diff --git a/flang/CMakeLists.txt b/flang/CMakeLists.txt
--- a/flang/CMakeLists.txt
+++ b/flang/CMakeLists.txt
@@ -199,7 +199,6 @@
   set(MLIR_MAIN_SRC_DIR ${LLVM_MAIN_SRC_DIR}/../mlir/include ) # --src-root
   set(MLIR_INCLUDE_DIR ${LLVM_MAIN_SRC_DIR}/../mlir/include ) # --includedir
   set(MLIR_TABLEGEN_OUTPUT_DIR ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/tools/mlir/include)
-  set(MLIR_TABLEGEN_EXE $<TARGET_FILE:mlir-tblgen>)
   include_directories(SYSTEM ${MLIR_INCLUDE_DIR})
   include_directories(SYSTEM ${MLIR_TABLEGEN_OUTPUT_DIR})
 endif()
diff --git a/mlir/CMakeLists.txt b/mlir/CMakeLists.txt
--- a/mlir/CMakeLists.txt
+++ b/mlir/CMakeLists.txt
@@ -155,6 +155,9 @@
 add_subdirectory(tools/mlir-linalg-ods-gen)
 add_subdirectory(tools/mlir-pdll)
 
+set(MLIR_TABLEGEN_EXE "${MLIR_TABLEGEN_EXE}" CACHE INTERNAL "")
+set(MLIR_TABLEGEN_TARGET "${MLIR_TABLEGEN_TARGET}" CACHE INTERNAL "")
+
 add_subdirectory(include/mlir)
 add_subdirectory(lib)
 # C API needs all dialects for registration, but should be built before tests.