New Year, New Goals: Strategies for Aligning Workplace Objectives with Employee Resolutions

The beginning of every new year provides an opportunity to set fresh goals and reflect on previous goals and achievements. Although some might disagree with the idea of creating new years resolutions, this exercise of planning accordingly for the year ahead is important, especially within a business setting. When approaching this in a business context, it is important to ensure that your workplace objectives align with the aspirations and goals of your employees, to ensure continued engagement and motivation.

In this blog we’ll discuss the  importance of aligning your business objectives with employee aspirations as well as share useful strategies to align both business and employee objectives to achieve overall success.

The importance of aligning organizational objectives with employee goals and resolutions

When employees feel that they can identify with company goals, values and objectives, it benefits not only them as individuals in their roles, but also the organization as a whole. By taking the time to understand and listen to employees about their short and long-term objectives and aspirations, you’ll be able to quickly grasp whether they fit the culture of the organization or not as well as understand whether they will be engaged, motivated and fulfilled in the role that they perform.

When employee goals are aligned to those of the organization, it:

• Drives overall business performance because when employees and the company are aligned on goals, it creates a shared vision that creates an environment that promotes teamwork and efficiency.
• Boosts employee motivation due to the fact that employees feel more invested in achieving company goals when they can identify that they directly align with their own personal career goals.
• Increases employee retention as their own personal goals are supported by the organization, resulting in them feeling a sense of loyalty to the organization.

Strategies for aligning business goals and employee objectives

When it comes to aligning goals of the organization with those of employees, there are a number of ways that this can be achieved. The most important aspect to consider is to ensure that there is a continual line of communication between employees and the organization, whether this be through middle managers or senior leadership.

Here are a few strategies for aligning goals:

Allow for open communication
Managers and senior leaders should regularly engage with employees to understand each of their personal and professional goals for the year. To do this effectively, leaders should encourage employees to use specific tools or frameworks that the organization makes use of. An example is the SMART goal-setting framework, which stands for Smart, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-bound. This helps employees create goals that are both realistic for the year and attainable.  

Demonstrate the connection between individual and organizational goals
When meeting with employees to discuss goals for the year, leaders should share the organization’s mission, values and compare these to the goals the employee has set for themselves. Once the comparisons have been made, the employee and leader can then create a set of both actionable individual and team objectives.

Provide employees with support and be flexible
When discussing employee resolutions, it is important to be supportive for leaders to be supportive of their goals and objectives. There are a number of ways that leaders can show their support to employees, whether it be creating the opportunities for upskilling or providing work-life balance improvements, these gestures will be appreciated by employees and will aid them in achieving their goals.

Recognize employee progress and create continuous feedback loops
As much as creating new goals and objectives is important, it is equally, if not more important to follow up and check in on the progress of the goals that were created in the beginning of the year. Leaders should make an effort to celebrate both the personal and professional milestones that employees achieve. To execute this process most effectively, feedback loops should be used to continually refine goals and maintain employee motivation and momentum.

Potential Challenges and Solutions

When attempting to align the goals, mission and values of a business with employees, there may be a few challenges that are encountered.

The most common challenge that usually occurs is a disconnect between what the business wants to achieve as a whole and what the employee may want to achieve in their own personal capacity. This can lead to disengaged employees or tension between employees and management. The best way to solve this situation is to intentionally listen and understand the goals of the employee and to clearly outline how their personal goals may contribute to the broader goals of the organization.

Another challenge that may arise is the inability to maintain focus and motivation throughout the year when attempting to achieve goals. This can be overcome through regular check-ins between leadership and employees, providing employees with the opportunity to express any concerns they may have and work together to revise specific goals that are still attainable.

How Technology Can Help in Goal Alignment

Technology can be incredibly helpful when it comes to aligning personal employee goals to those of the larger organization. To ensure a smooth goal-setting and management process, organizations should consider adopting tools such as performance management systems and employee engagement and feedback software that can track the progress of goals. By making use of these types of technology, organizations will be able to assess important information from data generated by these tools, which can provide insight into which goals need to be refined or maintained as well as track the progress of each goal.

Conclusion

In conclusion, aligning organizational objectives with employee goals is not only a good exercise to complete in the new year to ensure successful workforce planning, but it also has the potential to drive business success, increase employee engagement and motivation and decrease employee turnover. In order to successfully align the goals of the business with employees, managers should encourage open communication, demonstrate how employee goals contribute to the wider organization, be supportive and flexible, and lastly, recognize employee progress and provide opportunities for employees to offer feedback. By ensuring all stakeholders of an organization are aligned to the overarching goals and objectives of a company, it results in a high-performing team that can win together!

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