Barb Brown, principal and co-owner of Business Strategy Consultant, BrownFlynn, led 25 representatives of the SC2019 Work Groups in a session on setting SMART goals and objectives at Trinity Cathedral on Monday.

Brown summarized the meeting this way:

The intention…is to build upon the existing great work from your groups and refine/edit goals and objectives following the common framework discussed at the Metrics Session. We will then share this with the strategic consultant that will be hired soon so we are all operating (to as great a degree possible) from the same framework and can share with them where work groups stand today and plan to go. The consultant will not be critiquing or editing the work from the groups; what this exercise will do is provide the consultant a running start to formulate a 10 year plan that will be implemented by the workgroups and others.

Brown tasked the groups with "reformulating" their goals and objectives to be more Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-based (SMART), and to have them ready for 2019 strategic plan consultant when they are selected.

“Please have 3-5 goals identified and supporting objectives ready by April 15th,” Brown urged. “Again, these do not have to be perfect and we encourage you to provide any supporting information, caveats, or challenges to the goals and objectives you list. A Word document or e-mail with the goals and associated objectives listed is sufficient and please submit to me at trisha.brown@csnohio.net and Sharmell Brown in the City's Office of Sustainability, sharmell_brown@clevelandwater.com.”

An example of a SMART goal: To reduce carbon emissions. A SMART objective might be: To lower operating costs by 15 percent over the next two years by improving the efficiency of the manufacturing process.

A small group exercise focused on reformulating current goals and objectives of five SC2019 Work Groups with SMART principles. The results might look something like this:

Communications & Branding group
Goal: Communicate progress of the 2019 groups to the public.

Objective (new): Assist with the monthly communications between the groups, and create an actionable timeline

Green Building
Goal (new) : To use the goals of the Green Building group to create green jobs

Objective: Create an inventory of existing green buildings and campaign for city of Cleveland to adopt the International Code Council's 2009 building code (Note: these are the group’s current projects. The objective, Brown commented, should include a specific date).

Local Food
Goal: To accelerate (the current goal reads ‘support’) the development of a sustainable regional food system

Objective (new): Gather a baseline of local food producers and the consumption of local food for September, 2010 (the second SC2019 Summit).

Social Entrepreneurship in the Urban Core
Goal: Develop CLEVA, to allow citizens to make micro-investments in local social ventures in the urban core (current goal)

Objective: Solidify partnerships with funders and community organizations; recruit a board; formulate a business plan; inventory what exists in the market place (feedback for this group included looking to Jumpstart http://www.jumpstartinc.org/ for their resources for start-ups).

Advanced Energy Research and Commercialization
Goal (new): To make Cleveland a nationally recognized center for advanced energy research and commercialization

Objective: Create a showcase for new technology to stimulate the market for advanced energy; educate; create a baseline, an inventory of existing centers

In a free-form discussion of adopting metrics, the following questions were asked:

• Do we need to develop an overarching set of metrics for the SC2019 process that informs what each group is doing?
• Should we agree on three ‘memorable’ SMART goals and objectives, ones that connect with a broad base of Clevelanders (i.e. like the Northwest U.S., which focused on the health of the salmon as an indicator of water quality because it resonates with more people)?
• Can we have a meeting with the strategic plan consultants to understand their approach and assure that the Work Groups goals and objectives are adopted in their plan?
• Emphasize to the Work Groups doing this SMART exercise that they consider how goals and objectives impact the economic development of the city.

To view the 2019 Metrics for Success primer.