4 Keys to Setting Goals for your business

It is the beginning of a new year and it is time to set new goals for your business for 2010. Setting goals is an important part of continuously improving your business. It allows the business owner and their employees to be proactive rather than reactive in their dealings. The specific goals for 2010 should align with the long-term strategy of the business. Below are several keys for setting business goals.

1. Goals should be relevant. That is, they should be something that somehow ties into your strategy.

2. Goals need to be actionable and measurable. It is not specific enough, for example, to state a goal of improving customer service. You need to understand how to improve customer service and state your goal in those terms. For example, an acceptable goal for improving customer service is to reduce project turnaround time by 3 days. You will then need to track and measure past and future project turnaround time.

3. Goals should have a timeline assigned to them. If the timeline is a longer period of time, the goal should also have benchmarks. For example, if the goal is to increase sales by $40,000 by December of 2010, then you might set a quarterly benchmark of $10,000 to track your progress toward the goal.

4. Goals should be reasonable. Goals that are completely unattainable serve no purpose toward improving your business operations. They only lead to frustration.

Obviously goals are usually focused on generating greater profits so they are often developed in the areas of customer service, sales, improving operational efficiency, and improving employee competency.

Check back next week when we blog about various items related to goals and operations that are useful for the small business owner to measure and track.

Building a team to make running your small business easier.

Still working too hard running your small business? Have you set up a team to help you manage your company? No matter how skilled you are and how diligent you are, you cannot run a business all by yourself. Even small businesses need a team.

Your management team can be employees or it can by outside consultants. Taking advantage of the skills and knowledge of an expert can improve your bottom line despite the costs to procure these skills. A valued consultant has an outside perspective that can bring clarity to your business operations.

How do you get the most from your professional services dollars? Make sure you do your homework up front and hire someone who has the experience your business needs. Talk through your expectations and spell them out in the contract you agree to with your consultant. Finally, listen to the advice you are being given. Even if you do not like what you hear, you need to consider the possibility that the expert is right! If your business is not running as smoothly as you would like or not achieving the profits you need, an outside perspective and fresh ideas are needed. The quickest route to failure is to keep doing the same things.

What are you looking for from a small business advisor?