Associating the primary goal or target for work items

  • Release version: Australia
  • Updated March 12, 2026
  • 2 minutes to read
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    Summary of Associating the primary goal or target for work items

    This functionality in ServiceNow allows you to link a primary goal or target to various work and planning items, ensuring alignment between your projects, demands, programs, features, epics, and planning items with strategic objectives. Associating these goals or targets helps track contributions and progress towards organizational goals.

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    Key Features

    • Primary Goal and Target Fields: Available on forms for Project, Demand, Program, Feature, Epic, and Planning item records, enabling you to specify the primary goal or target each item contributes to.
    • Multiple Associations: Besides the primary goal or target, you can associate additional (non-primary) goals or targets via the Goal/Target Relationships related list on the same forms.
    • Role-Based Access: Setting primary goals or targets requires specific roles depending on the work item type (e.g., projectmanager for projects, demandmanager for demands, safeartuser for SAFe features and epics, etc.).
    • Visibility of Relationships: Once associated, these relationships can be reviewed both from the goal or target’s related list and from the related lists on the respective work or planning items.

    Practical Application

    To associate a primary goal or target with a work or planning item:

    • Open the record (e.g., Project, Demand, Feature, Epic).
    • Ensure you have the required role to make changes.
    • Populate the Primary goal and/or Primary target fields on the form with the relevant goal or target.

    This association is supported for the following items with the indicated required plugins and roles:

    • Project: PPM Standard plugin, projectmanager role
    • Demand: PPM Standard plugin, demandmanager role
    • Program: PPM Standard plugin, programmanager role
    • Feature (Agile Development 2.0): rmfeatureadmin role
    • Feature (SAFe): Scaled Agile Framework plugin, safeartuser or safeadmin role
    • Scrum Epic (Agile Development 2.0): scrumstorycreator role
    • SAFe Epic: Scaled Agile Framework plugin, safeartuser role
    • Planning Item (Project, Demand, Scrum/SAFe Epic): Strategic Planning plugin, snaligncore.apwuser role

    You can associate a goal or target as the primary for the work and planning items where the items contribute to achieving the goal or target. You need different roles to set a goal or target as the primary for work and planning items.

    You can associate a goal or target as primary to work and planning items by populating the Primary goal and Primary target fields on the Project, Demand, Program, Feature, Epic, and Planning item forms.

    You can also associate non-primary goals or targets to work and planning items from the Goal/Target Relationships related list on the Project, Demand, Program, Feature, Epic, and Planning item forms.

    Once you associate work and planning items to goals or targets, you can check these relationships directly in the goal's or target's related list or in the respective work or planning item’s related list.

    The following table describes how the primary goal or target can be set for each work and planning item.

    Work / Planning item Plugin required Role required Steps to associate the primary goal
    Project PPM Standard project_manager
    1. Open the required project.
    2. On the form, enter the goal or target that you want to associate to the project in the Primary goal and Primary target fields respectively.
    Demand PPM Standard demand_manager
    1. Open the required demand.
    2. On the form, enter the goal or target that you want to associate to the demand in the Primary goal and Primary target fields respectively.
    Program PPM Standard program_manager
    1. Open the required program.
    2. On the form, enter the goal that you want to associate to the program in the Primary goal and Primary target fields respectively.
    Feature Agile Development 2.0 rm_feature_admin
    1. Open the required feature.
    2. On the form, enter the goal or target that you want to associate to the feature in the Primary goal and Primary target fields respectively.
    SAFe Feature Scaled Agile Framework safe_art_user or safe_admin
    1. Open the required feature.
    2. On the form, enter the goal or target that you want to associate to the feature in the Primary goal and Primary target fields respectively.
    Scrum Epic Agile Development 2.0 scrum_story_creator
    1. Open the required epic.
    2. On the form, enter the goal or target that you want to associate to the epic in the Primary goal and Primary target fields respectively.
    SAFe Epic Scaled Agile Framework safe_art_user
    1. Open the required epic.
    2. On the form, enter the goal or target that you want to associate to the epic in the Primary goal and Primary target fields respectively.
    Planning item (Project, Demand, and Scrum/SAFe Epic) Strategic Planning sn_align_core.apw_user
    1. Open the required planning item.
    2. On the form, enter the goal or target that you want to associate to the planning item in the Primary goal and Primary target fields respectively.