Work ON Your Business - 5 Steps to Make It Happen
Are the memories of your summer still sharply in focus or are a faded memory as you slip back into work and wonder what happened to January?!
Welcome to 2022!
This blog is talking to you if you find yourself setting goals and objectives but don't actually have a plan of how to implement them. Sometimes you achieve them, sometimes you don't, but that's more by luck than anything. You're not alone, but it can be frustrating, or at worse, business critical.
This is a way to keep you on track and is one of my favourite subjects!
How to dream big, but make it happen!
This can be applied to any part of your business (and even to your personal life, but that's definitely not my area of expertise!!)
I have personally found this a useful discipline and have used it with a number of clients who find it useful. It helps us all ensure we achieve the outcomes we want, rather than getting lost in the detail.
It's also really helpful to use this as a way to make a start on something that might seem quite a big and somewhat unachievable objective; a mountain that looks reaallllllyyyyy hard to climb.
It's still just about the start of the calendar year, so a perfect time to do this. It's also a really useful exercise to do at the start of your new financial year.
This doesn't have to be complex, so let's start by taking the big dreams, or even the 'I've got to achieve this by the end of the year' items and writing them down. (I'm assuming these are the right actions and aligns with your strategy - that's a whole different focus area!)
Step 1: Write your objective(s) down
Write down what you want to achieve.
Step 2: Define how success is measured
Now write down how you will actually know if you have achieved something, how will you measure success? It is simple to say you have been successful in employing 12 new people, but might be slightly harder to say "establish thought leadership" or "move further up the value chain."
How will you know you are on track to success? There's no point waiting until the end of the year to dust off your plan and realise it wasn't achieved and that's where the next section comes into play.
Break the elephant into bite-sized chunks
Breaking your goal into manageable bitesized chunks, with more obvious tasks and goals along the way helps make the big mountain seem much more scaleable. I suggest 4 chunks of a quarter (three months) is a good approach.
Step 3: Break it into quarterly chunks
This approach can also ensure you keep focused on one area at a time, rather than getting distracted, or not getting traction because there are simply too many balls in the air. This isn't about saying NO you can never do something, but rather, YES, but your priority today is over here.
This step is all about identifying what you are going to focus on each quarter.
Look at the first quarter and capture the key tasks, who is going to do each one (or at least take ownership) and what outcome you expect.
Then build on that for each quarter. Sure, you might need to keep a little agile as the year goes on, but by putting down milestones, tasks and owners you have already started to identify what is needed to get you there. This is not about capturing the minutiae of each activity, rather the big rocks.
An Example: I want to establish myself as a thought leader for my expertise on how to make balloon animals
Why is this important?
Most balloon-making gigs are taken by clowns who do this as a part-time job; I want to be seen as an expert and be a full-time balloon artist serving the corporate market
How I will know I'm successful?
I will have won 4 pieces of work worth $20k each where my content and thought leadership has been referenced as part of the sales process
I have appeared on TV news and have one piece of balloon art exhibited at Te Papa
Quarter 1
Develop a habit - create a content plan; find and engage a content writer
Publish 3 blog posts focusing on how to create balloon animals.
Quarter 2
Build credibility externally - identify 8 established and respected leaders to target who I want to publish my fabulous balloon thought leadership articles eg conferences, podcasts, publications
Publish 6 pieces of content - 3 written pieces and 3 case studies about how my balloon-making has led to world peace
Quarter 3
Build credibility externally - deliver content to 4 of the above (eg speaking gigs, publications) and leveraging each one through my own channels
Publish 6 more pieces of content - this time with a focus on how to guides and useful tips
Quarter 4
Build my channels - establish a YouTube Balloon channel and interview 3 other balloon thought leaders
Publish 6 pieces of content - 3 from my interviews and 3 about careers in balloon creations
This is obviously a very basic example I'm using to illustrate the point...if you are thinking of making a living from balloon-making it probably needs a whole lot more than this!
Hold Yourself to Account
Don't just make the plan and put it in a drawer. I suggest you establish a quarterly review process. This is that thing about working ON your business, not just in it.
Work ON your business
Hold a review meeting. This could just be with you and a notebook sitting in a coffee shop; hiring a meeting room off-site; a couple hours over a breakfast; or a more formal meeting in the office.
Step 4: Hold quarterly reviews
Whatever you do, it needs to be "protected" time that you respect; needs to be outside of your normal operational & 'management' meetings and should not be a meeting that gets shifted around because there's an operational deadline, or a new client wanting to meet you. Treat yourself as your own client and honour yourself as such. From what I see, this is actually one of the hardest things to do in the whole process.
If you know you're not good at holding yourself to account, ask someone else to lead the review - someone who can hold you to account. This could be someone within your team, or an external trusted peer - get in touch if you'd like to chat through how I can help here.
Set An Agenda
As with any good meeting, have an agenda.
Focus on:
Your overall strategy - how are you tracking towards the big picture
What have we achieved in the last quarter. This is super important, as many of us get overwhelmed when looking ahead, but forget to look back and reflect on what we have achieved
What went well
What is no longer relevant
What did not go well
What didn't get done & why
The review of what didn't get done & why is particularly important. Whether you're having a review with yourself in a cafe, or with the rest of your team, this is the time for honest reflection. Is it because you forgot about what you'd set out to do since last quarter? Is it because something else got reprioritised? Was that the right decision?
Important or Urgent?
Think about important versus urgent work - the most important activities are often pushed aside because something loud and annoying and seemingly urgent has cropped up. How can you manage this going forward? This is not about blame, but is about raising your consciousness in a way you may not have done before, enabling you to make more strategically driven choices.
Now you're a quarter in, it's time to review what you'd planned for the next quarter and confirm the key priorities. You might need to push things back, increase your cadence, get more resources, or reprioritise. This has got to work for your circumstances, but again be true to what your overall strategic aim is.
Set your meeting date for the next quarter.
Essentially rinse and repeat for each quarter.
Show It Visually
You might find it helpful to have a copy of your core objectives on your wall so you can be visually reminded about what your priority is for the quarter.
For some people, having the end game visualised can also be really motivational. That might be the outcome you're aiming for (10 new customers), how you're going to celebrate (photo of a hot air balloon), or what this is going to enable you to do when your business / department / career is successful (photo of an apartment on the Gold Coast, new car...) - do whatever works for you and your team!
Celebrate
Step 5: Annual review & celebrate
It's the end of the year. Now is the time to take stock. How did you do & why did you get the result you did? You have been reviewing every quarter, so where you are now should not be a total surprise.
Are you pleased? Then celebrate! You've done brilliantly.
And start it all again for next year. You might have a different focus area, or you might build on this year with a further stretch.
Good luck!
Five Easy Steps
Step 1: Write your objective(s) down
Step 2: Define how success is measured
Step 3: Break it into quarterly chunks
Step 4: Hold quarterly reviews
Step 5: Annual review & celebrate
I'd genuinely like to hear any feedback from you. I have found this works well for me and for people I work with, but I'd love to hear if you have other tools that work for you, or if there's anything about this approach that you either really love, or really hate & why!
