Above And BeyondSet higher goals for your employees--and they'll excel.

Could you double productivity in your business or leapfrog overcompetitors? Think these are just dreams? Not so fast. Stretchgoals can make the impossible happen--"that's the formulafor turning fantasy into fact," says Jeff Blackman, amanagement consultant in Chicago and author ofPeak YourProfits(Career Press). "When President Kennedy saidwe'd have a man on the moon by the end of the 1960s, manypeople laughed. But it happened, and that shows us exactly what astretch goal can accomplish."

Doubling your employees' productivity isn't easy. But isit harder than landing a man on the moon and bringing him backalive? "You'll never know how great your people can be ifyou start off telling yourself to be realistic in setting agoal," says Bill Roche, an executive coach in Silver Spring,Maryland. "My advice: Start off very big when setting astretch goal. Even when the goal isn't achieved, you'vefocused the attention of your people on how great you want tobecome."