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We’ve talked about this topic in other blog posts, but we had a meeting recently with Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust. They have a well developed reuse system but have adopted Warp It to help with the management. They asked what sort of metrics they could use to quatify a goal using the Warp It system- financial, environmental or social? For us it was a no-brainer. To be blunt: Track the financial savings! That is what your seniors want to see primarily. What was re assuring about the conversation was the fact Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust were setting goals for the project- and the comment stimulated this blog post!
Set your goals at the start of each project for best results
This blog tackles why you should, at the start of each initiative or project, no matter how big or small, have a target or a set of goals to aim for. You always need something to aim for on a personal level. If you add a goal or target to a project, it keeps you on the right path- avoiding distractions. It helps you develop your plan of attack- your project plan or reuse plan or waste plan etc. This advice applies to any project but as usual we talk about how to start a reuse programme, waste stategy, procurement strategy and circular economy.
Know your next step
The goals are broken down into milestones, and the milestones are broken down into tasks, and the tasks are broken down into sub-tasks- to give you a project plan. You can see here and here guides on how to break down projects into milestones and developing goals. Use this method and not only will you know exactly what you’re doing, but your project will feel significantly more manageable.
Tell people about your crazy goal!
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You’ve got to tell people about these goals, and the benefits they hold. Tell people across the estate what your goals are and make them very public. Tell everyone you know, because once these goals are out in the open, people will hold you accountable. It’s much like quitting smoking - once you tell people, it’s harder to go back. Subconsciously you’re going to push so much harder because everybody’s watching you and knows exactly what you’ve said. Get your communications team involved. People will help and motivate you When you announce your goal, whether it be by newsletter, internal messaging, social media or email, people are going to think “Woah, that’s so ambitious, and a little crazy, but we’ve got to help and support them!”. It helps to pull other people on board at the start of a project, and then when you’re halfway through, and you need another push, you reach out to them, and they’ll see how far you’ve come, and want to contribute to you going the whole way. Further down the line, when you achieve your goal, you can send out a communication saying “Thank you so much for all your help, we reached our goal in our waste plan X months ahead of schedule. We want to keep going, and we’ve been set a new target by the CEO, so if we do X and X, they will do X in return.” You can use ideas like this to spike your communications, give them a call to action, motivate people and develop the team ethic further. Get your communication template here. What could you use for your goal? It doesnt matter what it is really....as long as it is measurable and with a deadline. We spoke to Sion Griffiths from HMRC, and when we asked what his goals were for the project, we were interested by the fact they weren’t financially motivated. They revolved around staff usability and how many were engaging with the reuse programme. So their reuse programme set goals of X amount of users not only on the system, but actually using it. (Which they can find out easily on Warp It) By seeing how many people used this system, they could make certain assessments about their communications, technology and user usability. Perhaps you should think about setting procurement, carbon, financial, or waste diversion goals. Maybe you can set goals based on customer satisfaction, customer complaints, customer retention or customer interaction! It’s going to be better if your goals are quantitative and with a deadline. Remember The goal informs your targets, the targets inform your milestones, your milestones inform your tasks and subtasks and the minute little jobs that when you add them all together will be the cement that holds everything in place when you achieve your goal. You can download our simple guide to setting goals below- click the quote below!
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