Goals without diagnosis cannot be evaluated
If nobody stated what problem the goal answers, there is no basis on which to say later that it was the wrong goal — only that it was missed.
Goal Core · Object
Strategic goals
The few goals that decide direction. A strategic goal is not simply a large goal — it is one that answers a diagnosed problem and commits the organisation to some paths at the cost of others.
The term
What it is
Strategic goals set direction. They are the small number of commitments that shape what the organisation becomes, and they are answerable to purpose and vision above them rather than to this year’s operating pressure.
The most useful correction the strategy literature offers here is that a goal is not a strategy. Rumelt’s account of bad strategy is largely an account of goals presented as though they were strategy: a statement of desired performance with no diagnosis of the obstacle and no guiding policy for getting past it. A strategic goal earns the name when it can be traced back to a named problem.
The second correction is Porter’s, and it is uncomfortable in practice: strategy involves choosing what not to do. A set of strategic goals that excludes nothing is a wish list, however carefully it has been worded, because it gives no help at the moment two attractive options compete for the same resource.
This object names a level of decision, not a point in time. How it relates to the horizon objects is set out once, on the core page: Two axes, not four boxes
Why it earns a place
What goes wrong without it
Too many strategic goals is the same as none
Strategic goals are meant to resolve competition for scarce attention. A list long enough to cover everything the organisation is already doing resolves nothing.
They are what tactical goals are judged against
Without them, tactical work can only be assessed on whether it was completed, never on whether it was worth doing.
One level in
The modules within strategic goals
Four working areas. The first is the one most often skipped, and the one the rest depends on.
Strategic themes
The few coherent lines of effort the goals group into, so that separate goals reinforce one another instead of competing for the same people.
LearnTrade-offs
What is deliberately not being pursued, recorded alongside what is. The value of writing it down is that it is available later, when the excluded option returns looking attractive.
LearnHorizon and measures
When the goal is expected to land, and what would count as having landed. One primary measure per goal; a second usually means the first was not trusted.
Learn
Across the framework
What it touches
- Vision CoreStrategic goals should be readable as steps towards the stated vision.
- Market CoreDiagnosis usually begins here — with competitors, audience and opportunity.
- Brand CorePositioning is a strategic choice and belongs among these goals, not after them.
- Data CoreWhere the outcome measures are defined, collected and reported.
Beyond the framework
Models worth knowing here
The Omnigoal says where this belongs and what it touches. It does not tell you how to think about it — other people have done that, and done it well. These are theirs.
Rumelt’s kernel of good strategy
Richard P. Rumelt · 2011Also known as Diagnosis, guiding policy, coherent action
A strategy is a diagnosis, a guiding policy and a set of coherent actions — and anything without all three is a wish list.
The diagnosis names what is actually in the way. The guiding policy is the approach chosen to deal with it. The actions are coordinated steps that follow from it and support each other. The argument is that most documents called strategy contain only ambitions, and that the absence of a diagnosis is what makes them impossible to argue with.
- Reach for it when
- As a test on any strategic goal: can you state the obstacle it answers, and does anything follow from it that rules something else out?
- Where it stops
- It is a standard for what a strategy must contain, not a method for finding one. It can tell you that yours is empty without telling you what to put in it.
Richard P. Rumelt, Good Strategy / Bad Strategy, Crown Business, 2011.
The Ansoff Matrix
H. Igor Ansoff · 1957Also known as Product–market growth matrix
Four directions growth can come from, ordered by how much is unfamiliar in each.
Selling more of what you have to who you already sell to; taking what you have to new markets; building something new for the customers you know; or doing both at once. The order is the argument — each step away from the known multiplies what has to be learned, and diversification is the one that fails most.
- Reach for it when
- When strategic goals need to be laid out side by side and someone has to say plainly how much new ground each one crosses.
- Where it stops
- It sorts directions; it does not size them. Two options in the same box can carry entirely different risk, and the matrix has nothing to say about that.
H. Igor Ansoff, “Strategies for Diversification”, Harvard Business Review, 1957.
Porter’s generic strategies
Michael E. Porter · 1980Also known as Cost leadership, differentiation, focus
There are three ways to win a market, and trying to do more than one at a time is how companies end up winning none.
Compete on cost, compete on being meaningfully different, or serve a narrow segment better than anyone serving everyone. The famous warning is what makes it a strategy tool rather than a menu: a company that pursues cost and differentiation at once, without being clearly best at either, ends up in what Porter called stuck in the middle — carrying the cost of both and the advantage of neither.
- Reach for it when
- When strategic goals commit to being cheaper and better and more specialised, all in the same document.
- Where it stops
- The claim that the three cannot be combined has been argued about for forty years, and several companies have plainly managed it. Read it as a demand to say which one you are betting on, not as a law.
Michael E. Porter, Competitive Strategy, Free Press, 1980.
These are other people’s models, named here so you can go to the source and use them properly. The Omnigoal is not affiliated with their authors and is not endorsed by them; nothing of theirs is reproduced here — no canvas, no diagram, no wording. Each is described in our own words, with the originator credited, because the framework is a place to put thinking, not a replacement for the people who did it. Model names and trademarks belong to their respective owners and are used here only to refer to the work itself.
Every model in the framework, and where each one belongsThe quickest test of a strategic goal: ask what it rules out. If the answer is nothing, what has been written is an aspiration, and it will not help when a decision has to be made.
The other objects in the Goal Core
Purpose
This is the fundamental reason for the organisation’s existence from an internal perspective. It’s the driving force and guiding principle behind the company’s actions and decisions. The Core Purpose is deeply rooted in the company’s values and mission, focusing on why the organisation exists beyond making a profit. It’s about the impact the company wants to have on its employees, stakeholders, and the values it upholds.
LearnShort term goals
Focuses on immediate objectives and quick wins that are crucial for near-term success and momentum.
LearnLong term goals
Encompasses broader, future-oriented objectives that guide the company’s vision and long-term growth strategy.
LearnTactical goals
Targets specific, actionable steps and tactics that support the strategic objectives and operational efficiency.
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