Goal Setting Theory

What goal setting theory is

Goal Setting Theory (نظرية تحديد الأهداف) is a theory of work motivation that looks at the qualities of the goal itself, chiefly how specific and how difficult it is, and asks how those qualities relate to a worker’s effort and level of performance. It is attributed to Edwin Locke and to Gary Latham, who worked with him on it for decades.

Its definition does not establish that raising the difficulty of goals improves performance in any particular organisation, and it does not describe what happens in Saudi organisations.

Where does the theory come from?

We checked the bibliographic data of the works listed in Crossref. That data establishes that the works exist, not what they contain. We give the titles without hyphens, following our writing rule, and the year range in the 1987 title is written out in words.

• Locke (1968). The article “Toward a Theory of Task Motivation and Incentives” in Organizational Behavior and Human Performance, volume 3, issue 2, pages 157 to 189.
• Mento, Steel and Karren (1987). The article “A Meta Analytic Study of the Effects of Goal Setting on Task Performance: 1966 to 1984” in Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, volume 39, issue 1, pages 52 to 83.
• Latham and Locke (1991). The article “Self Regulation through Goal Setting” in the same journal, volume 50, issue 2, pages 212 to 247.
• Locke and Latham (2002). The article “Building a Practically Useful Theory of Goal Setting and Task Motivation: A 35 Year Odyssey” in American Psychologist, volume 57, issue 9, pages 705 to 717.
• Locke and Latham (2006). The article “New Directions in Goal Setting Theory” in Current Directions in Psychological Science, volume 15, issue 5, pages 265 to 268.
• Latham and Locke (2006). The article “Enhancing the Benefits and Overcoming the Pitfalls of Goal Setting” in Organizational Dynamics, volume 35, issue 4, pages 332 to 340.
• Latham and Locke (2007). The article “New Developments in and Directions for Goal Setting Research” in European Psychologist, volume 12, issue 4, pages 290 to 300.
• Ordóñez, Schweitzer, Galinsky and Bazerman (2009). The article “Goals Gone Wild: The Systematic Side Effects of Overprescribing Goal Setting” in Academy of Management Perspectives, volume 23, issue 1, pages 6 to 16.
• Locke and Latham (2019). The article “The Development of Goal Setting Theory: A Half Century Retrospective” in Motivation Science, volume 5, issue 2, pages 93 to 105.

We have not read the text of any of these works, so we take no phrase, figure or finding from them. What we describe of the theory’s content is a summary, in our own words, of what secondary pages we found through searching say, and some of those pages are blogs and consulting sites. The titles of these works are no substitute for their texts, and we infer nothing from them beyond their subject.

Two of the titles point to the downside of goal setting. The 2009 article by Ordóñez and colleagues speaks in its title of side effects of overprescribing goal setting, and the 2006 article by Latham and Locke speaks in its title of pitfalls. This shows that the literature has discussed that downside, but we have not read what was said about it.

What does goal setting theory say?

Secondary summaries state that the central idea is a comparison between kinds of goal. A specific, difficult goal, as they report it, is associated with higher performance than a vague goal such as “do your best”, an easy goal or no goal at all, provided that certain factors are present, which the summaries call moderators. We report this as what the summaries say, not as a finding we have verified.

The summaries divide the account into two parts:

• How a goal works. The summaries list four mechanisms: directing attention to what serves the goal, mobilising effort in proportion to its difficulty, prolonging persistence towards it, and prompting the person who holds it to look for better ways of working. The labels we give these mechanisms are our own choice.
• What moderates the effect of a goal. The summaries usually name feedback, which shows the person where they stand against the goal; commitment to the goal, which they tie to the person’s conviction that it matters and that they are able to reach it; and the complexity of the task. Some add ability or the constraints surrounding the work, so the number and names of the moderators vary from source to source, and we treat none of those lists as a final formulation.

The summaries report that the effect of a goal is weaker and less clear on complex tasks, where discovering the right method is the real test, because effort alone is not enough there to find it. They also report that some sources recommend learning goals instead of performance goals in that case. We report the recommendation and go no further, because we have not seen its original text.

What the summaries describe, then, is a relationship between the qualities of a goal and performance as it was found in studies. That relationship comes from research and is not a recipe, and it is no guarantee of a result in any particular team.

How does a vague goal compare with a specific one in practice?

Take a hypothetical team of 6 customer service employees, each of whom closes 40 tickets a day on average. In the first case the manager says, “Improve your closing.” That is a vague goal, and nobody knows when it has been met. In the second case the manager says, “15% over your current average within two weeks.” That works out at 40 × 1.15 = 46 tickets a day for each employee, and a team total of 6 × 46 = 276 tickets a day, against 6 × 40 = 240 today.

Suppose that after a week of tracking the six results were 41, 44, 47, 39, 45 and 46 tickets. Their total is 262, so the average is 262 ÷ 6 = 43.7 approximately. Two of the six reached the goal, which is 33%, and the average fell short of the goal by 46 minus 43.7, which equals 2.3 tickets. These figures give the manager and the team something concrete to discuss: who is close to the goal, who is far from it, and what stands in the way for each of them.

Now compare a goal raised to 60 tickets, which is 40 × 1.5, when the highest result of the week was 47. The summaries state that commitment to a goal is affected by the person’s conviction that it can be reached, so a reader of the theory would expect commitment to weaken in this case. That expectation needs testing in the same team, and it is not a guaranteed result.

All the figures are hypothetical, set for illustration, and they represent no real team and no study. A rise in the average after a goal is set, if it happened, would not prove that the goal caused it, because the ticket load or the team itself may change over the same period.

How goal setting theory differs from related concepts

• Wording a goal. A framework that requires a goal to have five qualities, being specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time bound, is set out in SMART Goals. That framework is for writing a single goal, whereas the theory asks which qualities of a goal are linked to performance. In our view, the framework’s “achievable” and the theory’s “difficult” need reconciling in each organisation, because the first leans towards safety and the second towards challenge.
• Tying a goal to numerical results. Pairing one qualitative objective with a limited number of numerical results that show it has been reached, set with ambition in mind, is the approach known as Objectives and Key Results (OKR). It is an organisational method for setting goals, whereas the theory is a psychological explanation of how a goal relates to effort.
• Deriving goals from a higher goal. When the goals of departments, teams and individuals flow from a goal at the level above them, the practice goes by the name Goal Cascading. That practice concerns the link between goals, whereas the theory asks about the qualities of a single goal.
• Other theories of motivation. A short item on goal setting theory sits beside the other theories of what drives a worker to make an effort, each in brief, in our glossary entry on Work Motivation. In goal setting theory the goal itself is the starting point, and it is something a manager is able to prepare and adjust.

How does a goal connect to monitoring?

In the summaries, monitoring plays the part of a moderator, since it tells the person who holds a goal where they stand against it. Regular comments given close to the event, as a steady habit, carry the meaning of Continuous Feedback. A short meeting between an employee and their direct manager offers one setting for reviewing a goal, as in the format described under One on One Meeting.

Linking those two practices to the feedback moderator in the theory is our own reading, and we know of no text that attributes the link to Locke and Latham.

How goal setting theory is misread

• Assuming that harder is always better. The summaries tie difficulty to commitment, ability and feedback, not to difficulty alone.
• Confusing it with SMART goals. The SMART framework is a way of writing a goal, whereas the theory is a set of assumptions about how a goal relates to effort.
• Treating it as grounds for imposing goals on employees. Commitment is a moderator the summaries name, and imposing a goal does not guarantee that commitment is present.
• Attributing popular figures to it. In the sources we reviewed, we found no figure that comes from a text we examined, so we cite no percentage of improvement.

What is the role of HR?

Before any goal is fixed, HR can suggest questions for managers to ask. Is the goal specific enough for the employee to know when it has been reached? Does the employee have a way of knowing where they stand against it? Does the employee see the goal as attainable? HR also takes part in training managers to discuss goals with their teams. Decisions on setting the goal itself, and on tying it to appraisal or reward, stay with whoever holds them in management.

What does the evidence allow?

We do not claim that specific, difficult goals raise performance, nor that the theory suits every organisation or every task. We have not read the texts of Locke and Latham, nor the articles recorded in Crossref, and we know of no Saudi study of the theory in Saudi organisations that we would rely on, so we attribute no effect and no figure to any source.

In our view, the theory is better treated as a hypothesis to be tested in the team itself: a specific goal stated openly, regular monitoring, and a review of what changed and why. What is decided after that depends on the task, on the state of the team and on what shows up in its work.

This is an explanation of the concept, not legal advice.