Rethinking Goals: From Performance to Regeneration

We are still operating inside an outdated industrial mindset.

Even in purpose-driven sectors like healthcare, most organisations still run on metrics, KPIs, and outputs - and most people are still treated as units of performance.

And the higher you go in leadership, the more rigid these mental models often become.

🧍Hollowness at the Top

In my village, I see a man my age who spent his life leading sales divisions in a global business. Every year: cut 10%, drive numbers up, protect margins.

Now? He’s hollowed out. Physically, emotionally, spiritually exhausted.

The system rewarded performance. But it never asked him to grow. And when it was done with him, it discarded him.

💡 Why do silos persist — even when we know they’re killing collaboration?

Because silos protect power.

They make roles clear, status defined, and performance measurable.

To break them down requires more than structural tweaks - it requires a different working model of human nature.

That’s the real challenge:

Do we believe people come to work to extract value and maximise self-interest?

Or do we believe people come to work to contribute, grow, and improve things for others?

🔥 HR: Operational Function or Catalyst for Regeneration?

HR sits in a powerful place. But too often, HR is stuck in operational mode - recruitment, compliance, policies.

What would it mean for HR to become a catalyst for regenerative practice?

• To challenge leadership assumptions about motivation

• To design goal-setting systems that value essence, contribution, and care

• To build human development into the centre of strategy - not as an add-on

It’s HR that can push the conversation from:

“How do we increase productivity?”

to:

“What’s the purpose of this organisation and what kind of humans is it shaping?”

🌿 What are regenerative goals?

Goals that support:

• Personal growth and energy (the “soil”)

• Organisational contribution (the “tree”)

• Systemic benefit (the “forest”)

Instead of siloed KPIs, regenerative goals invite people to work across boundaries - to see their role as part of something alive and interconnected.

They require trust.

They require leaders to let go of control.

They require HR to stop managing headcount and start cultivating capability.

👣 If you’re in HR or Learning…

Ask yourself:

• Are we reinforcing the same extractive mental models - or challenging them?

• Are we designing for trust, for growth, for agency?

• Are we keeping people in performance loops - or helping them connect to something deeper?

Carol Sanford,

founder of The Regenerative Business Development Community, says:

“Regeneration starts when people are seen as potential, not problems.”

If you’re ready to explore how regenerative goals could shift thinking in your organisation, contact us.

We can help you map out how to challenge business-as-usual - and build a workplace people actually want to grow in.

Mark