As Quality professionals, we love goal setting season. It’s the perfect time to get aspirational and embrace the idea of continuous improvement that fuels GxP organizations.
But that doesn’t mean it’s not also a little daunting. You want quality management goals that are both impactful, yet realistic. Inspirational, yet actionable. How do you strike the right balance to create meaningful QA goals that are actually achievable?
It’s all about thinking SMART.
What are SMART quality management goals?
SMART is a framework for goal setting and it stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. There are a lot of goals you could chase after, but following the SMART framework makes it more likely the goals you set are worthy of pursuing.
How to use the SMART framework to set better quality management goals
The SMART framework is useful no matter what kind of goals you’re setting, but it’s especially helpful for Quality teams. Often, Quality departments are short on resources, operating with small teams and budgets. It’s easy to set goals that are either too broad or too ambitious. The SMART approach keeps your objectives grounded in reality while still pushing your organization toward improvement.
Here’s how the SMART goal framework can shape your quality management goals:
Specific
Ambiguity is the enemy of improvement.
You’d never write an SOP that simply said “keep all equipment maintained.” To be actionable, an SOP has to be clear and specific with its expectations and instructions.
The same is true of your goals.
For example, instead of “make our quality processes more efficient,” narrow in on the factors that influence efficiency, and be specific about what you’ll improve. That could mean focusing on document approval time, total number of errors, the time it takes to find a document, etc.
And the more information you have about your current quality activity performance, the more specific you can be. Maybe you know there’s an approval bottleneck during a specific part of your workflow. All of a sudden, the goal “decrease document approval time” becomes “decrease document approval time between workflow stages 2 and 3 by 30%.”
Take note of the “by 30%” added to the end. That’s an important component of a specific goal. It gives us a clear parameter for success.
Without it, speeding up approval by 2 seconds is technically hitting our “decrease document approval time” goal… but is that a true win?
Not only does specificity prevent your goals from becoming too broad and overwhelming, it makes each objective immediately actionable.
Measurable
“Build a culture of quality” is an admirable mission. But it’s a bad goal.
How do you know when you’ve built it? Does everyone share your consensus? If at the end of the year you find yourself saying “I think we hit our goals,” they probably weren’t SMART.
Don’t let success be up for interpretation. Make your goals measurable.
Start by looking at the quality metrics or KPIs you’re currently tracking (or maybe the ones you want to start tracking). These could be metrics like:
- The speed at which employees can find the documents they need
- How long it takes to complete an audit
- How long it takes for a document to go from draft to final approval
- The number of major and minor audit observations the company received
- How long it takes to address audit findings
- Company-wide training compliance percentages
- The time taken to implement corrective actions
- The recurrence rate of issues
- The percentage of CAPAs deemed effective
(Check out our longer guide on the right quality metrics to track for continuous improvement here.)
Make sure to give your goals a benchmark value in addition to their goal value. For example, “In 2024, our on-time training completion rate was 70%. In 2025, our goal is to hit an 85% on-time training completion rate.” Or even, “We’re starting 2025 with 50 SOPs that need to be updated. By the end of Q2, we aim to have 50% of those revised, with 100% revised by the end of Q4.”
Keep in mind, the key to meeting your measurable quality goals is… actually being able to measure them.
An eQMS that offers in-depth data analysis for your document management, training management, change controls, issues, and audits will make setting and tracking your goals a lot easier.
The more robust the insights function of your QMS software is, the more specific you can get with measurement. For example, in our Insights module, Quality leaders can even drill down to measure the time to final stage by unique issue category. These metrics can help you determine exactly what’s working and what’s not, making the path to hit your goals clearer.
Achievable
Setting quality management goals is a balance between thinking big and thinking realistically. Yes, you want goals that push your team and your organization to improve, but you don’t want them to be so lofty they’re unreachable.
The key? Use benchmark data as a guide for reasonable improvement.
Let’s say your audit on-time completion increased by 5% last year compared to the year before, even without a concentrated focus on this metric. With more intentional procedures and process updates, it might be reasonable to set a 10% increase goal in 2025.
Don’t forget to consider the resources you have at your disposal before setting your team’s goals in stone. Do you have enough team members to carry out the activities necessary to meet your goals? Do you have the right QMS tools to support improvement efforts?
Goal-setting season is a great time to advocate for the resources you need for success. Here are a couple of guides to help you do just that:
- How do you get the Quality Management tools you really need?
- Vanguard Clinical: How the Associate Director of Quality made the financial case for a better QMS software
- eQMS University: Getting Leadership Buy-In for the Quality Tool You Need
Relevant
The first half of the SMART formula explains how to make your goals stronger. But how do you know which quality management goals to set in the first place?
Above all, prioritize goals that are most relevant to your organization and will make the biggest impact.
Start by uncovering the clearest areas for improvement. Examine your problem log and make note of any patterns or consistent issues. Some common problem areas might be:
- A specific action (like a signature) is frequently delayed
- Access controls are incorrect
- Documents take too long to find during an audit
- Users are referencing outdated documents
- Corrective actions take too long to implement
Take a close look at any part of your QMS that has a high risk of human error, as well as practices that haven’t scaled or adapted as your organization has evolved. (If you haven’t already, this is a great time to set the habit of pulse-checking your QMS health).
Goals that address these issues are bound to be relevant and worthy of pursuing.
Time-bound
This one is pretty straightforward: Your goals need a deadline.
Since you’re likely setting your yearly goals, a pretty standard deadline would be… the end of the year. That said, quarterly milestones are great to add to your goal plan.
This allows you to check in on your team’s progress and course-correct before it’s too late. Maybe that means a new process isn’t working as planned, or is less efficient than hoped. Or maybe the quality management software you slotted to invest in next year bumps up in the priority list.
The QMS software that makes goal tracking easier
Good data is critical for good goals.
Whether you’re identifying improvement areas, setting benchmarks, or tracking progress throughout the year, you need a complete view of your quality activity data.
The easiest way to get this data? Choose an eQMS that incorporates in-depth quality data reporting.
At ZenQMS, we’ve done this via the Insights module.
A snapshot of the Insight module, featuring just some of the audit data available for users.
With the Insights module, users get access to data across all of their quality activities, including document management, training management, audits, change controls, and issues. Plus, our dashboard makes reporting on quality management quick and easy with interactive charts.
Through the Insights module, quality leaders can:
- Identify and analyze trend data on compliance, training, risks, and more
- Provide leadership with actionable insight to fuel improvement and growth
- Prove the impact and value of quality management
- Export dashboards to PDF for easy sharing
- Export data from visualizations to CSV and XLSX formats
Want to see the Insights module in action? See the 3-minute demo here. Then, reach out to our team to get an overview of how it can impact your unique GxP-regulated organization.