dug 
I’m storing organisational goals in a database table and have bumped into a model-mixup…
If I want to track progress over the short to mid term, then I could use OKRs where the progress against key results might be measurable on a monthly basis (maybe) with objectives being assessed for completion on a quarterly basis.
If I want to look further ahead, specifically if I want to build a timeline of progress from today through to say, 5 years from now, I could talk about strategic imperatives or outcomes, and at some point I could write down the org’s North Star destination. In a social or public sector project, I could map outputs and intermediate outcomes; long-term outcomes; and impact.
But this seems surprisingly abstract and inflexible (not least as I don’t want to re-create my database every time I have a new customer obviously).
There are loads of popular models we all use to track this stuff (KPIs, balanced scorecard, OKRs, North Star, other Lean methods etc.), but laying them out on a long timeline feels odd. I guess this is partly because a strategic challenge might be a driver in year one, but if there is a context change like new legislation or a merger or a restructure, then that imperative might just disappear even if it hadn’t been formally reached or resolved?
Equally, once you look ahead beyond say two or three years (depending on your customer’s sector of activity) it gets metaphysical fairly quickly.
Leaders may only be in a role for a year or two, environmental factors change more and more quickly and big, structural challenges can be magicked away with a results announcement. Do companies have actual, meaningful, North Star metrics?
Across the whole timeline, it would be good to cascade causality.
It’s good to know that a given activity is going to lead to a given outcome but seen as a whole, this causality can seem artificial or biased (or dogma-led or political) which doesn’t help. I guess a North Star metric is more typically focused on some quantifiable or strategic business growth (like user engagement or customer value), while Theory of Change’s impact encompasses a broader, often more qualitative or systemic change, especially in social or public sector projects (like improved community health or educational outcomes). So I guess that means I shouldn’t use “North Star” and “Impact” interchangeably…
Where does that leave me for my timeline representation and how I store the data?
Conceptually, I like a model of progress based on learning, like a staircase or a ladder. Companies can behave like that in the short term but realistically don’t once you stretch the timeline.
So maybe the more realistic model is like driving, I’m on the road because I need to get somewhere and as well as paying attention to road signs, I need awareness of what’s in front and around me. Maybe it’s time to dig out the old family deck of Mille bornes…
In any case, have you cracked this one? Let me know.