In this video, I want to look at the skill of setting tasks and goals for individuals, because it's an important part of day to day leadership, making sure that people know what you expect of them, and how you expect to behave. And I like to think of this as a three component process. And the first component is context. People need to know the context in which you want them to do the task. Because the more context more background, the more understanding they have of what they're doing and why they're doing it and how it fits into other things, then the better they'll be able to perform because people are intelligent. And by giving them the context or the background, you'll help them answer for themselves some of the questions they may otherwise bring to you.

If they get stuck, but there's another reason why context is important, because we need meaning in our lives. And if we don't understand why we're doing something, then we're never going to be motivated. And I'm sure you've had that experience of your boss asking you and I'm talking here about your poor bosses asking you to do something and you thought, why do you want me to do that? I don't understand. And if your boss doesn't answer that question, I'm not saying you won't do it. You probably would, because it's your job to but you never feel really good about doing it, you'll never feel really motivated and keen to do it.

Whereas if we know why we're doing something and how it fits into a bigger picture, and you know the value of it and the benefit of it and who benefits. Understanding that context not only gives us more information to make better decisions when we run into problems, it's motivating and energizing to the second component is deadlines. tasks have to be done by a specific time. And if I know when you need me to do the task, then I can schedule my work accordingly. If I don't, then I may either do it immediately putting off other more urgent things. Or I may leave it too long, and find that you get frustrated with my poor performance.

Just because I haven't done it doesn't mean I'm gonna do it badly. I just didn't know when to do it. And I haven't done it yet. So be very clear about the deadline. Now my preference when working with trusted team members is to be absolutely honest about when you need it, and trust that they will respect that and deliver it on time. But we all know that sometimes when you're working with certain people, you may choose to set the deadline here, knowing that you needed a week later, to give you some buffer.

Now clearly if you're working with someone who's inexperienced and therefore allowability you do need to build into the deadline, time to review their work, to quality assurance, and to put it right or to supplement it if you need to. But the deadline is the second component of task setting. The third component of task setting, being clear about what excellence looks like. In fact, I like to set to standards. I like to be very clear what done looks like, you produce this. It's done, it's finished.

It's okay. But if you want my maximum support, if you want my maximum level of praise, this is what excellence looks like. This is what's known as an evidence procedure. I will tell people what evidence they have to present to me if they want to get certain levels of my praise and support. Consequently, if I want a base level of praise, thank you, you've done a good job. Well done.

Get to hear, get two done. But if you want my full price, if you want me to congratulate you and think of you as a high caliber, high ability performer, then this is what excellence looks like. You give me that evidence, you get their awards. If you notice, I've given you context, deadline and excellence. We're not described how to do the task. This is the low instruction level for the high instruction level.

For the high instruction level, that's when you also need to set out the individual tasks. These are the steps that you need to follow. So here we have it. context, deadline, excellence, and if necessary, the steps that you need to follow. What else might you need to include? Well, there might be some reporting procedures, some admin, there might be some resources.

But that's basically it. actually very easy, as long as you are clear in specifying what you need, why you need it, and when you need it and if necessary, how to do