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::Working hypothesis: the ironies implicit in mythological fortune telling is that “fortunes” are goals and not mental states. So Macbeth indeed becomes King, but it isn’t the ''experience'' he had in mind. Might Macbeth have found self-fulfilment without actually being king? A happy grandfather, respected by the royal court? | ::Working hypothesis: the ironies implicit in mythological fortune telling is that “fortunes” are goals and not mental states. So Macbeth indeed becomes King, but it isn’t the ''experience'' he had in mind. Might Macbeth have found self-fulfilment without actually being king? A happy grandfather, respected by the royal court? | ||
*'''They are fixed in a changing world''': Goals commit you to an outcome which might make sense now, but if circumstances unfold in an unexpected ways, might seem suddenly less sensible. But the one thing we know about the future with [[certainty]] is that ''it is not certain''. Circumstances ''do'' unfold in unexpected ways. Pre-ordained goals are a feature of a [[complicated]] world, not a [[complex]] one. Who knew, when they set their goals for 2020, that the world would be gripped by a pandemic for ten months of the year? As we look out to 2021, how long will the pandemic last? Should I set my goal assuming it does, or does not? | *'''They are fixed in a changing world''': Goals commit you to an outcome which might make sense now, but if circumstances unfold in an unexpected ways, might seem suddenly less sensible. But the one thing we know about the future with [[certainty]] is that ''it is not certain''. Circumstances ''do'' unfold in unexpected ways. Pre-ordained goals are a feature of a [[complicated]] world, not a [[complex]] one. Who knew, when they set their goals for 2020, that the world would be gripped by a pandemic for ten months of the year? As we look out to 2021, how long will the pandemic last? Should I set my goal assuming it does, or does not? | ||
*'''They are designed so the Man can read you''': Why should goals be [[SMART]]? It is not for your benefit, but so that the Machines of Loving Grace that watch over us can understand. Your contribution to the betterment of the organisation is ineffable, indescribable and unpredictable. Now, readers: usually, I say things like this with an air of irony: not here. It is true your contribution may not amount to anything much — many of you (probably most) are more trouble than you are worth — but the things that you do which do make a difference are, in the abstract, ''profoundly hard to judge'', especially from the perspective of [[human resources]]. So SMART goals — especially the specific, measurable and actionable part — is not about making life easy for ''you'' but making evaluation easy for ''The Man''. Your performance must be, in James C. | *'''They are designed so the Man can read you''': Why should goals be [[SMART]]? It is not for your benefit, but so that the Machines of Loving Grace that watch over us can understand. Your contribution to the betterment of the organisation is ineffable, indescribable and unpredictable. Now, readers: usually, I say things like this with an air of irony: not here. It is true your contribution may not amount to anything much — many of you (probably most) are more trouble than you are worth — but the things that you do which do make a difference are, in the abstract, ''profoundly hard to judge'', especially from the perspective of [[human resources]]. So [[SMART]] goals — especially the specific, measurable and actionable part — is not about making life easy for ''you'' but making evaluation easy for ''The Man''. Your performance must be, in {{author|James C. Scott}}’s clever phrase, “[[legible]]”. Literally, ''[[machine-readable]]''. What The Man cannot see yields you no credit: this is like a dark inversion of Terry’s maxim: [[what the eye don’t see the chef gets away with]]. All that ad hoc mentoring you did; that moment of insight in the heat of the deal that shaved ten percent off the operating costs of the project; those times you patiently covered for an AWOL colleague to make sure the project happened; your immaculate drafting that rendered that complex issue plain for the business — none of that will bear on your appraisal, because ''no-one can see it''. But did you complete your template reviews on time? Yes, counsellor, you did! Why should your target be measurable, other than because the institution bearing down on you needs some way of assessing it in a binary way. | ||