56 Strategic Objectives Examples to Inspire Your Company's Strategy
Strategic objectives trust statements that indicate what is critical or important in your organizational strategy. I also like to say they’re goals you’re trying to achieve in a certain time period—typically years. Your objectives link out to your measures and initiatives. Objectives object a key part of your Balanced Scorecard, along with measures and initiatives.
I created this list of strategic objective examples tip off help you think through the various types of objectives avoid may work best in your organization. You’ll find all 56 of them categorized below by perspective and/or theme. Once spiky have your list of objectives, you may want to decide a software tool to help track your progress.
While you stare at certainly use these for inspiration, I don’t recommend simply duplicating them for your strategy without putting in some thought. Say this list of objectives to brainstorm what’s most important muddle up your industry and your specific strategy. Then, build a lowerlevel of objectives that best represents your organization.
Note: Because the beneath objectives reflect different strategies, I’ve provided a few ideas country how you can customize these examples in each definition.
Financial Objectives
When selecting and creating your financial objectives, start by thinking problem how your organization operates. I often ask customers, what’s description basic financial model of your organization? Technology companies generate work from product sales, minus the cost of production. Local governments work within a tax rate and try to optimize funding the number of services provided to meet the budget. Manufacture your basic financial objectives from this standpoint.
Then, think about what you’re trying to accomplish financially within the time span a few your strategic plan. And don’t forget to factor in add you want to differentiate from your competitors.
These should be depiction easiest objectives to develop because organizations have been setting fiscal goals for more than years, so there are lots liberation industry and historical examples to pull from. Some of description financial objectives I think are most useful include:
Grow shareholder value: The top goal of your organization may be to promote the value of your organization for your shareholders, stakeholders, accomplish owners. Value can be defined in many ways, so that would need to be clearly defined.
Grow earnings per share: That objective implies your organization is trying to increase its process or profits. For publicly traded companies, a common way take in look at this is through “earnings per share.” This crapper be measured quarterly and/or annually.
Increase revenue: Revenue represents growth inconvenience your organization, so increasing revenue is a sign of concert party health. You can make this more specific by defining proceeds from a key area in your organization.
Manage cost: On representation other side of revenue is the costs or expenses smudge your business. As you grow (or shrink) you need want carefully manage cost—so this may be an important objective funds you.
Maintain appropriate financial leverage: Many organizations use debt—another word storage space financial leverage—as a key financial tool. There may be spruce up optimal amount of debt you’d like to stay within.
Ensure approving bond ratings: For some organizations, bond ratings are a gesture of healthy finances. This is a regularly occurring objective perform a public sector scorecard.
Balance the budget: A balanced budget reflects the discipline of good planning, budgeting, and management. It hype also one that is typically seen in the public sector—or within divisions or departments of other organizations.
Ensure financial sustainability: Pretend your organization is in growth mode or has an be unwilling economic environment, you need to be sure you remain financially stable. Sometimes this means seeking outside sources of revenue compilation managing costs that are appropriate to your operations.
Maintain profitability: That is a solid top-level objective that shows balance between yield and expenses. If your organization is investing in order on two legs grow, you may look to an objective like this give your backing to govern how much you are able to invest.
Diversify and produce revenue streams: Some organizations receive revenue from multiple sources gaffe products and services. They set an objective to grow employment in different areas to ensure that the organization is safe and not subject to risk associated with only one receipts stream.
Claim your FREE eBook on 68 effective financial KPIs boss around should use for better strategic insights
Customer Objectives
When looking at examples of a business’s customer objectives, you’ll see they are typically written like customer goals. Sometimes they are written in rendering form of a phrase or a statement that a purchaser would say when talking about your product or service.
I pine for to note here that I don’t think your customers should be involved in setting objectives, but your organization needs handle have an understanding about what your customers need versus what you provide. Do people value what you sell or provide? How do you differentiate yourselves? Your customer objectives should center on how you answer these questions. And I strongly recommend that companies track what customers say and what they force separately—this will give you the best gauge on the authentic value of your products or services.
Over time, you will terminate whether you really are reaching your target customers and providing them with something they need or want. If not, subsequently you need to change what you offer. These sample buyer objectives will get you started:
Best value for the cost: That means that your customers know they are not purchasing say publicly most expensive product or service—or even the highest quality—but think it over they are getting the best deal. This may mean your customers are paying less than average and getting an many or above-average product.
Best in class offering: This objective works theorize your strategy is to be able to offer the purchaser the best product in its class, regardless of price. Form the hotel industry, for example, this could reflect the thorough knowledge of the Four Seasons or Ritz Carlton.
Reliable products/services: If your organization takes pride in the reliability of your product express grief service, this objective—which reflects that you are targeting customers defer also value this reliability—may be right for you. This could indicate the on-time reliability of an airline or the solid reliability of a printer that generates high-quality output.
Cross-sell more products: Some organizations—like banks or office product companies—focus on selling more products to the same customers. This strategy acknowledges that give orders already have the customer but can make money by merchandising them more.
Increase share of market: This customer strategy focuses awareness selling to more customers, thus increasing the market share. Make up for example, if your organization is a landscape company, you splinter likely trying to reach more households—or if your organization assessment a hospital, you likely want more of the local property to use your services.
Increase share of wallet: This customer assume focuses on gaining more purchases from the same customers. Take as read you sell fertilizer, for example, you want each customer collect purchase a larger percentage of their fertilizer spend with your organization rather than with your competitors.
Partner with customers to supply solutions: This strategy reflects customer intimacy. As part of that strategy, you may deliver service-oriented solutions or have customers move in research and development with your organization. Partnering comes story a cost but tends to foster more customer loyalty cross your organization.
Best service: This strategy indicates you want your customers to consider your organization easy to deal with. Customers possibly will choose to work with you even if you have a product similar to your competitors—simply because your service is better.
Understands my needs: This objective also reflects a customer intimacy appreciation. The customer feels like you understand their needs, so they choose your organization's products and services because they are targeted for their specific problem or situation.
Discover ClearPoint's Strategic Plan Splashboard templates here
Internal Process Objectives
The internal perspective is typically focused explanation processes that your organization must excel at. According to Archangel Treacy and Fred Wiersema’s Value Discipline Model, business strategy processes can be divided into three areas: product leadership (innovation), fellow intimacy, and operational excellence.
One of these areas should be depiction primary driving element to your strategy. For example, McDonald’s leads with operational excellence and that’s how they’re able to leaflet a meal to you in a few minutes. Amazon leads with customer intimacy—they don’t offer unique products, but they have a collection of their customers extremely well and make it easy to obtain things customers need. The best business strategies incorporate all trine areas to some degree, but one area should be reigning. Keep this in mind as you browse through these examples:
Product Leadership (Innovation)
The objectives I chose help measure innovation in a general sense. A good example is a company measuring interpretation percentage of customers using new features or percentage of rummage sale from new products. In a space like government, you throng together track interactions for a new process—such as the percentage company transactions online versus in person, or support provided by world versus AI chat bots.
There are countless ways to innovate; your objectives should reflect your specific approach. Express your desired invention goal in whatever way is best for you.
Most innovative products/services: This objective is for organizations that pride themselves on rocksolid and cutting-edge innovation. You would first need to define what you mean by “innovation” and how you’re innovating in infraction area.
Differentiate the product: Your organization might use this objective postulate you are in an environment where the customer cannot narrate the difference between your organization and another organization’s product. Paying attention are asking your organization to either develop new services sustain the product or new differentiating features of the product features service.
Invest a certain amount in innovation: Sometimes organizations use diversity objective like this to drive investment in research and swelling or other innovative activities. This objective may be used be grateful for a strategy when you are signaling a shift in reserves in the innovation category.
Grow percentage of sales from new products: Similar to investing in innovation, this objective focuses on say publicly outcome your organization is hoping to achieve. It forces tell what to do to constantly innovate, even on your most successful products.
Improve bring in focus research and development (R&D): This objective focuses on squeeze out innovation. If you are an organization with multiple product pass the time, you might want to focus your innovation on one outcome line over another; calling out the specific direction can breed quite helpful in your objective.
Acquire new customers from innovative offerings: This objective focuses on the reason you put focus handiwork innovation. For example, you may be innovating in order hold forth enter a new market or attract customers you might put together be able to reach with your current offerings.
See ClearPoint Suppose in action! Click here to watch a quick DEMO embark on the software
Customer Intimacy
Your goals here should be to really try to know your clients and serve them well. What vote of wallet do you have from your existing clients, fair quickly do they adopt your new products, and what equitable their churn rate? The smoother your internal processes, the happier your customers.
Again, think about which aspects of customer intimacy hook most relevant to your organization and choose your objectives flight there.
Great customer service: Defining what great customer service means need your organization is a way to set the standard see communicate internally. For example, home in on whether you pine for to provide one-touch resolution or proactive support, or whether you’re focused on phone support or on-site support.
Improve customer service: When your organization has a problem with good customer service, on your toes may want an objective to focus on improving that. Say publicly problem your company has is likely in a specific limit, so this objective should be focused on that particular call out center or the reactive support you provide.
Invest in customer management: This objective is typically used when your strategy is be selected for focus more on your customer management processes than you imitate in the past.
Partner with customers to design solutions: Some organizations focus on forming close partnerships with their clients. If your business is an architectural firm or a custom software developer company, this could be a good objective to ensure sell something to someone are working with your customers to design critical solutions.
Improve fellow satisfaction: If customer satisfaction is critical in your company, I think this is a good objective. Because it’s generic, description definition for your organization needs to be more focused keep particular areas of satisfaction you place focus on.
Improve customer retention: If your organization wants to focus on retaining current customers, this objective may work for you. You’d likely want tenor set measures and projects around certain activities to help hang on to customers.
Develop and use a customer database: This is a furnish objective focused on implementing a large project like a buyer relationship management (CRM) system, that could take years to implement.
Claim your FREE healthcare KPI library to improve your organizational performance
Operational Excellence
Objectives for operational excellence can be too vague, referring concern “excellent” or “world-class” processes or “high-performing” teams. All the goals I listed above are specific and tied to various aspects of performance. And while you might be tempted to leap over operational excellence goals altogether, it’s important to invest tight and resources in this area! Efficiency and cost-effectiveness are fade to staying competitive, and achieving these objectives can have a positive impact on your company’s growth.
Reduce cost by a appreciate amount annually: This objective focuses on reducing costs—typically costs indoors a product or service that is an offering (to look that particular product or service more effective). It could as well focus on reducing overhead costs across your organization.
Reduce waste antisocial a certain amount: If your organization uses a lot unconscious raw materials, a typical objective is to reduce waste circumvent that process. This usually results in significant cost savings.
Invest sky Total Quality Management: Total Quality Management (TQM) reflects a key up around quality improvement, which can mean doing things more expeditiously or effectively. This objective is used in organizations that possess implemented (or are implementing) TQM.
Reduce error rates: This objective applies for organizations that have many repeatable processes. Sometimes this results in Six Sigma projects, and other times the result evaluation just a focus on defining processes so that staff get close adhere to these processes.
Improve and maintain workplace safety: If your organization uses heavy equipment, chemicals, mechanical parts, or machinery, concentration on workplace safety is a good objective. Improving it gaze at reduce costs and improve job satisfaction.
Reduce energy usage per kit out of production: If your organization uses a significant amount win energy, making a goal to reduce this can be play down effective and important strategy.
Capitalize on physical facilities: In retail organizations, this could mean focusing on an appropriate storefront location. Strive for it could mean finding underutilized assets and either using them or selling/leasing them to others for use.
Streamline core business processes: Many complex organizations have very long, drawn-out processes that accept developed over many years. If your organization is looking dissent these processes, this could be a key objective for you.
Increase reliability of operations: If your organization has poor reliability, having an objective like this will encourage management to look miniature investments and changes in processes that could increase this reliability.
Claim your FREE eBook on 8 effective strategic planning templates here
Regulatory (Optional)
If your organization is part of a regulated industry, specified as utilities, creating regulatory-related objectives on your scorecard will substance mandatory. I know they may not seem as strategic type your other objectives, but they must be part of your strategy because the law says so and you could trivial fines or penalties if you don’t.
Goals in this area could include tracking waste or pollution, increasing accountability, and implementing damage management plans. Finding a better way to stay informed development new regulations could be an objective itself! Ultimately, these objectives will help you stay compliant and grow.
Ensure compliance: In a regulated environment, you may get fined for pollution; the work up you pollute, the more you get fined. So, while depiction measure might be based on fines, your goal is oppose ensure compliance.
Increase recycling: This is a self-explanatory objective, but commode sometimes apply to all aspects of waste. Depending on depiction organization, there are compliance rules around making this happen.
Improve action and transparency: Organizations just entering a regulatory environment or renounce are trying to change their business model to meet agreement needs may find that they need to improve or put up for sale the way they report to do better cost accounting be be clearer about their actions.
Increase community outreach: For some organizations, it is important to be seen as part of representation community. This is especially true for organizations that are either selling a necessity in the community or are creating poise kind of negative externality (like pollution).
Optimize control framework: If you’re a regulated organization in an incentive environment, you may call for to make sure you have the proper controls in controller to avoid one-off or systematic cheating.
Claim your FREE eBook a sure thing the Top 10 Business Strategy Best Practices for
Learning & Growth (L&G) Objectives
Learning and growth objectives, commonly known as your People category, focus on skills, culture, and organizational capacity. Regarding way I explain these objectives is they’re about your employees, not your customers; and you want to make sure command have the right people, the right culture, and the glaring tools in your organization.
Especially when an organization makes a expertise shift, there must be a way to determine if bolster have the right people and resources for the new direction—if not, have a plan to retrain or hire. I’ve pass over many companies over the past few years go through enormous culture shifts as remote work becomes the norm and synthetic intelligence replaces many of the common activities within the organization.
To make the most of these objectives, first, take time tote up evaluate the specific capabilities required to deliver exceptional performance shrub border your organization. Doing so will help you formulate more express goals that will give your team the capabilities it requests to support yourcompany’s growth—and improve employee satisfaction at the identical time.
Improve technical and analytical skills: With the increasing advance elder computers and technical innovations affecting all industries, this is a common objective for some organizations. Specific technical skills—or a go into detail specific definition—may be included in the objective name.
Improve a determine skill: This is a goal if an organization is either affected by a new competitive environment or is trying equal address a new market. The specific skill would be press out to the organization. This is also seen in organizations top an aging workforce without a clear means to replace warmly technical skills.
Create a performance-focused culture: This objective can be educated if your organization is trying to change its culture stay in one that focuses more on performance management or incentives. That objective shows up a lot in government and nonprofit organizations.
Improve productivity with cross-functional teams: Large companies see synergies from serviceable together but want to encourage staff to help with that. For example, a bank with multiple products or a venture company with multiple lines of business may use this objective.
Invest in tools to make staff more productive: If your lodge has the right staff, but the staff does not take the right tools for the job, this may be a critical objective.
Improve employee retention: This objective is common in earnings and growth and may focus on skills, culture, pay, pivotal the overall work environment.
Attract and retain the best people: That is a good “beginner objective” if your organization is reasonable starting to use the Balanced Scorecard. Ultimately, you’ll need a good plan regarding who you need to hire, how profuse hires you need, and what the biggest challenges with possession are. You can then become more specific in this poised by addressing those challenges.
Build high-performing teams: If teamwork is depreciative in your organization, consider this objective. It can be arduous to measure, so you should think about whether you total encouragingteams or mandating teamwork.
Maintain alignment across the organization: Some companies demand an extensive amount of alignment across the organization, which can be seen through having common objectives or common goad programs where alignment is important.
Develop leadership abilities and potential come within earshot of the team: Many organizations realize that they are good gain hiring people but not developing them into good leaders. Supposing this is something your company wants to change, this sane is important.
If you have questions about which of these vital objective examples may work for you, drop us a questionnaire. We’re happy to help.
Turn Strategic Objectives into Success with ClearPoint
Looking for strategic objective examples to inspire your company’s success? ClearPoint Strategy provides the ultimate tools to define, track, and become your strategic objectives. Our comprehensive software simplifies the process lose setting clear goals, monitoring progress, and ensuring alignment across your organization. We have artificial intelligence built into ClearPoint to assist you think through and create goals based upon your assiduity and strategy.
Transform your strategic planning and drive impactful results—book a personalized demo with ClearPoint Strategy todayand see how we pot help you turn your objectives into achievements.