When you set a goal to achieve something specific, you are much more likely to achieve it. Ambitious goals also turn out to be more motivating than goals that are easy to achieve. That is the reason SWOOP includes a goal setting feature.

Since 2015 we have done extensive research into how organisations, groups, communities and people collaborate on Microsoft Teams, Viva Engage and Workplace and we have published this in our annual benchmarking reports which are freely available in our benchmarking library on our website.

Our Enterprise Social Network performance measures for Viva Engage and Workplace are aligned with the SWOOP maturity model which is based on prior work by Simon Terry and Siemens. In the graphic below you will see how the goals are aligned to the different maturity levels:

Our ongoing investment in benchmarking since 2015 has enabled us to form a comprehensive picture of what ‘good’ looks like, and we now feel confident we have been able to find the important signals that can provide insights into collaborative performance. Using an Olympic team analogy, we can measure resting heart rate, body mass and other important performance metrics for each athlete, for each team, and for all the teams in different sports. We also know what athletes from other countries are achieving. This will help you focus your attention on where it will provide the greatest return.

The goal setting feature in SWOOP is available for all dashboards and nearly all quantitative metrics. The goals are set up as minimum, maximum or a range. For instance, the Response Rate has a minimum goal of 58% replies to posts. Once you reach the 58% you are achieving what the top 20% of organisations achieve.

Enterprise goals

Community goals

The following default goals represent what the top 20% of benchmarked communities have achieved. Community goals are different for small, medium and large communities. Size is based on the number of members:

• Small: 1-50 members
• Medium: 51-499 members
• Large: 500 or more members

Personal goals

These personal goals are derived from the Enterprise and Community/Group goals:

How default goals were arrived at

The default goal is based on what the top 20% highest performing organisations, communities and individuals have achieved. Therefore, SWOOP's default goals are ambitious but realistic, though we'd strongly recommend that you consider if the standard goal is relevant for your particular context. If not, SWOOP provides the ability for you to adjust the goal accordingly.

Adjusting the default goals

When the default goals aren't quite right for you, you can simply change the goals. There are 3 different goal types:

• Minimum goal: For example, you can set a goal of minimum 75% of posts must get a reply.
• Maximum goal: For example, you can set a goal of maximum 10% of messages are replied to in 24+ hours
• Range goal (min plus max goal): For example, you can set a goal range of min 75% and max 85% of posts get a response.

*** When adjusting a goal, please allow up to 24 hours for the changes to be reflected on all users' dashboards. 

Who can change a goal?

Depending on the dashboard and your permissions you can change goals.

Normal user

A normal user can:

• Change the goals on your Personal dashboard
• Change the goals on the Community, Segment, Topic or Thread dashboards

If you adjust the goals for a community, segment, topic of thread then your name will be recorded against this along with the date it was adjusted.

SWOOP Full Admin

In addition to the above, a SWOOP Full admin can:

• Change the goals on the Enterprise dashboard

If you adjust the goals on the Enterprise dashboard thread then your name will be recorded against this along with the date it was adjusted.

Collaboration strategy and goal setting

Goal setting is a strategic planning activity, and it can be a very powerful way of engaging your organisation and/or your team in thinking through what you want to achieve from your collaboration platform. Remember the goals are nothing more than signals that will tell you if you are heading in the right direction, but achieving them is not necessarily success in and of itself. Collaboration is a means to an end, but not the end itself.

We suggest you approach goal setting the following way:

1. Decide what the most important business outcomes are for your organisation.

2. Decide what role the collaboration platform will have delivering these outcomes.

3. Decide what the collaboration goals should be. SWOOP provides default goals based on what the top 20% of organisations achieve, but you need to confirm these are right for your context.

Here are two examples of how a desired business outcome drives the goal setting for collaboration:

Example 1

An organisation had been implementing Lean Six Sigma to drive further efficiencies in the sales process. It discovered the remaining sticking issues were not about process, but about how people executed the process. Head office could not understand why it was so hard for the field-based salespeople to follow the prescribed process. They then introduced an enterprise social network to improve collaboration between field-based salespeople and head office to uncover what was getting in the way.

Several regional groups were created for salespeople to ask questions and share photos etc., as they ran into problems following the process in the field. Since the core aim of the group was for head office people to answer questions from the field, a goal of 90% replies to posts was set, and a minimum 50% of the field-based salespeople had been actively engaged by posting or replying.

After just four weeks, nearly a hundred questions had been asked, every single question had been answered and 67% of the salespeople had actively taken part. The sales process was tweaked as additional training was provided where needed.

Example 2

A recurring issue identified from the annual employee satisfaction survey was employees asking for more direct interaction with the senior leadership team. To augment existing communication channels, the leadership team decided they would use the company’s enterprise social network more deliberately to engage their people in two-way dialogue. A goal was set for the senior leadership to become Catalysts or Engagers, to post updates and reply to questions (proportionally aiming for two replies for every post) as well as posting questions to encourage feedback (Curiosity Index of 10% or above). The senior leadership team members received individual coaching from the corporate communications team, and the leadership team was able to sustain an improved online engagement profile which led to significant uplift on this specific area in the following year’s employee engagement survey.