Establishing goals and plans for the future
This seems to be the time of the year that many of us sit back and reflect on our lives, our businesses, and our future. Although planning for the future would be more effective as a regular occurrence, we will take this opportunity to reflect and plan, and maybe even set in motion some regular planning.
With the economic turmoil that we have all faced in recent years it has often been difficult to plan and to be optimistic. In spite of all the bad news, it is even more important than ever that we plan our futures. We need to start by focusing on the good news and the fact that things are starting to turn around.
Although work is still not as abundant and easy to find as it had been in prior years, there is still work to be found if you work at finding it. The good news is that it is not too late. If you are not sure where to start, I recommend you start at home and close by. By that I mean start by promoting to your existing clients and get them to help you by promoting to their friends.
Just keep in mind that people do want more for themselves and many of them do not want to continue to wait. I am not saying that people will be doing large jobs, however more people are willing to do smaller projects. If you are resourceful you can help your clients to fulfill some of their wishes. Perhaps the project can be scaled back, or possibly done in phases. If you can help them, they will want to work with you rather than your competitor.
We sometimes wish we had crystal balls so we could predict our futures; however we all have at our disposal a tool far better than a crystal ball. That tool is the ability to establish goals and plans for ourselves and our businesses. Unfortunately many of us do not recognize the importance or simplicity of planning and so we do not take full advantage of these tools. Typically we set New Year’s resolutions or state a goal that we do nothing to fulfill. Instead, let’s make the resolution to set our short and long term goals and then do what is needed to make them a reality.