Did we pick the right goal?

Ask a project leader you know and they will tell you there are countless ways to set goals poorly.
We may define the goal in a way that is too vague or too specific. Or the goal can be well defined but lack a framework to assess its completion.

But it is also easy to pick the wrong goals to pursue in the first place, especially when project targets are selected by a heterogeneous group of individuals with conflicting incentives or agendas.

In an organization, each department often has a clear idea of what performance looks like. Leaders know what their teams must deliver, what work they must produce, and with what resources and budget.

However, when a transverse project is decided and when it lacks clear, single ownership, conflicting priorities are revealed. This naturally often leads to compromised, soft decisions and directions.

The main objective of the project becomes a list of top priorities; but priority is a word that should seldom be pluralized.

The remedy is to agree on a single main and immutable goal for the project. A goal that transcends departments thanks to its proximity to the organization's core strategy.

Of course, finding such a goal that dominates, unites and hopefully sorts out department-level priorities can be challenging within an organization that hasn't formulated or expressed clearly its north star metrics.

In such case, there's no other choice but take a step back or two to address this question first and try to reach alignment and consensus between the leaders on what the organization's top priority is.

For it is from the organization's top priority that a project's top priority should stem. Not from operational goals.