Setting goals is important, but what comes next?
Setting goals and writing them down is an important step for every business owner, but in many cases, this is where the story ends. You see, it’s one thing to establish goals, but taking the necessary steps to achieve them requires a high level of commitment and effort.
As you may know, one of the services I offer to my clients and followers is full transparency. I willingly share my stories of success and more importantly, my failures, because I believe wholeheartedly that others can benefit from my mistakes and hopefully avoid making those same errors themselves.
When I started my entrepreneurial journey 14+ years ago I had no issue with identifying my goals, but the action plan for achieving them eluded me and I felt stuck. I had to learn the hard lesson, that goals without a clearly defined plan for achievement were worth nothing at all.
So what is the first step?
In my previous blog, I shared the importance of SMART goals.
When you establish goals that are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Timely you put yourself in an excellent position to succeed, but it’s also very important when creating goals that you start by prioritizing your actions. This step may be the hardest one to take, but once you do, everything else flows from there and the puzzle pieces seem to fall into place.
As I worked to prioritize my actions, it became rather apparent that generating revenue had to hold the highest priority, so finalizing my marketing blueprint and developing my sales pipeline required a sense of urgency. While growing the company, expanding to include employees, and adding new service offerings were important goals, I knew they were secondary. With a family to support and bills to pay, my priorities had to be focused on revenue-generating activities.
So every single day I spent the bulk of my time working on revenue generation. I made phone calls, sent emails, scheduled appointments, and created marketing content. Administrative tasks, no matter how important, had to be done in the evenings or on weekends. I knew that the only way to realize my revenue goals was to focus my work efforts on revenue-generating events and make those my priority.
As I scaled my business, I had to alter my priorities to achieve the larger objectives and reach the long-term goals I had established. This meant setting aside specific blocks of time to complete work projects, create infrastructure for growth, and implement operational measures geared toward efficiency and productivity.
If you are just getting started and considering your goals, I encourage you to focus your efforts on revenue generation and customer satisfaction. Make the intentional decision to spend 80% of your time completing revenue-generating tasks and ensuring that your product/service delivery includes the highest level of customer service that will ensure client retention.
If you’d like some help with goal setting and prioritizing your actions, I would love to help. Reach out to me at kent@kentgustafson.com if you need some help or even if you’d just like to talk it through.
Schedule a one-on-one call with Kent to create a financial plan with lasting impact.
