So much of success comes from setting goals for yourself – that’s nothing new. You write your goals down, make them SMART, share them, remind yourself what your goals are and which ones you’ve accomplished… but in navigating that “goal wilderness” there’s an audacious monster of a goal that you should not neglect: your BHAG (bee-hag).
A BHAG is a “Big, Hairy, Audacious Goal”. The concept is pretty simple: pick an objective that is a little (or a lot) extreme, but that you believe you can accomplish (regardless of what others might think). Unlike more traditional SMART goals, a BHAG doesn’t need to come with a plan. Not knowing exactly how you’ll get there is rather the point.
Perhaps the most famous BHAG of all time was when John F. Kennedy challenged our country to the goal of “…landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to Earth.” But, a little closer to the ground (and more recently) was one that I set with The Sales Cyclist in March of last year.
First, a drop of background: Dreamforce is a major industry conference for those who work with the Salesforce.com software platform (as we do). It’s attended by more than 170,000 people from around the world with more than 4 million others watching remotely. The speakers range from Fortune 100 business leaders to industry experts – but all of them are recognized as having something significant to say to the Dreamforce audience. I said to Ben:

“We’re going to go this year, and we’re going to present on stage.”

As I uttered those words, I realized that I had no idea how it was going to happen. What I did know is that I wanted to create something great for our Sales Team and being recognized by Salesforce would be a significant measure of that success.
For months The Sales Cyclist, the Sales Team, and I focused on the more tangible goals. We worked on software tools and integrations, building a more efficient process for serving our customers and finding insights in our data that led to a greater understanding of how we can continue to improve.
Our BHAG was always in sight, but never a primary focus – and that’s what’s crucial here. A BHAG will almost always be too big to take in one bite. A well-made BHAG should be the culmination of the principles and strategies you really want to encourage. That way, as you work on the shorter-term SMART goals and objectives, you can always be building towards something grander.
Then, as opportunities become available and as breakthroughs occur, you’ll know which paths are the right ones to take. For us, it started with Salesforce noticing the work we’d done to customize our platform. They invited us to participate in a contest alongside 300 other companies, including 7/11, TD Bank and hundreds of other household names. Because one of the rewards was the chance to present on stage, it naturally fit into the BHAG we had set.
The contest wasn’t simple; it required us to have an idea for an app, get it approved by Salesforce, build a prototype, and present for evaluation. Everyone had a chance to participate in the process and in the end, our entry (named “Sales Hero”) was selected as a winner. Not only were we invited to Dreamforce for the standard winner’s presentation, but we were asked to conduct a solo presentation as well. The BHAG’s time to shine was nigh.
While the success was sweet (who doesn’t like to win?), what made it all the better is that when we stood on that stage and presented to a room full of developers and members of the Salesforce Ecosystem, we knew that we had accomplished a goal we set for ourselves. Success didn’t just happen to us. We chose the kind of success we wanted and then made it happen.
Now that’s what I call audacious.
 

Goals are great. ET-D2 thinks so. You probably think so. They’re even better with a BHAG – a giant, crazy, guiding goal which you may not yet know how to accomplish but will. Join the conversation below or connect with Jim directly.