words like “fewer”, “improved”, or “faster”. What these goals often don’t have is definition or clarity around what these words mean. How many fewer? What specifically does improved look like? How much faster? By when? If we don’t have clear goals at the beginning of a change initiative (and throughout it as things inevitably change) how can we know if the initiative was successful?

Another part of making change goals clear is continuing to ask “why” until you arrive at the foundational reason for that goal. Usually this foundational “why” will have something to do with helping people and/or making things easier for them in some tangible way. If we aren’t precise about the “why” of what we’re doing how will we know if we achieved our goal?

Holistic goals

What I mean by holistic is do your change goals include “do no harm”? In the Hippocratic Oath that physicians take they pledge to do no harm, to consider all potential risks to a treatment, to not cause unnecessary suffering to their patient.

In the past few years, the European Union has begun placing a strong focus on the well-being of people as a necessary part of change initiatives in the workplace. Do you consider the impact your change initiative will have on human beings and how to successfully reach your goals while doing no harm (or at minimum the least harm possible)?

In the past few years, the European Union has begun placing a strong focus on the well-being of people as a necessary part of change initiatives in the workplace.

Closing thoughts

I want to hear from you. What has your experience been with clear and unclear change goals? What do you think about having “do no harm” as a change initiative goal?

Please post your thoughts and comments below. Let’s help each other become the best change management practitioners and enthusiasts we can be!

In August of this year I will be open to work directly with organizations on their change initiatives. More on this in a future post! In the meantime, feel free to reach out. My contact information is in the Contact section of my blog. I would love to listen and learn about your change related needs and explore how I can be of help.

Thank you for reading. Until next time, take care and keep up the good work!

Mike