Why Goals FAIL

In a large number of cases, where goals fail, it is because they do not have a actual target they are working towards. A good example of a goal that will generally fail is “To earn more money”, and this translates into many other potential goals like “To sell more products” “To convert more sales” “To Lose Weight”. While all of these are goals and they describe what you want to do, they do not quantify what you expect to achieve for a success.

Really how can you expect to not FAIL when you do not set a level to reach for. Looking at the goal “To earn more money”, you will probably find when you do the numbers a lot more people succeed at this then will accept that they do. Maybe you are earning $50,000 per year, and you want to earn more money. Without setting what you want to reach for in this goal success would become earning $50,001 next year. So you get to the end of the year and have earned that extra $1, and while you achieved your goal, you just start along the path that goal setting did not work, because when you think about it what you really wanted was to earn an extra $10,000.

How to Improve Your Goals

Having short and vague goals whether it is in your business or personal life, just do not work. You need to put detail into the goals and build a goal that has a definite point where you know you have either achieved it or failed. To do this there are two key elements that need to be part of your goals creation process. Not having the following two elements as part of the actual goal, will make it all that much more difficult for you to actually get to a point where you either succeed or fail.

• Have a Target - Having something that you are working towards is an essential part of the goal, this being a specific target is greatly more powerful then a simple phrase. In setting a target for your goal, “To Earn more money” becomes “To Earn an additional $10,000″. It creates a specific figure that you know you are aiming for.
• Have a Timeframe - Just like having something specific you are working towards, having a date that you expect to achieve this by is another important factor. If you do not know when you want to achieve the goal by, then it will just keep dragging on. It is often found that a task will expand to fill the available time, a goal is quite similar it will often take about the time allocated to it, to be achieved. In this case “To Earn more money” becomes “To Earn an additional $10,000 in the next year.” Specifying a particular date can also be helpful, as often a year from now you may not even remember the specific date.

Things to Consider

While adding these two elements to your goal will make it a much clearer and more definite, these alone will only increase your chances so much. There are still a range of things that can impact on your individual likelihood of achieving the goals you set.

• Make it achievable - Almost more important than any other factor a goal needs to be achievable for you. This requires a little bit of insight on your part as to what you are capable of. For example if your business has been running for 3 years and making $5000/ month profit, setting a goal to make $50,000/ month profit within 6 months, is probably not very practical, for a number of reasons. Something more practical might be a goal to increase monthly profit by $1000 / month over the next 6 months. Keeping things practical and achievable can help you to achieve and exceed your goals.
• Goals should be a challenge - But not to challenging. While you do need to push yourself a little beyond what you believe you are capable of, going to far beyond may push you a little to hard to achieve. This goes hand in hand with making things achievable. However it can also depend upon where you are in your business. While 100% month on month growth might be achievable in the first few months of business, 5 years in without precedent in your business it will likely be very difficult to achieve.
• Step it up - If you still feel that you would like to push yourself a little harder, but maybe not all in one go, it may be worth considering setting smaller goals that take things a step at a time. For example rather then setting a goal of increasing profit by $10,000/month within 6 months. Try setting three smaller goals of increase profit/month by $3,500 in 2 months, and work on this goal 3 times over 6 months.

Where are you at?

At the end of the day though the most important part of setting goals for your business is to actually get in and set them. Thinking about setting goals is not really going to get you anywhere, it will just leave you thinking what could I have done if only I had set a goal.

So it is time to go and set some goals for your business, all the factors of what you want to achieve, in what time frame and at what speed, is entirely up to you. Just remember to include all the parts of a goal to give yourself the best chance to achieve your goal.

Looking at what you may want to include in your technology plan, can be an interesting mix of information. Some of it may seem obvious while other parts maybe not so obvious.

• How you use technology – Before your even consider the purchase of any technology products you need to look at how your business is going to make use of these products. For example it is no good buying the latest and greatest point of sale technology if it is going to be hardly used. Whereas trying to work with second hand cash registers in a high volume retail store.
• What is the best Technology – Once you have established how you will use technology, do a little research and find out what is the best technology you could have. What is the best technology and what you can afford are not always going to be the same thing, so also research at the same time what other similar technology that may be suitable is available.
• Your Budget – Setting a budget for technology, should not be seen as creating a long list of expenses, your technology purchases should be seen as investing in your business. To carry on from the example above, while it may cost a lot more money to have the latest point of sale technology, if you were in a high volume retail business this additional investment in technology would help to greatly improve your customer experience. While all technology is not perfect, using second hand cash registers would more than likely create more down time, and give you less ability to track your business.
• Define your needs – Finally once you know how you use technology, and what is available, it comes time to define what you are actually going to use. This really takes a little working with what is available and what you have available for this investment in terms of budget. In almost every case while you may want what is best the budget often cannot stretch to meet this. So it can mean making some hard decisions.
• Look to the future – As we know technology doesn’t last forever, and as such there is always going to be a point in the future where it needs to be updated. As such it is worth looking at what period you are comfortable in writing off the cost of your equipment and where it is going to benefit most for you to upgrade. There will of course be a number of factors that come into play here. The first is if you originally purchased or leased the equipment. Second is overall value, some equipment costs more and is designed to last longer then other equipment, taking this into consideration is important.

While a technology plan is not essential it can help you to see a little better just where your business is going in term’s of staying current, and making the most use of technology. It can also assist you in your longer term financial planning to see when and where you are going to need funds available to upgrade your infrastructure. Have you created a technology plan, has it help you in business, let us know in the comments below.

Often it does not take long to realize that the plan is not working entirely as planned, or that you are growing faster or slower then your plan outlines. The best way to work with this continual ongoing change in your business is to always be thinking and planning and modifying your plan as you see fit.

While you may not find that it is entirely essential to change your plan every time something happens there are many times that it can be quite important to change your plan. Let’s have a look at some examples.

• New Major Client – There is often a good chance that you have not planned for taking on a major client. Unless you have been very optimistic in your planning, the chances are that gaining a major client will move your business in quite a different way to what you expected. Changing your plan to account for this, especially considerations of staff, facilities, and financial estimates, can be beneficial.
• New Equipment Available – Technology and equipment is something that is always advancing. While you may not have seen a need for an expensive piece of equipment when you started the business, as you work with your business you may see how this equipment could benefit you. Before buying the equipment consider looking at it within the scope of your plan and how it would affect your plan.
• Loss of Finance – While many businesses are built on savings and or little finance, there are just as many businesses that are built on finance. This being the case whether you have used finance or some other way to fund the business if the circumstances of this funding/finance change it can have quite an impact, especially if it cannot be replaced. Allowing for this in your planning initially often is not thought of, so making changes as this may occur is an important step to the long term survival of your business.

Taking some time each week or even each month to reassess your position and adjust your business plan accordingly can be an important part of your business. For the most part just to be sure you are if not on track, at least realigning things to get on track.

It’s just that somebody who’s starting a home-based business or a professional services firm doesn’t need to pay a consulting firm thousands of dollars to prepare a full-fledged business plan just to raise the small amount of money they’ll need for legal fees, accounting software, a website and maybe a new laptop. More….

I thought this article quite relevant, as I want to start sharing a bit more information about getting your business plan together here. Especially information about what you really need to do and what you may not really have to do. As i think that some people spend way to much time planning, and not enough time taking action to get their business moving.

While I believe their is a place for business plan’s, this post lays it out about as simple as possible a plan is really only absolutely needed when it is actually going to be used to guide the business.

This is where it becomes confusing for many. Trying to figure out who to listen to, whta to actually include, what to leave out, and most importantly, Will it work for what they want the plan for? This is potentially the biggest reason for making the plan in the beginning to achieve what you want the plan to achieve. For example there is no point if you are looking to write your business plan, to get finance for your business, a single page breif overview, is not going to be sufficient.

So lets take a look at some of the most common forms of business plans. While there may be some if not many other options, there following type of plans, are likely to be able to fulfill the majority of business needs with just some small changes.

• The One Page Business Plan – Taking it to the basics, can be a great way to focus your idea, and be able to quickly review it. The sort of information that you may want to include, in this plan is really just the basics. Such as: Business Name, the idea, the business concept, what the business offers in products and services, some business goals, and expectations of the business. This type of plan will really only be of benefit to yourself, and maybe a close business partner, as it really only shows you the basics.
• The Basics Business Plan – This is in essence similar to the one page plan, however you can structure this plan a little more, while also including a little more information. You really have no limit on how long this plan may be and you are really not limited to what type of information is included, but really whatever information you need. Some of the information you include could be, the same as above, but additionally, marketing information, sales forecasts, budget information, as well as any other relevant information.
• The Detailed Business Plan – A detailed plan can become an essential part of your business, in a number of different circumstances. If you are looking to get finance for your business, attract investors, or grow your business quickly then something more detailed may be needed. This plan is often structured well, and in the cases i have used it includes seven main areas. These included Executive Summary, Company Summary, Products and Services, Market Analysis Summary, Strategy and Implementation Summary, Management summary and a Financial Plan. Each of these headings will have a number of sub headings, which outline as much information for your business as you can put together, on how your business will run and why it will work.

While this is just three different business plan options these are the basis for a large majority of the different plans that you may have come across. While yes there may be almost a different style for everyone, in essence they come back to a few basic methods at some point. So these may not be everything that is available, however they will be a good place to get started.

So as with many things in business, there is no better time to get started, than now.