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Strategic goals versus operational objectives

Cup of coffee
I recently received an email from a Strategic Coffee reader asking for help in understanding the difference between strategic goals and operational objectives.

I think it is easy to get so wrapped up in the definitions of words that we lose sight of our real objective: designing and implementing better strategies! However, I think there are a couple of interesting ideas behind this question which are worth exploring.

I think of goals as broad statements of direction, and of objectives as being Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Timebound (that is, SMART). Goals bring a vision alive, whilst objectives translate the goals into actionable units. In an ideal world, I would translate my vision into goals, then break my goals down into more specific SMART objectives, and then design actions and activities to achieve my objectives. That way I can clearly measure progress towards my vision and make adjustments to my activities if I need to.

I think of operational objectives as describing the desired internal state and/or performance of an organisation. Typically, they might relate to the efficiency and/or effectiveness of the business, or some other performance criteria. Strategic objectives, on the other hand relate to progress towards the organisation's goals. They may overlap: for example your strategy may require a certain standard of operational performance. This could lead to goals and objectives which are both strategic and operational. In the Balanced Scorecard framework, the internal business process perspective would typically contain objectives which are both strategic and operational.
photo credit: anieto2k via photopin cc

Can you simply buy talent?

Shortly after Marissa Mayer stepped into the breach at Yahoo, she stoked controversy by cancelling the company's  'work from home' policy. At the time many predicted that this clamp-down would result in a mass exodus of talent to competitors such as Facebook and Google or any of the many startups it shared Silicon Valley with.

Last week, Ken Goldman, Yahoo's chief financial officer declared that Yahoo had won the war for talent (speaking at a Morgan Stanley investor conference in San Francisco).

However, tellingly, they had done so by simply buying talent. Yahoo bought 37 companies, and their staff, since Mayer took over. And although Yahoo received an impressive 340,000 job applications in 2013, career site Glassdoor reported that it had to pay the 3rd highest wages in Silicon Valley in order to do so.

However, it is not clear to me that simply buying talent is a sustainable strategy. Despite its proclaimed victory, Yahoo failed to join the 15 other Silicon Valley firms on Glassdoor's 50 best places to work list. Most of the companies acquired were early stage startups whose engineers might be more interested in moving on to their next projects as soon as their earn-out periods expire. And whilst high salaries might attract large numbers of job applicants research suggests pay is a hygiene factor which is seldom able to overcome more fundamental dissatisfaction with working conditions and culture.

My personal view is that attracting and retaining top talent requires more than deep pockets - it requires visionary leadership and a strategy that people can get behind. As Yahoo's revenues continue to decline, it remains far from clear that Mayer has delivered that yet.