This blog was originally published in July 2022 and has been rewritten to reflect the latest enhancements to Goals in Dynamics 365, ensuring the most up-to-date insights and best practices.
Setting and monitoring goals are fundamental practices for organizations aiming to align their teams with strategic objectives and drive performance. In Microsoft Dynamics 365, the Goals feature enables businesses to define, track, and analyze various targets across sales, service, marketing, and other domains. This functionality ensures that individuals and teams remain focused and accountable, facilitating data-driven decision-making and continuous improvement.
What Are Dynamics 365 Goals?
Goals in Dynamics 365 allow organizations to establish measurable targets based on specific key performance indicators (KPIs). These goals can be customized based on various factors, including timeframes, departments, and individual performance. They enable businesses to track progress effectively, identify areas for improvement, and ensure alignment with overarching business objectives.
Real-Life Example:
🔹 A retail company sets a goal in Dynamics 365 to increase online sales by 15% in Q2. The system tracks e-commerce transactions and compares them against the target, allowing the sales team to make adjustments to their digital marketing strategy in real-time.
Why Organizations Should Use Goals
Organizations that leverage goal-setting in Dynamics 365 can experience significant benefits, including:
- Increased Focus and Alignment – Ensures that all employees and teams work towards the same strategic objectives, improving business cohesion.
- Enhanced Performance Tracking – Provides real-time insights into progress, enabling organizations to make informed decisions quickly.
- Data-Driven Decision Making – The ability to measure and analyze performance against predefined goals allows businesses to optimize their strategies.
- Motivation and Accountability – Employees and teams have clear expectations, driving higher engagement and productivity.
- Improved Forecasting – By analyzing historical data and current trends, organizations can make accurate predictions and set more realistic future goals.
Real-Life Example:
🔹 A customer service team uses Dynamics 365 to track their goal of resolving 80% of support tickets within 24 hours. If they notice delays, the system flags issues, allowing managers to adjust staffing or automate responses.
Key Components of Goals in Dynamics 365
There are three primary components of a goal in Dynamics 365:
- Goal Metric – Defines what will be measured, such as revenue, number of leads, or customer interactions.
- Rollup Query – Specifies which records will be included in the goal calculation, ensuring accurate tracking.
- Goal – The actual target set, encompassing the goal metric, rollup query, and defined timeframe.
Real-Life Example:
🔹 A B2B SaaS company wants to track how many new software licenses they sell each quarter. They create a Goal Metric for ‘Total New Licenses Sold,’ set up a Rollup Query to track the deals closed in their CRM, and establish a quarterly goal of 500 licenses.
Parent Goals and Child Goals in Dynamics 365
In Dynamics 365, goals can be structured hierarchically using Parent Goals and Child Goals to ensure alignment between different levels of an organization.
What Are Parent and Child Goals?
- Parent Goals represent high-level objectives, such as total revenue for an entire company or customer satisfaction rates across all departments.
- Child Goals are sub-goals that contribute to the overall achievement of the parent goal. These may be assigned to specific teams, departments, or individuals.
Benefits of Using Parent and Child Goals
- Improved Goal Structuring – Breaks down complex business objectives into manageable components.
- Greater Visibility – Ensures leadership can monitor performance at different levels of the organization.
- Better Accountability – Assigns responsibility at various tiers, helping teams stay focused on their specific contributions.
- Automated Rollups – Child goal progress automatically rolls up into the parent goal, providing a consolidated view of organizational performance.
Real-Life Example:
🔹 A national insurance company sets a Parent Goal of achieving $100 million in annual revenue. Each regional office has its own Child Goal contributing to that total, such as: “Texas Office: $25M,” “California Office: $35M,” and “Florida Office: $40M.” The system automatically aggregates these child goals into the total national revenue goal.
Some Common Scenarios Where Businesses Might Use Goals
Organizations can leverage Dynamics 365 Goals in multiple ways, such as:
- Sales Targets – Setting revenue goals for sales teams to achieve within a given period.
- Customer Service Performance – Tracking case resolution times and customer satisfaction scores.
- Marketing Campaign Success – Measuring the number of leads generated from marketing efforts.
- Project Management – Monitoring the completion of project milestones and deliverables.
- Employee Performance – Establishing individual or team performance benchmarks.
Real-Life Example:
🔹 A digital marketing agency sets a quarterly goal to generate 5,000 new website visitors. They track it in Dynamics 365, breaking it into monthly targets, and adjust strategies as needed.
Recent Enhancements in Dynamics 365 That Support Goal Management
Microsoft continues to evolve Dynamics 365, introducing features that enhance goal management:
- AI-Powered Insights – Predictive analytics and actionable recommendations enable proactive goal optimization.
- Enhanced Microsoft Teams Integration – Users can access and share goal-related data directly within Microsoft Teams, streamlining collaboration.
- Automated Workflows – Advanced automation triggers actions based on goal progress, reducing manual interventions.
Real-Life Example:
🔹 A financial services firm integrates Dynamics 365 with Microsoft Teams, allowing sales managers to receive AI-powered goal progress alerts directly in Teams, ensuring real-time collaboration.
How to Implement Goals in Dynamics 365
To effectively implement and manage goals in Dynamics 365, follow these steps:
- Define Clear Objectives – Set specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART) goals that align with business strategies.
- Configure Goal Metrics and Rollup Queries – Ensure that goal metrics and rollup queries are correctly set up to capture the right data.
- Monitor Progress Regularly – Use dashboards and reports in Dynamics 365 to track goal performance and make adjustments as needed.
Real-Life Example:
🔹 An IT services company uses Dynamics 365 to track their help desk resolution time goal. The system flags unresolved tickets exceeding 24 hours, triggering an automated escalation workflow to managers.
In Conclusion
So now that you’ve seen the impact that Dynamics 365 goals can have on your business, what is stopping you from getting started? To see how quick and easy it is to set goals up in your organization, visit How to Configure Goals in Dynamics 365.
How enCloud9 Can Help You Optimize Goals in Dynamics 365
At enCloud9, we specialize in helping businesses maximize the potential of Microsoft Dynamics 365 by implementing and optimizing goal-tracking strategies. Whether you’re looking to improve sales performance, customer service efficiency, or marketing success, our team of experts ensures that your organization sets up and manages goals effectively.
Why Choose enCloud9?
✅ Customized Solutions – We tailor Dynamics 365 configurations to align with your unique business needs, ensuring that goal tracking is efficient and relevant to your objectives.
✅ Expert Implementation – Our team has extensive experience in setting up Goal Metrics, Rollup Queries, Parent and Child Goals, and automated tracking workflows to keep your organization on target.
✅ Training & Support – We provide hands-on training and ongoing support to ensure your team understands how to monitor progress, analyze results, and adjust goals for optimal performance.
✅ AI & Automation Integration – enCloud9 helps businesses leverage AI-driven insights, automated workflows, and Microsoft Teams integration to streamline goal management and enhance collaboration.
Let’s Optimize Your Goal-Tracking Strategy!
If you’re ready to take goal management in Dynamics 365 to the next level, enCloud9 is here to help. Contact us today to learn how we can implement, customize, and optimize your Dynamics 365 Goals for maximum efficiency and success.
Visit us at enCloud9.com to get started!
Beyond that, Goals is just one of the many overlooked features in Dynamics 365 that can enhance your sales strategy. To dive deeper, explore our full six-part series on forgotten features, including Sales Quoting, Kanban Boards, Territory Management, and Duplicate Detection, Dynamics 365 App for Outook.
