Goals

Set individual goals for employees, measure them with a clear indicator, follow progress with statuses and comments, and get a company-wide view.

Who can do thisEmployeeManagerManager creatorScoped adminAdminSuper admin

The Goals module lets your company give each employee clear, measurable individual goals, follow their progress over the year and keep a written trail of every update. A goal always belongs to one person (the assignee), has a deadline, and is measured by an indicator (true/false, number, percentage or multi-choice). Managers follow their team's goals, admins get a company-wide dashboard, and goals can be created straight from a finished skills review.

Note: Goals is a licensed module. If you don't see Goals in the sidebar, your company may not have the module enabled; ask your admin (see Modules and licences).

Goals or OKR?

OpenAleph has two separate modules for objectives. They don't share data.

	Goals	OKR
What it is	Individual goals, one per person	Company or team Objectives broken down into measurable Key Results
Structure	Flat: one goal = one assignee + one indicator	Hierarchical: OKR plan › Objective › Key Result › child Key Result
Typical use	Yearly objectives, development goals, action plans after a review	Quarterly or yearly company strategy shared by several people
Progress	The assignee's indicator value, plus a customisable workflow status	Calculated automatically and rolled up from Key Results to the plan
Statuses	Company-defined statuses (for example Not started, In progress, Completed)	Fixed: Current, Upcoming, Finished, Archived

See OKR for the other module.

Key concepts

Term	Meaning
Goal	A measurable objective assigned to one employee, with a title, an optional description and a deadline.
Assignee	The employee the goal is for. Each goal has exactly one assignee. When you create a goal for several people, OpenAleph creates one separate goal per person.
Responsible	The person accountable for following the goal. By default it's the assignee's direct manager (or the creator if the assignee has no manager). It can be changed.
Creator	The person who created the goal.
Indicator	How the goal is measured: True/False, Number, Percent or Multi-choice. It holds a starting value, a goal (target) value and the current value.
Completion	The progress tag computed from the indicator (for example "40 / 100", "60% / 100%", or the option picked). It turns green when the goal value is reached.
Status	A workflow label chosen from the list your admins define (by default Not started, In progress, Completed). It is independent from the indicator.
Template	A reusable goal definition (title, description, deadline, indicator) that pre-fills new goals.
Related items	Links between a goal and the skills review cycles it came from.
Last events	The activity log of a goal: every value update, change and comment.

Who can do what

Action	Employee	Manager	Manager creator	Scoped admin	Admin / Super admin
See and update their own goals (value, status, comments)	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Edit or delete their own goals	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
See Team Goals (goals of their reports)	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Update the goals of direct reports	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Create goals	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
Create and manage Templates	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
Open the Dashboard	No	No	No	Yes (their population)	Yes (whole company)
Permanently delete a goal	No	No	No	Yes	Yes
Create, rename, reorder and delete Statuses	No	No	No	View only	Yes

Permissions: a goal can be viewed by its assignee, the assignee's managers (direct and indirect), its creator, and admins (scoped admins only for employees in their population). It can be updated by its assignee, the assignee's direct manager and admins. Access levels are explained in Roles and access levels; scoped admins in Scoped admins and perimeters.

Where to find it

In the sidebar, open Goals. Depending on your role you will see:

My Goals: your own goals.
Team Goals: the goals of the people who report to you (managers and above).
Dashboard: every goal of the company, as a table or a Kanban board (scoped admins and admins).
Templates: the company's goal templates (manager creators and above).
Statuses: the list of goal statuses (admins).

Your own goals also appear on the home page ("Key Results & goals" section), managers get a Team goals section on the home page, and each employee profile has a Goals section (see Your profile and member profiles).

Typical workflow

An admin checks the goal statuses in Goals › Statuses (three default statuses exist: Not started, In progress, Completed).
A manager creator or an admin prepares templates in Goals › Templates for recurring goals.
A manager creator creates goals for their team in Goals › Team Goals (or from a finished skills review), picking a template or starting from scratch. Each assignee gets a notification and an email.
During the year, the employee (or their manager) opens the goal, clicks Update current value, adds a comment, and moves the status forward.
The manager follows everything from Team Goals; admins use the Dashboard and its Kanban board.
When the goal value is reached, the goal shows as achieved and the assignee is notified (if someone else recorded it).

Notifications and emails

See also Notifications and emails for how notifications work across OpenAleph.

Event	Who is notified	Channel
A goal is created for you by someone else	The assignee	In-app notification, mobile push and email ("You've been assigned a new goal") with a View goal link
Someone else updates your goal and it reaches its goal value	The assignee	In-app notification, mobile push and email ("Goal achieved")
Someone else deletes your goal	The assignee	Email

Nothing is sent when you act on your own goal (for example if you create a goal for yourself or record your own achievement).

Mobile app

See Mobile app to install and sign in.

The OpenAleph mobile app has a Goals app with My Goals and Team Goals tabs (filters by year, and for team goals by team scope and status). From a goal you can see its details, Update current value, read the last events and add comments. Creating goals, templates, the dashboard and statuses are available on the web app only.

Pages in this section

My goals: find and read your goals, filter by year, restore deleted goals.
Create a goal: the three-step creation wizard, indicator types, assignees and responsible.
Update progress and follow a goal: update the current value, change the status, comment, edit, reassign, link and delete.
Team goals: follow and manage your team's goals as a manager.
Goal templates: create reusable goal templates.
Goals dashboard: company-wide KPIs, table and Kanban board.
Goal statuses: customise the statuses used by every goal.
Goals and skills reviews: create goals from a review and link goals to review cycles.

My goalsFind your goals in Goals › My Goals, read their progress and deadline, switch year, open a goal and restore deleted goals.Create a goalCreate a goal from scratch or from a template, choose the assignees, the responsible, the deadline and how the goal is measured.Update progress and follow a goalOpen a goal, update its current value, change its status, comment, read the history, edit it, change the responsible, link items, delete or restore it.Team goalsAs a manager, follow the goals of your direct or extended team in Goals › Team Goals, filter them, open, edit and create goals for team members.Goal templatesCreate, edit, delete and restore goal templates in Goals › Templates, then use them to pre-fill new goals.Goals dashboardGet a company-wide view of all goals in Goals › Dashboard with KPIs, filters, a table view and a Kanban board by status.Goal statusesCreate, rename, recolour, reorder and delete the statuses used by every goal of your company in Goals › Statuses.Goals and skills reviewsTurn a submitted skills review into a goal, link goals to review cycles with related items, and see previous goals during a review.

Still stuck?

Our team answers every question. Tell us what you are trying to do and we'll walk you through it. Contact support