Are You Planning Effectively?

With the end of the year fast approaching, as business owners, we are likely to be starting to plan for 2022 and to do this effectively, I suggest you do an ’End-of-Year Review’ first. This allows you to evaluate the past year of your business’s development and growth and helps to provide clear direction and strategies for the new year.

Unfortunately, a lot of us are more likely to spend most of our time planning and very little time evaluating, reviewing and reflecting.  But consider this… How will you know what ‘wins’ to celebrate if you haven’t actually recognized them? How will you know what improvements you can make if you haven’t acknowledged them? How will you know what parts of your business are (or aren’t) working?!

By establishing what you did well and what did not work for you this year, you’ll create a more effective plan and strategy for your business for next year.

Here are some of my key points to consider when doing your End of Year Review:

• Go into the process with a positive, growth mindset
• Approach the process with curiosity rather than fear
• Celebrate the wins
• Learn from the ‘mistakes’
• Identify opportunities to develop, improve and/or pivot (where necessary)
• Be organised.  Have your financial records and key metrics ready (or readily available)
• Ensure you review your company’s culture, values and mission, not just your goals
• Reflect on why goals were or were not met.  What ‘things’ impacted these results?
• Evaluate your financial data.  It’s not something to be scared of.  It can tell you SO much about your business!
• Follow up.  This is a living document, so keep it handy and check in every quarter.  Use it as a guide to ensure you are on the right track, not falling back into costly habits and continuing to learn and grow.

Reviewing your business should be something that you have scheduled into your calendar, regularly.  Especially at the end of the year!

Kirsty Gibbs