A common goal is what unites the team and brings in efficiency, positive energy, focus and responsibility. It is essential for collaboration, innovation and results. Viorel Panaite, founder of Human Invest, will tell you how you can gather people around the same goal to build together things that last.
Creating a common goal and using it in everyday life is perhaps the first mission of an entrepreneur if they want to take the company from the start-up phase to the next level. After 3 to 5 years, the period in which the growth originates from sales and from the market, in the market-oriented efforts must be supplemented with efforts for the internal consolidation, the increase of the operational efficiency and internal collaboration in order to ensure the company's development, and finding a common goal is critical to making these things happen.
A common goal is what brings the employees together and brings in efficiency, positive energy, focus and responsibility. It is essential for collaboration, innovation and results. Without a common goal, the company will develop slowly or go around in circles, people will find it difficult to overcome conflicts, teams will have a low level of mutual trust. A common goal transforms the vicious circle that often traps entrepreneurs in this phase into a virtuous one.
When you're the manager of the company you built, use your collaborative skills to create a common goal.
The values’ role is to act as benchmarks in the decisions you make, and they help you stay on track. The way you make decisions in critical moments shows you what your values are. Most experts in the field agree that people can operate in practice with 5 - 6 key values. Some of them are individualistic, others collaborative. The individualistic ones show one's concern for oneself, while the collaborative ones show the concern to be useful to others: employees, customers, business partners, etc.
When a common goal is alive in a company’s life, this is a sign that in that company you will most likely find an entrepreneur who prioritizes their collaborative values. Such entrepreneurs have it in them to find the necessary means. But what can an entrepreneur who is less collaborative and still needs to know how to build and work with a common goal do?
1. Know your nature, beliefs and values.
Knowing what defines you is a lifelong quest. However, there are tools that can help you learn things about yourself that you don't know or think about: EverythingDiSC is one of them. The constant experiences you have, the honest conversations with people who tell you truths that are difficult for you to hear, the leadership programs, they all help you define and cultivate your 5-6 key values. This is a step that I recommend wholeheartedly if you want to feel that you are standing on a solid foundation and if you want to have a common goal that is alive and useful to the organization.
2. Once you define the list of your 5 key values, evaluate how many of your values are individualistic and how many are collaborative.
The individualistic category includes values about "power", "image", "victory", "social status", "survival", "money", "popularity", "uniqueness", etc. The collaborative category includes values such as "being useful to others", "cohesion", "solidarity and mutual support", "mutual respect", "friendship", "mentoring", "fairness", "teamwork", "mutual trust", "inclusion", etc. Work with someone to decide the hierarchy of these values, as they define you and influence ALL the decisions you make, and the way you manage your company and your people. They will also directly influence the way you will go through the consolidation stage with your company.
3. In order to build a common goal, connect to the collaborative values you have.
Reconnect with the key people and experiences that trained you in the spirit of collaborative values. What advice and lessons do you think they would give you about the steps you could take to build your company's common goal? What do you think a person you admire for the way they intertwine the interests of those they lead with those of the company would do in your place? What team processes would you follow and what would be the next steps? How could you use your personal qualities in building the common goal? Put all these answers on paper and sketch some steps. Test the plan with your key people, adapt it as you listen, and invite them to take on a mission of that plan.
Using collaborative values accelerates individual maturation. In order to make the transition from the start-up phase to the next level, i.e. the consolidation phase, you need to build a common goal that gives you and the team additional and fresh energy. The absence of a common goal will result in burnout, it will give you the feeling that you are running in circles and that many of your efforts are in vain. Using your collaborative values is key at this stage!
If you want to learn how to make team processes that help you build a common goal work, read more about #5Behaviors .
