There are a lot of business owners who think that they have clear idea of where they want to take their business. As the leader of an organization, it is your responsibility and burden to use the leadership tools available to develop a vision for the future. But simply knowing what you want your business to achieve in the coming year isn’t enough. You have to define steps, actions, and milestones that you need to achieve in order to get your business there. And without a business plan, you aren’t likely going to achieve your goals.
Your Road Map
To draw an analogy, consider someone from Chicago who wants to take a vacation at a popular resort in another state. But there’s just one problem: this person lacks a map. It simply isn’t enough for this person to say that they want to take the vacation, because without a guide to lead them to their goal they are never going to reach their destination. This is the trap that a lot of businesses fall into. The hard part isn’t creating a vision for your company – it’s determining the best path to take to reach your goal. And without a solid business plan for the coming year, you are significantly reducing your chances of meeting your goals.
Course Correction
One of the key elements in a business plan is the ability to make corrections when you stray from the path to success. You need to look at what worked and what failed last year if you have any hope of improving your business next year. By constantly improving your business and eliminating strategies that don’t bear fruit, you will be miles ahead of the competition.
Growing Your Business
Saying that you want $X dollars in sales for the coming year or quantifying an achievable growth metric for your business is only half the battle. Many business owners have met horrific surprises when they projected their sales for the coming year only to find out that they didn’t even come close to meeting their quotas. Though your business may produce trends that show a positive and stable year-after-year increase in profits, you can’t rely on projections. As new technologies emerge and marketplaces become more crowded with competition, things change in the blink of an eye. Your business plan will help identify trends in the market and spell out in great detail how you are going to respond to them to help reduce the chance that your growth will stagnate.
Business Planning Assistance
If you need help creating a reliable plan for your business for the upcoming year, contact John M. Ruh and Associates. Whether you’re a new small business or you have a well-developed medium-sized business, we can help you chart a course to success. Remember that without a solid and specific business plan, there’s no telling where your business might be in a year’s time. You will be further ahead of your competition if you structure your business around an actionable plan.
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Written by John Ruh
John M. Ruh and Associates are mission based business advisors who partner with growth oriented leaders to create the right P.S.T. support: the right People, the right Structure and the right Tools.