Bill Canady says goals need two things: a specific deadline, and language simple enough that any employee can recite them word-for-word. Without a date, you can't track progress. Without recitability, it's just a leadership objective, not a real company goal.
Now, it has to be time-bound, not over the next couple of years, a date, a specific date, because a goal without a date can't be a goal behind schedule. And a goal that can't be behind schedule can't be managed. It has to be recitable by anyone in the building, not understood, recited. There's a woman running a machine on second shift who's never met you and probably never will. And the test of your goal is whether she can say it back. If she can't, you don't have a company goal. You have a leadership team goal. And the leadership team is not where the work happens.
