The best client meetings start with the business, not the technology. Goals capture what each client is trying to achieve, and the rest of Strategy Overview links back to them: the Initiatives you recommend, the Plans you build and the Report you present. Most of your recommendations should link to a Goal. It's one of the best ways to keep your clients engaged in the process and to validate what you recommend. Capture a client's Goals before you work through their Assessment or technology.
Adding a Goal
Goals has its own module, under Strategy in the left-hand menu.
Open Goals and click New Goal.
Under Start from a template, pick one of your Goal templates, or Start blank.
Enter the Goal name and pick the Company, then fill in whatever else you know.
Click Add Goal.
Switch between the List and Card views, and use Group by to see Goals by company.
Your admin sets up the templates in Set Up Your Goal and Initiative Templates. To turn a Goal you've written into a template, use Save this goal as a template on the Goal.
Tracking progress
Progress is tracked by default: drag a Goal's progress bar to set it. Setting a Goal to Done fills the bar, and filling the bar marks it Done. Under the bar, the Goal shows how many of its linked Initiatives and Plan items are done, and a whole linked Plan counts as one. Untick Track progress to hide the bar.
Linking Goals to Initiatives and Plans
Linking is how your recommendations connect to the business. Open a Goal, and in its Initiatives or Plan section, click Link to pick what moves it forward. You can link a whole Plan or individual Plan items. Linking a whole Plan replaces any links to that Plan's items.
You can link from the other side too: in the Goals section on an Initiative or a Plan item, or from Goals in a Plan's menu. Linking doesn't change the Goal or the Initiative. It connects them, so you can show the client how each recommendation serves one of their Goals.
Goals on your Report
The Goals Part shows the client's Goals on their Report. While the Report is Open, it shows live Goals, and when you complete the Report, it keeps them as they stood. Every mode opens on cards and can switch to a list. Build mode also lists each Goal's linked Initiatives and Plan items, which Present and Display leave out.
The Goals Part is on every Report template. If it was removed, add it back on the template's Parts tab with Add Part.
Open each meeting with the client's Goals, then show how each recommendation links to one of them. Start With the Goal, Not the Technology covers how to run that conversation.
Good to know
Administrators, Managers, Builders and Editors can add and edit Goals. Read Only users can view them.
Client users with External Client - Editor can view and edit Goals, and External Client - Read Only can view them.
Next: The Assessment