It’s a new year and you’re likely either extremely focused on planning and executing your fresh New Year’s resolutions. Or you don’t believe in New Year’s resolutions and roll your eyes when you hear people talking about their new fitness goals for the year.
Either way, if you want to achieve anything in life or business you do need to set goals. Whenever you are in the goal setting mode, it can be easy to gravitate to tasks or projects that you like doing more than other tasks, or ignore areas of your life that don’t register as important to you. So here is a challenge for you. Instead of focusing on only one area, think about creating goals for yourself that cover the following three areas.
- Business Strategy: A new year for your business could mean one of two things. Continuing as per usual or taking the time to step back, reflect on the past year’s goals and results and actively altering your plans and measurements accordingly. Personally I would recommend the latter. This is not just a good practise for you as a business owner, but an excellent re-focus for your team members. Reminding everyone about the business vision and what your key objectives for the year are.
- Have you set time aside to work on your plan for the year? If not, when will you do it?
- Once you’ve completed the plan, how will you ensure that it doesn’t land up in the bin?
- What do you need to do in your business to make this plan continuously visible?
- Self Development: When last did you read a book or sign up for a course, which would ultimately not just grow and develop you, but also add enormous value to your business? Reality check, the business world is evolving so fast that we need to continuously develop ourselves so we are not left behind.
- In your yearly goals and plans, what will you be doing to develop yourself? This could take the shape of reading a book on business practises, taking a financial literacy course, attend a social media conference or sign up for a certificate, diploma or MBA. Go on, pick something and book it in.
- Self care: Learning to put work aside to take time for yourself, is probably one of the toughest things for many business owners to achieve. Self care, like self development can take on many shapes, but it is something to seriously consider including in your yearly plan. It may be starting a new hobby, or joining a weekly yoga class. Whatever this looks like for you, stop thinking about it and just do it!
Instead of getting to the end of this year feeling burnt out, frustrated and regretting what you haven’t achieved. Take charge now and ensure that you are incorporating all areas into your plans.
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