SMART goals reduce creativity and innovation

from lmsgoncalves.com/2013/01/14/defining-objectives-is-really-productive/

During my Christmas holidays I read a great book – “Drive”.
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Part of the book talks about goal setting
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How many of you heard that goals must be SMART? Do you actually think it is a good definition for goals? SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-scaled.
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According to the studies discussed in the “Drive”, goals tend to narrow our focus. This does not sound too bad, right?
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in reality this is good only for activities that use the left part of the brain, i.e. for simple tasks that do not require creativity. But, as Daniel warns in his book, for complex and conceptual tasks giving a specific and measurable objective can blinker the wide-ranging thinking that is necessary to come up with an innovative solution.
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Another problem with specific and measurable goals, in my opinion, is that reaching them becomes the only thing that matters.
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On a larger scale, this may cause systematic problems for the organization
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“Give a manager a target and he will do everything to achieve it. Even if he has to destroy the company in the process” by W. Edwards Deming

 

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