The end of one year and the beginning of another is the perfect time to reflect on and celebrate business and personal accomplishments from 2019. Definitely take time to pause and savor your successes. Reflecting on the goals you achieved in 2019 is also a great time to plan for what you want to achieve in 2020. You know what they say…A goal without a plan is just a dream.
Whether you are expanding, launching something new or maintaining the status quo, 2020 will be different than 2019. That means setting new goals and making a new plan. Start by identifying an overarching change or improvement you want by the end of the year. Want higher profits? Increased cash flow? Need a new worker employee or automation?
Change and improvement don’t happen without a plan to get it done. Follow these three tips to establish a plan that will get you what you want to achieve in 2020:
- Gather the Numbers
Quantify all the applicable aspects of your goals. This task will require some research and could entail making estimates and assumptions. For example, how much profit growth do you want to achieve? Can you express that growth in dollars and as a percentage? How much would a new worker or automation project cost? How much of that cost would be one-time and how much would be ongoing? The more numbers you can nail down, the better.
- Be Realistic
Keep market conditions and your resource capacity in mind when setting growth and other goals. It’s important to be realistic in order to ensure that your goals are achievable. Setting unrealistic objectives is not only discouraging, it can result in allocating resources – aka time and money – on activities that are unlikely to succeed. Better to target those resources on realistic, achievable goals.
- Adjust As Needed
No matter how well you research the numbers and focus on what’s realistic, any view of future events is imperfect. Market conditions and other factors that you depended on when setting your goals could change. Periodically assess progress on meeting your objectives. Are you on track? Why or why not? Based on those answers, you may need to make some adjustments to the goals that you set at the beginning of the year.
The end of 2019 is the perfect time to savor your successes and to plan for what you want to achieve in 2020. Don’t let your goals turn into the dreams you never achieved. Establish a plan for 2020 and turn those dreams into your reality.