Every year, you set goals and hope to achieve them. But are you setting the right goals for your business? To set goals that will give you a sense of accomplishment and truly benefit your business, get SMART.
A SMART goal is:
Specific— Instead of saying, “I want to increase revenues,” say, “I will increase my net profit by 10% this year.”
Measurable–How will you know you reached your goal? Will it transfer over to your balance sheet? This is where QuickBooks can be an essential tool–use the Reports to measure your goals.
Achievable–A goal should really make you stretch, so you’lll be excited (and even a little scared) to reach it. So how will you know if you can achieve it? Get it down on paper and go over all the steps it will take to make it happen. Now is the time for a financial team management meeting! Your financial team will be instrumental in helping you put together a plan to achieve your goal.
Realistic–When you’re setting business goals, you should consider how they will work in your life and in your company. You must have not only the desire, but also the capability to make this goal happen, and it may take some changes to how you run your business. Ask yourself these questions:
Will you need to acquire new staff to hit these goals? By employing people in the community, your company will be able to give back in a very important way.
Will current staff to need to step up to help meet these goals? It’s a great opportunity to identify leaders and provide more motivation for them to meet their goals, too. (Better yet, link staff goals to your company goals to empower them as part of the team!)
Will you need to increase the workload at a time when one of your key team members will be out on leave? If it’s an accounting team member, we can help you there!
Timely–Dreams are great, but they usually stay in the air unless you attach a date to them. A goal is a dream with a deadline.
If you’re looking for suggestions on SMART goals for your business finances, read our blog on the subject! We’ve picked out 4 SMART goals to get you started.
