Divide the objectives into two categories: Musts and Wants. The Must objectives are mandatory: they must be achieved to guarantee a successful decision. When the time comes to assess alternatives against our objectives, any alternative that cannot fulfill a MUST objective will immediately drop out of the analysis. These objectives must be measurable because they function as a screen to eliminate failure-prone alternatives. We must be able to say, “This alternative absolutely cannot fulfill this objective; it cannot meet a requirement that is mandatory for success.
All other objectives are categorized as WANTS. The alternatives we generate will be judged on their relative performance against WANT objectives, not on whether or not they fulfill them. The function of these objectives is to give us a comparative picture of alternatives—a sense of how the alternatives perform relative to each other.
A WANT objective may be mandatory but cannot be classified as a MUST for one or two reasons: First, it may not be measurable. It cannot, therefore, give us an absolute Yes or No judgment about the performance of an alternative. Secondly, we may not want a Yes or No judgment. We may prefer to use that objective as a relative measure of performance.
An objective will be stated frequently as a MUST and then be rephrased as a WANT so that it can perform both functions. The MUSTs decide who gets to play, but the WANTs decide who wins.
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21st Century Organizational Transformation 