Outcomes are claimed to be determined by the routines a person maintains rather than by the targets they set.
The maxim is a corrective to goal-setting culture rather than a refutation of it. Goals direct attention and effort, which is measured; systems determine whether the direction is acted on, which is also measured, under the name implementation intentions. The two are complements, and the aphorism is memorable partly because it opposes them.
In practice
- A team with a target and no weekly practice hits the target in the final fortnight or not at all.
- A person with a daily routine and no goal makes steady progress toward nothing in particular.
- Possible explanations
- The explanation offered is that routines determine what actually happens while targets only state what is wanted. The researched form is implementation intentions, which specify when and where an action will occur.
- In its favour
- Implementation intentions have consistent support, and the practical emphasis on designing a repeatable process rather than restating an outcome is sound.
- Against it
- Goal-setting research finds that specific, difficult goals do improve performance, which the strong form of the maxim denies, so the opposition it draws between systems and goals is false.
- Standing
- Goal-setting research finds that specific, difficult goals do improve performance, which the strong form of the maxim denies. A narrower version, that goals without a process to deliver them fail, which is what implementation intentions address.
- Subject
- Creativity & Work
- Essay
- Protecting the conditions for good work