Aspirational vs. Committed goals

Four categories of metrics

When setting targets, there are 4 general categories to consider:

• Aspirational

• Committed

• Roofshot

• Moonshot

Regardless of the type of target you choose, labeling them can be useful. Using the tags feature in Tability can help make it clear which goals are which category.

Aspirational

Aspirational goals are goals that it's OK to not hit. There can be multiple reasons why a goal would be considered aspirational-- it's a lower priority or it's a harder to hit target. Aspirational goals are worth setting to give your team some big targets and show that you're reaching high, not just focused on business as usual. But too many aspirational goals can set your team up for failure if there's not a chance they'll be able to see a lot of success.

Committed

Committed goals are the opposite of aspirational-- these are goals that you have decided must be achieved, or must be given the most effort. Theses might be outcomes that have been promised to the board or are critical to your business's continued success. You should have some committed goals, but having too many runs the risk of stretching your team thin and/or not letting them prioritize their work.

Roofshot

Apart from whether your team must hit a goal, you'll also want to choose the difficulty of the targets you're setting. Some targets are going to be attainable, even if they require slightly more effort from the team. These are roofshot goals. Roofshot goals set their sights higher than what is currently happening, but are shooting for a relatively easy target. Roofshot goals are good places to start with OKRs and is likely where a bulk of your goals will be-- teams need targets that they can hit in order to buy into a new process.

Moonshot

Conversely, moonshot goals are highly aspirational by design, or would require a significant amount of additional resources in order to hit. Moonshot goals can be transformational for a business, but will require a majority of your teams' focus to hit. Moonshots should be used sparingly.

Combinations

Generally, goals fall into one of two combinations:

• A committed roofshot (achieveable and must be achieved)

• An aspirational moonshot (Ambitious and OK to miss)

Other combinations come with challengs:

• Committed moonshots will require a ton of focus and will need fewer other goals to ensure teams have time and resources to put towards this goal.

• Aspirational roofshots tend to be space fillers-- goals that can be hit relatively easy, but don't need to be prioritized. Not focusing on those goals tends to get results that are fairly close anyway, so including them in your plans can just add overhead (teams checking in on the goals) without adding much value to the process.