Three Steps to Setting and Reaching Stretch Goals

This week I am at the beautiful and inspiring Sundance Ranch in Utah at Zenger Folkman’s Extraordinary Leadership Summit, learning about innovative new research and approaches for developing extraordinary leadership. At the same time, the London Olympics are inspiring us with powerful examples of extraordinary athleticism and the pursuit of excellence.

Zenger Folkman’s research shows that moving our leadership performance from ordinary to extraordinary doesn’t require the sort of herculean effort needed to reach the Olympic medal podium. It doesn’t take split-second timing or years of intensive training across all aspects of our performance to become an extraordinary leader. We can build exceptional leadership by identifying and leveraging one or two strengths.

While moving leadership performance from good to great is much more attainable than an Olympic medal, it does involve setting stretch goals. A Zenger Folkman whitepaper entitled, “From BHAGs to SMART Goals: What Makes a Stretch Goal“ provides practical tips and techniques in a three step process.

Few of us will ever stretch far enough to put an Olympic medal around our neck. But Zenger Folkman’s research clearly shows that extraordinary leadership is a stretch that’s highly attainable for most of us by using a strength-based leadership development system.

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This week we’re learning much more about Zenger Folkman’s ground breaking new book, How to Be Exceptional: Drive Leadership Success by Magnifying Your Strengths. You can now download and read Chapter 1: Organizations Flourish with Strong Leaders .This special introductory chapter is embedded with brief video clips of Jack Zenger and Joe Folkman explaining key concepts. Click here to access it.