The Australian Small Business Blog: The Year in Review

As the year draws to a close, it is an opportune time to have a look at the scorecard for your business. You know, the one you prepared at the beginning of this year with your 2007 goals? Did you have a scorecard with goals? How did you go?

If you did not have goals, the chances are, your results were much the same as last year and your business is pretty much where it was in 2006 and next year is looking like more of the same. This tends to be the result when you don’t set goals.

Maybe you did set goals. Did you have a plan to achieve the goals? If the answer to that question was no, the chances are you made some, but not all of your goals. The very fact that you wrote out your goals will have made a difference, because goals create a focus. However you also need a plan. That is, the steps you would take to achieve your goals. What strategies you would use, and the tactics you would employ to turn your goals into reality.

So, you had the goals, and a plan but still did not get the results you wanted? Did you actually carry out the plan? Did you track your performance against your plan? When you regularly refer back to your plan, you are far more likely to achieve your goals as this forces you to step back from the coalface and work on your business. When performance was less than expected, did you adjust the plan? While persistence is a virtue in business, the same cannot be said for hitting your head against a brick wall. Perhaps there was an easier way? Did you seek advice when things were not working? While there is a cost to getting advice, even if it is just your time, the cost of trial and error is many times higher, and very demotivating.

If you did not achieve what you wanted to achieve in 2007, when look back on the year, and the goals, the plans, the actions, the tracking and the revisions is there something you didn’t do that would have made a difference? If you want 2008 to be different you must do something different.

The definition of insanity is to do the same thing over and over again, and expect something different to happen. Make 2008 different. Find out how in:

The Five Pillars of Guaranteed Business Success

May Your Business in 2008 be as You Plan It!

Dr Greg Chapman

Over to You. What do You Think? Post Your Comments Below.

Dr Greg Chapman is the Director of Empower Business Solutions and The Australian Business Coaching Club and is Australia's Leading Advisor on Emerging Businesses and provides Coaching and Consulting advice to Australian Small Business Owners in Marketing & Business Strategies Planning & Systems.

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