Goals

Ben and Martin dive into what could inform a goal—and what makes it stick. They share practical tips to keep goals alive all year, reflect on home vs work goal differences, and reveal common pitfalls from their own leadership journeys. If you’ve ever wondered how to inspire your team or yourself when it comes to setting and managing goals, this is a good place to start.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:03

Hi, and welcome back to another episode of Lead Every Day with me, Martin LeConte, and me, Ben Mooney. So, Ben, uh what are we talking about today?

SPEAKER_01 0:13

Today's topic goals.

SPEAKER_00 0:16

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 0:16

Setting goals, leading goals, all of the bit oh, that's shebang.

SPEAKER_00 0:20

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 0:21

It might feel like a bit of a weird time of year, depending when you're watching this, of course, to be talking about goals. You typically associate a conversation around it in January. But there's a there's a there's a reason why we've chosen purposely not to do that, and I'm sure as we talk have a conversation, those reasons will become quite clear. Okay, brilliant.

SPEAKER_00 0:43

So what's how where do we start?

SPEAKER_01 0:47

Um, I mean, I I always like to think about why things are important. What's the point in talking about goals? Uh why do we need them? So that might be a good starting place. Um I on the subjects of why they're so important, I think about the benefits of them personally for me.

SPEAKER_00 1:03

Right, okay. And the first thing.

SPEAKER_01 1:06

Yeah, well, the first thing that comes to mind is um uh the wedding. So that was my wedding was last year. Um if I haven't talked to you about this already, you're in luck, because I think I spoke to everyone about it, you know. He really has. But it's been a big thing, right? And one of the one of the big things for the wedding, one of my big goals was to lose a bit of timber. I was I was feeling quite um quite uh portly um the year before, and I thought I don't want this to be in the photos, you know. Plus, I was punching well above my weight anyway, right? So I needed to lose some. And when we talk about goals, the first goal that comes to mind was just about losing that weight. And I I remember going into I use Slimer World, right? One of the vehicles that helped me, it gave me accountability, and that's it, but we'll talk about that later, I'm sure. But one of the the the benefit of the goal with this is that it they they forced me, forced to say, well, how much do you want to lose? What's the figure? And then breaking that down over the weeks, well, what does that actually look like on a monthly weekly basis? I know that's quite an easy way to break down a goal, and not exactly how I would do it typically.

SPEAKER_00 2:18

It sounds like one of our favourite phrases already there. Start with the end in mind, how much do you want to lose?

SPEAKER_01 2:24

Well, yeah, absolutely right. I was in a I was in a I had a very clear idea that I want to be in this category of weight, you know. You think I want to be below that stone or in that kind of the 14s or 13s or 12s, that was kind of in my head.

SPEAKER_00 2:36

Right.

SPEAKER_01 2:37

And so, yeah, goal setting for me, it's it's it's very motivational. I and I say that because without that end in mind of I want to look that way for the wedding, and without having the the goal attached to that with the weight loss, I I wouldn't have done it. Because I've tried before. Saying, oh, I need to lose a bit of weight, I'm getting a bit of a muffin top, but I've not done it.

SPEAKER_00 3:01

So, how would you translate that into the work environment and the with our leadership hat on? How do we how can we help people with that? Because it I guess again, this is from personal experience. I don't think I've been particular I genuinely don't think I've been particularly good at helping my people to do that. So it'd be really interesting to get your your insight on that, Ben.

SPEAKER_01 3:25

Yeah, uh so interested about I've not been particularly good at helping my people with that. I've got a view on how well that was done in the Slim and World class as well, to be fair, you know. It but it was a very basic way of helping us set the goal, which was just the question, how much do you want to lose? So just it might seem really basic, but just asking the person the question, what is your goal? You know, instead of telling them, here's your goal for the year, I think is a really simple and kind of common sense place to start, right?

SPEAKER_00 3:59

Yeah, and I guess then there's a bit of right, so what is it? Why? And now for you, that was about looking good in the pictures for your wedding, and you know, that maybe there's a little bit of, and again, I still think about people over process going, so what difference will that make to you? How will that help you just to take it away from? And I guess this is one of the traps that I fell into when I was working on goals with people, the teams that I lead. It ended up being my goal rather than theirs. Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_01 4:32

It does, and we've seen that plenty of times in large corporates, right? The the the team or the manager would get a goal. You know, I want you to do this with the team, and that's translated, or uh what's it called? It's cascaded, that's it, that's translated from their boss, and it's translated cascaded to their boss. And then and when it's done really badly, it's just the same goal cascaded. So you'll see someone at an MD or RD level who has the same goal or same objective as the person who's frontline customer facing, and that that's the risk, I suppose, when we don't give people the autonomy or challenge people to think about their own goals, and and like you say, not just the what, but the why, why is it important to them?

SPEAKER_00 5:13

So, I guess then going back to that first bit, if we were to go start with the end in mind, it's the what do you want to achieve? Why do you want to achieve it? What difference will that make to you? And even if that is a bit of a cascaded goal, this is like these these are the goals of the business, right? So, what are what are you going to do to help do that? Why, and what difference will that make to you, or how will that help? Almost, it sounds like the way that you're doing it, you're giving the individual some responsibility and accountability. And again, genuinely, this is where I've got it wrong. I think that I've taken on too much accountability and responsibility for people achieving their goals rather than having them own their goals. And I know that might sound like a bit of a happy clappy learning and development thing to say, but you know, I think about you know, my challenges with weight loss and getting fit, and I went through a stage when I was really into it and I lost a load of weight, and then I just lost a little bit of motivation and desire, and and again, maybe that's something that will come on to a little bit later. How to keep those things live.

SPEAKER_01 6:30

I mean, just before we went on camera, we were talking about uh New Year's resolutions, right? And how how or why some of those things tend to fail.

SPEAKER_00 6:39

It's a bit of a statistic. The last statistic that I read is 78% of New Year's resolutions don't pass the third week of January.

SPEAKER_01 6:47

Third week, that's quite damning. I don't think I've made it to the third week with many of mine in the past. But yeah, and it's no wonder then when you look at some of the some of the ways that we set goals in business, um, it's no wonder that they tend to tail off towards a March time, mid-year time, because it's so easy to treat goals and goal setting as a once and done.

SPEAKER_00 7:09

Right.

SPEAKER_01 7:09

Right. I've asked the man which weight they want to lose in the Slim World, they'll just get on with it now, and we never revisit that goal. Um until you achieve it, and then they'll say, Alright, well, what's the next goal? But in the world of business, I guess my experience has been quite similar. We'll we'll have that conversation or cascade in January, and then they may be talked about in a quarterly review or a mid-year review. Maybe they're touched on at the end of year when you're trying to justify someone's pay rise or you know, uh performance ratings, that kind of thing. But it's no wonder that they can tail off because they're not talked about rhythmically, they're not all, they're not they're not on throughout the year.

SPEAKER_00 7:50

Yeah, I like that phrase, always on. Yeah. So that it becomes part of how I do what I do rather than a separate thing. Is that what you're saying? And and battling.

SPEAKER_01 8:01

Yeah, and what you were saying before about the why, you can just see then how important it is that you talk about not just the what, but the why.

SPEAKER_00 8:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:08

Because that's the thing that's gonna make people want to keep on talking about it through the year, right? Yeah. Opposed to just my boss tells me that I need to hit this metric. Yeah. That's that's not gonna light people's fire as much as as much as having a conversation on how they feel they would like to, how they feel they could and should contribute towards that metric and why that's important for them, not just to do that, but also why is it important to them to do that in that way.

SPEAKER_00 8:34

Right.

SPEAKER_01 8:35

So, like, for example, with the weight loss example, it's a simple one, I'm sure we've all used before when it comes to goal setting. But with weight loss, I I could be the guy who I'm going to I'm told to stop drinking wine, I'm told to uh go to the gym three times a week, it's never gonna work for me, right? It's just not, let's be real. But when someone says, actually, when you go to the gym, if you make it, try cycling there, right? And um uh a really simple, it's there's something really powerful in breaking down goals. I know we're drifting into a different topic here slightly.

SPEAKER_00 9:10

Well, let's let's hang on to that, and we'll come back to that in a minute. I guess the next thing in my head is like so we've started with that end in mind bit, and we've and that really makes sense to me, and I'm gonna I'm gonna use that, and and it's almost again, you were talking about this before we we started filming today. It's almost about that golden rule of leadership and having people having that level of clarity and certainty about what it is they're trying to do, why, and what difference. And then in my head, then I've got about always on and not that process three three three months, six months, nine months, twelve months is having that leadership hat on, so it's about the person rather than the management hat on, which is about the process. That those two things are really kind of standing out for me. So we if we've got that bit, okay, I've got it, I've got my goal. Um you you've done that bit where you've checked my level of motivation and commitment, you've got my ideas about what I'm going to do. How do how do you genuinely how do you keep it alive? So it doesn't become a three months, six months, nine months, twelve-month thing.

SPEAKER_01 10:17

Yeah, so that that I mean that's that's probably the million-dollar question for a lot of people, right? Uh, out there. This is where I think I've I've got this wrong in the past. I I was in the mindset of goals are set in January. I'm going back to this again, Martin, right? Goals are set in January and they're set for 12 months. And then we'll review them midway and we'll talk about them again at the end of the year. I think that's the first pitfall to make sure they are always on and they're rhythmically reviewed.

SPEAKER_00 10:43

It's funny you should say that because actually, one of the things I learned years ago was an acronym called B HAG. And if you don't know what BHAG stands for, big, hairy, audacious goals. But as a visual person, that doesn't really work for me anyway. But it's almost like those again, I don't want to keep going back to the weight loss thing, but the training thing, but almost like if I'm saying, oh, I want to lose 30 kilos, that almost feels unachievable. Exactly. So how do I make those goals not every year, but break it down because actually it just feels a little bit more attainable.

SPEAKER_01 11:24

Yeah, and with it, I think I I think there's a couple of things, the two things come to mind straight away. You'll probably have some more ideas for this. The first one is breaking down the time scale, and the second one is breaking down the goal itself. So you can the first thing I the first trap I've fallen into again is believing that a goal is a 12-month thing. And that's the good, but actually the goal can be well, actually, no, I'm gonna I'm gonna give myself a kickstart this year. So for the next six weeks, what I'm going to do is I'm gonna make sure I set the dog out for another walk per day, and I'm also going to set me a live 30 minutes early so I can make sure I prepare a healthy breakfast and a healthy lunch before the day starts. So that can be a six-week goal.

SPEAKER_00 12:07

But it sounds like you're already breaking down that six-week goal into mini goals.

SPEAKER_01 12:12

Yes, exactly right. And if you many people I'm sure watching will be familiar with um a chap called James Clare, he wrote a book called Atomic Habits, which if you read this, you know he'll he'll explain this far more eloquently than I will, but uh it's just about creating habits, so not breaking down the goals into a series of tasks, but things that can be done on a as as close to caveat to that, as close to daily basis as possible. That's how you're gonna create the habits that then create the change that create the goal or the success, right? So again, and we're using the weight loss example, but so there's this breaking it down into breaking the task or breaking the tasks down into tiny component parts, habits, and there's stop thinking about a goal as a 12-month thing. Yeah, a goal could be a six-week thing or a or a two-week thing or a couple of day thing, and they could start or end at any point in the year. Yeah, and and for me, those you ask me what are some of the things that help keep them alive and help talk about them rhythmically, they're like two of the top tips I think I've I've learned from the hard way. Nice.

SPEAKER_00 13:22

How about you? No, in my head now I've got a little bit of actually if they're smaller things and they're achievable, you get to celebrate little wins. So you almost get to tick little things off rather than going, trying to try, I'm gonna try and think of a business goal now, right? So oh, let's think of a goal that you know we might have set ourselves when we were starting out working together. Oh, we need to get 40 new clients by the end of the year. That just seems obviously we'd love that to happen, but that seems massive and unachievable. But actually, if you're going, oh, actually, the the goal is five new clients every month, andor four new clients every month, but breaking that down, three new connections, five new marketing posts, and all of those things you can oh, I've done that. That's a little tick in the box, and that might give me a little bit more, it's almost the motivation to keep going.

unknown 14:21

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 14:21

When I look at the scales, a pound difference or a kilo difference is a is a is a win, it's not where I want to be again. It's like when I used to go to the gym with my trainer Alex. So, Alex, if you're watching, miss you mate. Um, you know, doing an extra rep and he was he was he was brilliant at celebrating the wins.

SPEAKER_01 14:42

I'm glad you said about celebrating the wins again because that's I think that's a massively important point. And what could that look like? You said about in the gym. I can see Alex, you know, praising you and pushing on and motivating you from a from a leadership perspective in the world of work. How might that celebrating the win look in your experience?

SPEAKER_00 15:00

From my perspective, often that's giving someone a bit of feedback about something that you've seen them do differently and calling that out. So, you know, praising praising effort and performance, and even if it hasn't gone well, you know, a great friend of ours, Christine. Hi, Christine, um, has a fantastic phrase called FLIRN, and it's failing while learning, and she has a big thing about celebrating the FLIRN. So actually, you're celebrating the learning process. I'm learning how to do it, how it doesn't work, is also success because I've tried it.

SPEAKER_01 15:37

Just like the medical profession, right? It's it's normally the case you you're ruling things out rather than finding the cure straight away.

SPEAKER_00 15:44

So I I guess for me that's a real that's a really good thing about you know, with my leadership hat on, almost being really present and proactively looking out for those things. Because I I think you know, if I'm thinking, if people are thinking about that goal as that big thing at the end, it's quite easy to forget the little things, and it's almost when you give someone a bit of feedback or you you you evidence something and you talk to them about something that makes it makes them oh, I didn't even realise I was doing that. I think that's a big thing. So again, for you with how with you as a leader support somebody throughout a even if it was six weeks, eight weeks, whatever it is, I'm that I'm not I'm never gonna use annual goals again, mate. But if you were supporting someone through six weeks, eight weeks, what what are some of the leadership activities from your perspective that we need to be focused on?

SPEAKER_01 16:44

Uh I I think there's a real risk here. We can talk about tasks. So, right, every week a leader should do this, this, this, this that would make so staying away from that kind of you know rigidity a little bit, there's there's a really simple one, I think, which we've talked about before in a previous part about you know the courage, the flexibility, the humility. I think there's a really it can be a really brave thing to do and a really transparent thing to do to admit to a team member that you're working on goal and you'll find it quite tricky at the moment. Right. What are you doing? What's working for you? You know, because in the past where I've in in the in the business that I've worked with, I've had some sort of alignment with the goals of my people. We're not gonna talk about that specifically today, but there've been common themes and similarities, so I can easily talk and say, Oh, you know, I remember that chat, Rupert, how's that going? How are you finding this? I'm finding it really tough, what's working for you? And just that helps keep it alive. And I don't know, there's something I think there's something really powerful and really motivating about being asked for help, especially by the boss. Oh wow, they chose me for help. That almost encourages someone to go, right? This is I'm it it just makes them focus in on that thing a little bit, right? So it's quite a natural, organic way to maybe do that rather than how are you getting on negotiators this year, Martin? Or this weak Martin.

SPEAKER_00 18:09

Yeah, no, I like that. And in my head, and we'll talk about this in a future pod, I'm sure. There's a massive link there to psychological safety. So if you have the ability to talk about, oh, I'm struggling, and maybe even in my head now, I'm like going, you know, we talked about us giving people feedback. Oh, what have you seen me do? Or, you know, I think I'm struggling with this. Can you give me some examples of when you've seen me struggle with it, or have you got a different view or opinion? So sometimes you know, you can do it that way, and then there's that bit of reciprocation when they go, Oh, yeah, well, I've been talking, I love that.

SPEAKER_01 18:41

Brilliant. I I think that's a really clever way to another clever tip to go out for feedback quite overtly about how we're doing against the goals that we have. Not and again, let's think about goals here not just as a metric, not just as a figure, not just as a widget, but maybe something that's more of a behavioural aspiration, right? Something that as a team we want to be seen for being, I don't know, let's say, uh growing the reputation and brand of the team in which we work, for example, and creating champions or supporters in a business, for example. Think of how powerful it would be to go out and ask for people for feedback on how do you how how do you see our relationship just now? What we're doing just now that's really working for you, what might be getting in the way of how we're working together. We've been working together for six weeks now. What's been what's going well? Which by the way, could have started on the 12th of April and finished on the 11th of June. It it doesn't matter when that happens.

SPEAKER_00 19:34

And that sounds very much like what one of the things we talked about in the earlier podcast on feedback about really good at receiving it and those questions that you can ask. I love that. I guess there's something for me in my head as well. And we again we we may have talked about this already a little bit in terms of adopting um that situational leadership too approach. Glad Chart, one of our most and from our both Ben and my perspective, we admire this guy. He's a he's an absolute legend. Task delegation maestro, right? Yeah, task delegation maestro. And it's almost like, right, so what do you what do the people need to help them achieve that goal? So I think one of the things that I've done quite often is they've gone and they've gone and set the goal. Maybe I've steered it too far in terms of my direction, so they're going, well, Mike just wants me to do this, and I've actually heard people say that well, you're just telling me to do it, so I know that I've got it wrong. But then there's almost a bit of once they've done it, I become very supportive and just coach, rather than actually, if they're really struggling with it, they might need some advice or and it's almost like, how do I go and goes back to your three things? How do I demonstrate that flexibility approach to think about that goal as a new task and almost put my situational leadership to approach on rather than just oh well, it's a goal, I coach, they do.

SPEAKER_01 21:05

That's that's a brilliant shout. Um, it it takes me back to being sat at a computer back in back in the early 2000s, where a boss has come along to me probably on the 5th, 7th, 8th of January, and said, Right, just type all your goals into that system there. You've got you've got seven that are cascaded, you've got five that you need to create yourself, you've got one that's a personal development goal. So now I've got 13 goals, and they're saying create your goals for the year. And I'm thinking, I don't know how. Right. I don't know how to do that. So I think that's a great shout to remember that this is a task that we need to help people.

SPEAKER_00 21:43

And we need to find out what development stage they're at. So I yeah, no, and I I think I have using situational leadership to language, I have delegated goal setting, and have just gone everybody's a self reliant achiever. So delegated goal setting, because they've done it before. They might not have known how to do it, but they've followed the process.

SPEAKER_01 22:03

But how often does that happen in the world of work? Especially with larger organizations where the risk of that gold cast gold cascading happens where the business sets a strategic direction and then it's quick copy and paste that in before the end of January. Yeah. I've seen that plenty of times, and it's a real risk.

SPEAKER_00 22:22

There's something else you mentioned there, which is really interesting to me, and I've never had the right answer in my head. So you talked about, and you I know you were using this as an example, seven cascaded goals, five business area goals, and one personal goal in my head, quick bit of maths. That's 13 goals. That feels like a lot.

SPEAKER_01 22:44

Yeah, and you've got a question, how how likely is it that you're gonna you're gonna succeed against those? I'm I sorry, I'm stealing your example here from uh uh a session that we ran a few weeks back and you talked about tennis balls. Right? If I if I throw one tennis ball at you, how what's the likelihood of you catching it?

SPEAKER_00 23:03

Pretty high.

SPEAKER_01 23:04

You'd hope, yeah. For me that would be quite low because I'm rubbish at that kind of thing. But if I were to throw a bucket of tennis balls at you. Thirteen. 13, how many are you gonna catch?

SPEAKER_00 23:15

Probably none.

SPEAKER_01 23:16

And then if I throw one tennis ball at you and then let you catch that, put it in your pocket, put it somewhere, throw another one, throw another one, how many are you likely to catch?

SPEAKER_00 23:26

One at a time, more likely 13.

SPEAKER_01 23:28

It's just it it feels like common sense, right? But how often in the world of work do we do we forget that common sense approach?

SPEAKER_00 23:35

And sometimes we might not have a choice because in the organizations we work, is they but I guess then there's a bit of right, so I've got all these goals, but I'm going to prioritize them. So I'm gonna go, even though I've got 13 goals, I am going to go, right, but this is our priority. This this is the first thing we need to focus on. This is gonna make the biggest difference to our performance as a team and for you as an individual, and then how do we how do we um how do we bring those together? But giving me 13 at once, and um I don't it's almost like I don't know where to start.

SPEAKER_01 24:13

I've been there. Yeah, I've been there and I didn't know where to start and watch. Again, it's cascaded, but think about what we talked about in the past with the courage piece, and we spoke about an earlier pod, it's not just about having the courage to be able to challenge someone's behaviour, which is where you tend to go when you think of leadership, but it's also having the courage to be able to challenge a process that might not be in the team's best interest. So if you think that how much have you gonna put your you know, your brave pants on, as I like to call it, and think, I don't feel this is right for the team. I'm I'm gonna do something about this.

SPEAKER_00 24:47

Yeah, and maybe in my head, and I'm just thinking about um so that that kind of stuff isn't career limiting, because I've been there, yeah, um, and you're better at it than me. Almost having the courage to go, so the people, and this is not in all organizations, but typically that goal is has it been completed? That's the measure. So how you do that, that should be within our gift as a leader. So even if I get 13 goals, I can then decide going, but actually, as a team, we're gonna focus on this one, then we're gonna focus on this one, or as individuals, they pick one thing or two things, because maybe I can catch two balls, and they're the two things I focus on. And especially if they're six, eight weak things, like you said, I can do those, put those balls away, ready to catch two new. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 25:34

When you put those to one side again, if you think about the habits thing we talked about earlier, the likelihood is that someone might have achieved the goal, be that a widget, a metric, or a behavioural thing, but the habit, if the habit has been formed, it it might just stand the chance of continuing throughout the rest of the year. So just because the goal's been achieved, you might still be reaping the reward of the habits and the new ways that the team just do what they do. Love that.

SPEAKER_00 25:59

And then it becomes part of BAU activity.

SPEAKER_01 26:02

Yeah, no, I love that. As you said before, right? It's then how important is it, like you said before, to catch people doing that stuff right. Yeah. When they're doing it, catch them do it right. It doesn't take a bunch of flowers, a bottle of wine and a box of chocolates. It's just notice what you did there. Thank you. Yeah, no, I love that. Simple things, right?

SPEAKER_00 26:23

So that feels like a really nice, right? I've got the I've got the destination, I've got, I've got a little bit of right, how to keep it alive. What if anything are we missing before we start to wrap up from a goal perspective in in your head?

SPEAKER_01 26:41

I I've been in a position before, and I think a lot of people have in large organisations again, where they go, right, I know I need to set goals, I know I need to help my team with setting goals, and maybe I'm in a position where I've been fortunate enough to be given a blank sheet of paper and said, create the goals for the team. What do you want to work on? And you think, well, what on earth should inform the goals for the team? Maybe that's worth having a bit of a conversation about because it can be it can be easy thinking about the you know the the the process of setting it. We talked about times and re uh reviewing and checking in and you know all that good stuff and smarter objectives we've heard about, but people tend to struggle with what should inspire the goals themselves. So what would what what would we have to say on that part?

SPEAKER_00 27:32

Oh, inspire the goals. It's in my head, that's what does suc what does the idea where am I trying to go personally and professionally? So the Cheshire Cat moment again, right? Yeah, that's exact that's exactly it, right? So I need to know where I want to go first. I almost need to decide, and maybe that's what happens quite a lot with cascaded goals. The organization decides where they want to go, and actually, there's a bit of good language here for all that. Actually, our job then as leaders is to translate that stuff into meaningful actions for people. But again, that you're right, that Cheshkat syndrome thing is giving people absolute clarity and certainty about the road we are taking, but then it's our job to help them navigate that route.

SPEAKER_01 28:23

Yeah, solid. So think about the end you have in mind. What do you want to, and that could be things that the team are doing particularly well currently, but you think I want them to be, I want this, I need this team to continue doing this stuff over the next coming years. It might be a pain point perhaps that the team's facing that you think we need to we need to knuckle down and work on this. I get that, okay.

SPEAKER_00 28:45

And and then there's that, you know, there's that thing around, right? So there are task goals, there's team goals, and there's personal goals, and I guess there should be, and maybe it's a case of like not going, oh right, so this month is task goals, this month is team goals, this month is personal goals. What's right for that person, that team at that particular time? So then I'm doing it from a people perspective with my leadership hat on and not a process perspective. And it's I'm just thinking, how do I think about personal goals that I've been motivated to achieve? I always had that. There was always that end in mind. I knew I was gonna do what I mean, and it's that. So I think there's some really good things in there. Start with the end in mind, think about what you need to do as a leader to help support, whether that's training, whether that's coaching, whether that's mental whatever that is, recognizing and you know, celebrating success, all the flerns, making it part of those conversations, not just a tactical thing that you do, making it part of VAU activity, and that thing about them always being on. Yeah, I'd almost go, and this just popped into my head, and this is maybe a bit of a Martin thing, and maybe this is goes back to the when we talked about the word feedback, taking the word goals out of it. That's a great shame. What do you look? These are the things we've got to achieve. I need your help. Let's let's talk about how we achieve them. What are your strengths? What what what can you bring? What can you add? What do you need from me? How can I support you? And it's almost how do we work on this stuff together?

SPEAKER_01 30:25

I really like that because it you think again, like the word feedback has those negative connotations. I dare say, after so long in in large corporate word goals or objective might have a similar kind of negative connotation associated with it, right?

SPEAKER_00 30:40

It's really weird though, if I set myself a personal goal outside of work, yeah, it doesn't have that same connotation, even if I start making some of the same mistakes, if it's a personal goal, it's something that I want to do. So at least I start off with a higher level of commitment, even if that fades over time. So that's cracking.

SPEAKER_01 30:59

I like that. There's one other one other idea that when we talked about what should inspire goals, um, and this is a light bulb moment that I had, I wish I had early in my leadership journey. That there's an option, and arguably I think this should include some sort of behavioural element, right? This is a behavioural. So if you were looking at the way, not just what you want the team to achieve, but the way you want that team to achieve it. I wonder if there's a way, if I've got a blank sheet of paper, I'm thinking, right, well, what do I really love about the way the team operates right now? What do I see that I maybe we need to cut out? And how do I how do I make a goal or an objective incentive to make that to drive that?

SPEAKER_00 31:40

Yeah, and I think that's creating that full picture. It's the what, but the how we need to do it to make sure that we're already lined. Now that's brilliant. Listen, thank you so much. That you've genuinely you've really got my creative juices flowing. I've got some ideas, and I'm I'm actually gonna set myself a personal goal. Might never share it with you again, but I'm gonna set myself a personal goal um by the end of this week and try and do some of that stuff for myself. So, and I might be calling on you to go, I need a bit of help with this, I need a bit of help with that. So, you know, one of those, one of our favourite goal of the rules of leadership is if you want someone to demonstrate a behaviour, go there first. So, you know, encourage yourself, you know, set yourself a goal, try and use some of the great insights that Ben shared with us today and think about all how does that work for you? Um and see where you get to, and we'd love to know how you get on.

SPEAKER_01 32:40

Absolutely, yeah. In the meantime, though, please do keep on getting in touch with your ideas or suggestions for other content and other topics that you'd like us to discuss as the leadership guys. You can reach us through uh LinkedIn, Martin the Compts, Ben Mooney, and you can find us on Instagram at the leadership guys. But for now, I guess that's all from us, right?

SPEAKER_00 33:01

Absolutely. Listen, have a great one, everybody. Thanks very much indeed again for tuning in, and we'll speak to you again soon.