Main Page | See live article | Alphabetical index In Organizational Development, goals represent desired future states of organizations. Goals and objectives are similar but can be distinguished: Since goals represent the end state, they may be 1 to 3 years out Objectives represent pieces of the goal (or steps toward a goal) and may be accomplished in less than a year For goals to be most effective, all members of an organization must understand the goals and be aligned with the goals. Also see Goal Strategic planning Management This article is from Wikipedia. All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.