Great growth requires great marketing, and great marketing requires clarity on what you are trying to achieve – the main goal at hand. I refer to this goal as a North Star, a clear, bright navigational aid that everyone on the team can see and work towards. This means that a goal and a metric to measure progress towards that goal are both essential. You, your team and your entire organisation need to be aligned on that North Star. It could be as simple as “maximise income” or as high-minded as “connect the world online” (Facebook’s goal when I began there in 2007). If done right, the North Star will be ambitious and clarifying.

The greatest threat to your North Star is your number two goal. This second goal is often a good thing to work on – it might even be better than the North Star. But flipping back and forth between the North Star and your second goal means you are splitting resources, probably competing internally and failing at both. Unfortunately, it can be hard to maintain disciplined leadership to make sure your people and teams use the North Star to question everything they do and that their actions align with...

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