The end of the business year is a great time to sit down and reflect on how your business fared over the year that’s just
passed. It’s a perfect time to see if you achieved the goals you’d set for your business and what goals, both personal and professional, you’d like to attain in the new year.
Here are the top 5 resolutions designed to help the business owner strike a better life-work balance:
- 1. Be consistent: Are you promoting your business consistently? Sometimes, promotion falls to the bottom of the priority list when there are other things going on and when budgets are tight. To attract new customers and remain front of mind with current ones, you need to keep promotions and networking as a priority. If you don’t have the time, resources or knowledge to undertake a targeted marketing campaign, consider hiring someone to promote your business so that it remains consistent.
- Delegation is key: When you’re an entrepreneur and money is tight, it’s tempting to do it all yourself. As a business owner, there are things at which you excel and business tasks that should be delegated. You need to make a decision to delegate tasks to others so you can focus on your core competency.
- Are your goals realistic?: When you’re setting goals, make certain they are attainable. If it is an overly aggressive goal, can it be broken down incrementally and charted out over the course of the year? Make your business goals for 2011 realistic, because dreams that are far out of reach lead to frustration.
- Resolve to network: Every business owner knows that the way to get noticed is to be in front of people which means you have to get out and network. Analyze the results you’ve received from the groups that you currently belong to; if you haven’t gotten any leads and feel the group is stagnant, look to join a new one.
- Open your eyes to new opportunities: The new year is a great time to think outside of the box. Have you ever considered joining a trade group? By joining a trade group you open your business to new opportunities and you can also pay for goods and services with trade currency and free up cash for other expenses. By networking with the members of a trade group you open your business to new opportunities to not only network but to new business partners who may be interested in the goods and services you have to offer.
Why not take a day outside of the office before January 1 hits to determine which goals you met, which still need to be attained and how to you can reach those in the coming year.