As leaders, we must challenge and connect with our people to inspire greatness. Challenge means pushing them beyond their limits. Connection means building an emotional bond. The best leaders balance both. They see employees' potential and find ways to develop it. They don't just accept people as they are. Specifically, great leaders: connect personally, set clear expectations, meet employees where they are, communicate positively, and give opportunities to shine. They make work meaningful. They get the best from people by caring for them as individuals. Exceptional leaders produce extraordinary results by fully tapping their team's potential. They take average people and motivate them to achieve insane results - without driving them crazy.
SMART goals are often touted as the gold standard for motivating employees and driving performance. However, while specificity, measurability, achievability, realism, and timeliness are admirable traits, SMART goals frequently fall short when it comes to inspiring people to give their all. To elicit truly extraordinary effort, leaders must set HARD goals instead. HARD goals get their name from the qualities that set them apart: they are Heartfelt, Animated, Required, and Difficult. When you examine any major accomplishment, you'll find people pushed to do what others thought impossible. Great leaders understand this, and they challenge their teams to realize their full potential by assigning HARD goals. As author Mark Murphy explains, "People who are 100% Leaders achieve greatness by pushing past the comfort zone and inspiring their followers to do the same." The conventional SMART goal framework emerged as a way to bring discipline and rigor to organizational objectives. SMART goals are lauded for being Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Timely. However, as Murphy notes, "The problem is SMART goals can be pretty dumb in practice. They don’t inspire people to make bold breakthroughs or to achieve quantum leaps in performance." SMART goals often lead to incremental progress at best, whereas HARD goals demand breakthroughs. So what are the key traits of HARD goals? First, HARD goals are Heartfelt. They connect to a larger purpose beyond profits. Google's famous corporate philosophy - "to provide the best user experience possible" - is one example. Heartfelt goals aim to serve people and create value. Leaders can make goals more heartfelt by considering who will benefit and framing objectives accordingly. Second, HARD goals are Animated. They paint a vivid picture of success and make people believe the goal is vital and interesting. Animated goals use clear metrics and concrete descriptions of desired outcomes. For instance, instead of "improve customer satisfaction," an animated goal might state "decrease customer complaints by 50% by Q4." Third, HARD goals are Required. They are not "nice to haves" but absolute necessities. This imperative element explains why achieving the goal matters. Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous "I have a dream" speech compelled people to action by framing civil rights as a moral imperative. Fourth, HARD goals are Difficult. They push people outside their comfort zones to acquire new skills and do their best work. A properly calibrated stretch goal signals faith in your team's abilities. Difficult goals also make people feel they are tackling something important rather than busywork. In sum, HARD goals inspire extraordinary effort in a way SMART goals cannot. HARD goals force teams to get creative and find solutions. Constraints can even boost performance, as startups often outperform well-resourced incumbents by necessity driving innovation. With the right balance of difficulty and support, HARD goals build character and bring out the best in people. They capture hearts and minds to drive real breakthroughs. Leaders aiming for greatness must set HARD goals to propel their teams forward.
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