If you’re like many business owners, the New Year offers hope – to achieve more than you have before – to re-think your strategy – to “do-over” goals that were abandoned last year when you allowed your attention to stray to the myriad of problems that cropped up, clients demands or the day to day details that took over your time and your focus.
And, if you’re like so many business owners, you tend to treat your business like it’s a job. You spend all or most of your time doing the work (working “for” the business) and overlook the importance of defining where you would like your business to go and how to get it there (working “on” the business). You may have even noticed that your business has taken on a life of it’s own, and gone in a direction that you really haven’t intended or wanted it to.
How to achieve business goals
In this first of a series of posts, I am going to give you an overview of the 5 elements that make up my 2014 Formula For Business Success. I hope you find it useful.
Element #1 – VISION
What happens if you drive your car without having a destination? You go around in circles. The same can be said about business success. You can’t achieve success without first being very specific about what you would like your business to be like when it’s “done” – to define exactly what success means to YOU. And since we’re talking about a small business here, it’s crucially important to define your personal vision as well. In my next post we’ll examine the visioning process a bit closer.
Element #2 – GOALS
Business goals are the objectives you want/need to reach in order to make your vision a reality. To set business goals, you must first identify “the gap” between where you are now and where you want to be. Stay tuned for more about “the gap” and how to set business goals in future posts.
Element #3 – STRATEGY
Strategy is to vision as a map is to a road trip. Once you’ve set goals, you’ll need to outline an approach and draw up a plan of how to achieve business goals. This plan or blueprint will help you to know exactly what you’ll need to do to achieve your goals and reach your vision.
Element #4 – ACTION
It’s hard to achieve business goals without pinpointing and implementing the step by step actions or “tactics” that will get you there. If you’re spending little or no time taking actions towards your goals, get real, they will simply not materialize on their own.
Element #5 – MOTIVATION, SUPPORT & ACCOUNTABILITY
I wish I could give you a magic pill – but unfortunately none of this will happen unless you do do the work, but I promise, it will be some of the most satisfying work you can do. In order to stay focused on the prize (your vision) and put in the work to set the goals, devise the strategy and take consistent action, you’ll need the motivation to stick with the plan and the support, guidance and accountability to see it through.
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