Five questions to measure outcomes

I co-created a workshop with the wonderful Emily Webber called Five Questions to Measure Outcomes. It’s a tool for teams and leaders wanting to describe and measure outcomes.

5 years ago I was running a workshop and struggling to get the participants to describe the desired impact of their work. Everything we wrote on our post-its came out as a solution (a feature or a thing delivered) and try as we might, we couldn’t get past this.

Emily popped some questions on the wall to help shift our brains into outcome-oriented thinking. They really worked, and I’ve been using them ever since. We’ve put them into a template and created a little workflow to help teams find the keywords and phrases that describe the impact and value of their products, services, projects and programmes.

It’s a simple exercise which you could use to set or recalibrate direction.  You could use it as part of your kick-off or part of your strategic planning rhythms.  Give it a go.

Outcomes, goals and objectives

In my experience, the best leaders are crystal clear about outcomes and focus their energies on achieving them. They’ll communicate goals and objectives to steer and inspire their teams but they don’t sweat the deliverables.

This is how I think about them:

A goal describes the broad direction to achieve an outcome

e.g. “Cater for a memorable birthday party”

An outcome succinctly describes the desired change or impact.

e.g. “Happy memories; full stomachs”

An objective makes goals specific, measurable and time-bound

e.g. “Sandwiches for 20 party people that everyone can enjoy”

A deliverable is a defined output that (may) achieve an objective or goal

e.g. “Party sandwiches”

Update: I co-created a workshop with the wonderful Emily Webber called Five Questions to Measure Success. It’s a tool for teams and leaders wanting to describe and measure outcomes.