Essential skills underpin the ever-changing technical requirements of the workforce, and are in strong demand from both employers and employees. 

92% of workers in the UK recognise the potential impact of essential skills, believing that they are important for success within their career. Despite this, employers consistently report a lack of essential skills as one of their biggest brakes on growth.

The skill of Aiming High enables individuals to rapidly acquire job-specific knowledge and technical skills they’ll need in their roles. It’s the ability to set clear, tangible goals and devise a robust route to achieving them. This skill is about being able to plan effectively – both to achieve organisational goals, and also to set your own personal development targets. The mission at Skills Builder is that ‘one day, everyone will build the essential skills to succeed’. This in itself, is an example of aiming high.  

The world of work is brimming with potential opportunities to develop your employability skills, so how can you aim high to be successful? 

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How Aiming High is built

Getting started

• Initially, this skill is about knowing when something is too difficult and having a sense of what doing well looks like. The focus is then on working with care and attention, taking pride in success, and having a positive approach to new challenges. 

Setting goals 

• Building on this, individuals are able to set goals for themselves informed by an understanding of what is needed, and then order and prioritise tasks, secure resources and involve others effectively. 

Creating plans

• At the higher steps, the focus is on creating plans with clear targets, informed by an individual’s skill set, and then building external views. 

Developing long-term strategies 

• At the most advanced level, individuals develop long-term strategies. These are informed by an assessment of internal and external factors, structured through regular milestones and feedback loops. 

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Different types of effective goals 

An effective goal is something that an individual wants to happen, and that they will work towards achieving. Goals have the ability to ignite motivation and drive within us. An organisation’s success, whether it is large or small, relies on a combination of people and factors working to achieve a shared goal. 

Individuals will set goals in lots of areas of their lives, and there are different types of goals that we might set ourselves: 

• Short-term goals: These are things that we can achieve quite quickly – for example, in a day or a few hours.
   
• Mid-term goals: These are longer goals – perhaps they take a few days, a week or even a month. Mid-term goals take sustained effort to achieve.
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• Long-term goals: These are goals that might take a lot longer to achieve – for example, that might be a promotion in work, achieving a particular qualification or something in our personal lives. These are goals that we need to work at for a longer time period and which it might be hard to see progress on day-to-day. When making long-term plans, it is helpful to consider what we do well, our strengths, and what we find more challenging, our weaknesses.

Setting goals in a stretch zone

Effective goals are those that are in our ‘stretch zone’. These will be goals that are not so easy that you are sure to achieve them, but also not so difficult that they are almost impossible to achieve. Setting goals in your stretch zone gives you the best chance of being successful and learning a lot along the way. For example, a team member who has never taken on a leadership role may set individual goals to manage an entire project independently. 

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How to prioritise and order tasks effectively

Identifying the resources

When we set goals in the workplace, we have to carefully plan which resources we’ll need and how to secure them. Resources are those things that we need to use to complete a task. We may have to share a budget of how much our resources will cost and a plan of how long it will take so that decisions can be made and our goals can be approved. If when we set our goals we realise that we can’t secure the right resources, we might have to make changes and find another way to achieve our goal. If an organisation doesn’t have someone with the right skills or knowledge, they might decide to hire somebody to help or offer training for their staff. Organisations may choose to hire physical resources like a machine, software or extra space to help complete tasks more quickly. All these resources - human, physical, and natural - will require enough money to pay for them.

Lots of things can be described as resources, and we can divide them up into different categories: 

• Human Resources: These are things that humans bring to complete a task. These include: the time and effort of people who can complete tasks, and their knowledge, skills and experience.
   
• Physical Resources: These are tangible things that we might need to be able to complete tasks. These include: machines, technology, buildings or physical spaces.
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• Financial Resources: This is the money that we might need to pay for things we might need to complete the tasks.
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• Natural Resources: These are the materials that we might need to complete the task like water, gas, minerals and lots of other things.
   

We are likely to need a combination of different resources to complete a task. For example, you might need to persuade other people in your team (human resources) to help you out, whilst booking a meeting room or work space (physical resources) to gather ideas. There are several ways to secure the resources that you need. It is also worth remembering that if you can’t obtain particular resources, there might be other ways of achieving your goals without them, or by changing some of the tasks you decide to carry out.

SMART targets

In the workplace, relevant targets can be motivating, provide direction and keep work on track over longer periods of time. SMART targets highlight progress and success, and help to inform decisions in the process to achieving a long-term goal. If targets are SMART, it means that they are: 

• Specific – it is clear exactly what you are trying to do.
• Measurable – you can measure whether the target has been met or not.
• Achievable – it is in your stretch zone – not too hard or too easy.
• Realistic – it is something that makes sense to do. 
• Timed – you know when it needs to be done by. 

Following SMART targets, either at an individual, team or organisational level, also helps to focus on the aspects of work which are a priority. If we are given unclear or irrelevant targets, it is difficult to know what work needs to be done or what is most important. Putting numbers and deadlines on goals is particularly helpful, because it means that we can see exactly what success looks like and also see very clearly whether we have been successful. When SMART targets are achieved, this success can be celebrated and can result in recognition and reward, such as a bonus or promotion.

Knowing if a goal is achieved

When reflecting on progress towards goals, it’s important to consider the success criteria. A goal sets out what you are trying to achieve, while the success criteria is a measure of whether you have achieved it or not; the two should work together. 

Given both the real impact on income and life satisfaction, as well as the perception that essential skills are important across life, it is unsurprising that demand for more opportunities to build essential skills is very high. So, can you really afford not to aim high and build your essential skills? 

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How can I improve my ability to aim high?

The world of work is changing at pace, impacting not only how and where we work but also the skills that individuals and organisations need to thrive. The best place to start building your ability to aim high is Skills Builder Benchmark. 

Benchmark is the world’s leading tool for individuals to assess their levels of essential skills. It is used widely by employers to understand their teams’ skill levels and target professional development, as well as by educators and impact organisations. Completing a self-assessment will give you a picture of your strengths and areas for development. 

Log in to Benchmark now.

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