Your objectives are related to fixed points in the future, but they are also alive. They are open to assault, delay, and revision.
Once your team’s objectives have been drafted, they need regular and objective analysis and evaluation. However exciting or critical they appeared when you agreed them, things may have changed since then.
Other things may have cropped up that have assumed a higher priority
New information or events have made the original objective redundant
The timeline for delivery might need to be brought forward or pushed backward
New discoveries might require you to add or remove certain elements of the original objective
Without a disciplined and regular review process, you could find yourself blindly pursuing a lost cause, or losing sight of what you were trying to achieve in the first place.
We have a Team Progress tool inside our digital Team Development toolkit called Muster, which invites you to check progress against objectives and take corrective action where necessary, at the appropriate time. It might mean having to give up on a pet project and stop doing something that you have really been enjoying, but you need to take an objective look at what is required now, and what value you will bring by pursuing the objective.
The gambler’s mentality is that having invested (and lost) so much in pursuing a desired outcome, the best thing to do is to carry on in the hope that all that effort, loss and pain will be worth it eventually. The idea of giving up is too much to bear. It means having to accept the losses and forego any chance of overturning them. This approach is as foolish in business as it is for the hapless gambler.
Teams that can pivot quickly and effectively will always be more successful. Being open to tweaking, correcting, reversing, and even putting the brakes on allows a team to keep relevant and productive.