“Our goals can only be reached through a vehicle of a plan, in which we must fervently believe, and upon which we must vigorously act. There is no other route to success”.
–Stephen A. Brennan
Most of you have begun to identify your annual goals; some of you may even have finalized the goals that your organization/company will work on throughout the year. Now what?
- The goals need to be cascaded to everyone that can support attaining them.
- Each person that has a role in the successful achievement of a goal needs to understand how they personally can help with achieving the goal.
One way to start to action each goal is to utilize the brown paper process. The steps in this process include:
Step 1
Identify the objective for successfully completing each goal
Step 2
Agree on the focus areas (streams) that are required for achieving the goal
Step 3
Identify what the desired end result is and the timeframe for completion (called “TO BE” in the process)
Step 4
Identify the dependencies (called Critical Success Factors (CSF’s) that are required for success. Ex. funding, skills, completion of other goals
Step 5
Document the ‘AS IS’ for each of the goals. (Let’s say you have a goal of 99% accuracy, what’s the current accuracy rate?
Step 6
Brainstorm what must be done to achieve the goal (called “HOW TO’s”)
Step 7
Ensure accountability by assigning an owner for each goal and for each “how to”
Please let us know if you’d like an excel template for the brown paper process. It’s ideal for taking action, obtaining results, and tracking where you are today to where you desire to be. The sooner you get started the more successful you’ll be!