Goal IgnitePart of the Management Ignition suite
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Intelligent goal-setting

Set goals people commit to, not just tolerate.

Describe what you want to achieve and who it's for. Goal Ignite sharpens the goal, reads how big a stretch it is, and gives you what you need for the conversation.

Built on 30 years of leadership research Three free uses, no card Ready in under two minutes

Talk or type. Say the goal the way it's in your head, out loud or on the keyboard, half-formed and messy. The tool does the tidying. That is what the sharpening check is for.

Most goals are set in January and forgotten by March. They get written the night before the appraisal, accepted because pushing back is harder than nodding, and abandoned the first time they meet real friction.

A goal accepted without commitment is an instruction wearing a goal's clothes. The difference between the two never shows in the meeting. It shows three months later, when the work gets hard. Goal Ignite is built to get you commitment, not compliance, and to do it on a real goal in the time you have before the conversation.

30minutes to shape one goal, done properly

Managers don't skip goal-setting because they don't value it. They skip it because it takes time.

Done well, a single goal takes about half an hour to shape: the wording, the success criteria, the support, the review points. So most managers do it in five minutes, or hand it down, or leave it to the night before the appraisal.

Goal Ignite shapes it with you in a couple of minutes, and the goal comes out better than the rushed version it replaces. Across a team of eight, every quarter, that is most of a working day handed back, before you have given a single piece of feedback.

Run across the whole suite, on a team of eight, the saving comes to two and a half to three working days a quarter. Tested in a workshop with 27 managers from 11 businesses across the UK, Europe and the US.

How it works

One real goal, start to finish.

Here is every step, on a goal a manager actually needs to set. Nothing staged.

The goal Jim asks Sarah Chen to lead a strategy review with a major client, ACME Plc, on 1st September. A real stretch for her.
1
Describe the goal

Tell it what you're aiming for, and who for.

You type or speak the goal in your own words, the way you'd say it out loud. The person's name, what you want to achieve, what success looks like, the deadline. No templates to fill, no jargon to learn.

Jim describes the ACME review the way he'd describe it to a colleague: get the client to own the agenda, hear what they want from the next three years, make the case for the relationship growing.

Setting a goal is easy. Setting one somebody genuinely wants to achieve is the whole job.
The Goal Ignite form, showing manager and team member name fields, goal title, goal description and a success-criteria box filled in for the ACME strategy review
Type it or speak it. Say it how you'd say it.
2
The sharpening check

It tells you when the goal isn't sharp enough yet.

Before it generates anything, Goal Ignite reads the goal and asks one question: is this specific enough to commit to? A vague goal produces vague effort, so it stops you there.

It names what's missing: no measurable outcome, no agreed agenda, no clear success criteria. Then it hands back a tighter version. You can take it, edit it, or keep your own wording.

Vague goals produce vague results. The check catches it before the conversation, not after.
An amber panel headed Your goal needs sharpening, explaining the goal lacks measurable outcomes and agenda detail, with a suggested rewrite and buttons to use it or keep the original
Names the fault. Offers a fix. Leaves the choice to you.
3
Profile the person

Pick the goal type. Read skill and confidence.

Choose how the goal is framed. SMART for structured work, Descriptive for a vivid end-state, NLP Outcome when someone needs a vision and a plan together. Then place the person on two dials: how skilled they are at this kind of work, and how confident they feel about it.

Sarah is capable but holds back from committing her ideas to paper. Skill in the middle, confidence lower. Those two readings change everything about how the goal should be pitched and supported.

Skill without confidence is a car with the handbrake on. Your job is to calibrate both.
The goal profile screen showing a stretch-level selector set to High, goal type set to SMART, and skill and confidence both set to Medium for Sarah Chen
Goal type, stretch, skill, confidence. Four readings.
4
The challenge read

It places the goal on the support-and-challenge grid.

From skill, confidence and stretch, Goal Ignite tells you where this goal sits. The Growth Zone is the one you want: a real stretch, with enough support behind it. Too much challenge and no support is the danger zone. Too little of either and nobody moves.

Sarah's goal lands in the Growth Zone. The tool reads it and recommends the cadence that fits: a weekly check-in with an open mid-week line. A stretch goal, held by someone less sure of themselves, needs steady contact. You catch the doubt early, before it takes hold.

A stretch goal needs steady contact. That is active interest, not surveillance.
The Growth Zone assessment card in green, explaining good capability meeting genuine stretch, with a suggested weekly check-in cadence and its rationale below
Growth Zone, with the cadence that fits it.
What you get

Three documents, ready before you walk in.

Every tool in the suite produces two kinds of output: something to share, and something to coach you. Goal Ignite adds a third. A collaborative template you finish together, so the goal is set with the person, not handed down.

For you, private

Coaching notes

How to run the conversation. Never shared.

Sarah has the skill and the confidence to take this on, but it's a real stretch. Set it with her, not for her, so she owns it.

Weekly check-in with an open mid-week line. Enough support to spot a problem early, without standing over the work.

The move, not a defence of the move.

The goal brief

Written to the team member. Ready to send.

Hi Sarah,

I'd like you to lead the strategy review with ACME on 1st September. It's a step up from what you've run before, and I think you're ready for it.

It's a stretch, so we'll work it together. Weekly check-in to keep us honest, and you can reach me any time in between.

— Jim

Finish together

SMART goal

Filled from your inputs. You add the rest.

SpecificLead the ACME Plc strategy review. Secure agenda input from the COO and CSO before the meeting.
MeasurableBuy-in from both on sole-supplier status for three years.
TimedMeeting 1st Sept. Draft agenda three weeks out, dry run one week out.
Note to you: agree with Sarah how you'll confirm buy-in. A verbal commitment in the room, or a follow-up note.

The output uses what you typed.

It fills what you already told it

You typed the COO, the CSO, the deadline and what good looks like. The SMART goal comes back filled in from your words. It leaves a note only where the call is yours to make. You don't get a page of blanks to complete.

It sounds like a person

No "exciting opportunity", no rallying cry. The brief states the task, says what success looks like, and offers real support. Your team can read it without rolling their eyes.

39%
more likely to be achieved

Goals written down and shared with an accountability partner. The brief and the cadence put that in place from the first conversation. Source: Dominican University of California, Dr Gail Matthews.

Set your next goal with it.

Bring a goal you need to set in the next two weeks. Run it through once. See the difference between a goal that's tolerated and one that's owned.

Open Goal Ignite See the full suite

Three free uses. No card required.