It has been a rollercoaster of a year for me and my business these days, with highs and lows that beat any other time in my self-employed life. With so much uncertainty these days it is easy for business owners to feel stressed, frustrated and anxious as they close one year and look ahead to another. Here are some tips on how to remain positive and productive.
Learn from the past
Run reports, assess analytics, review sales figures. See which areas of your business have been most profitable and which have been more trouble than they were worth. Look at your most successful campaigns and your best converting segments of your target audience. Get to grips with as many aspects of data that you can in order to refine your actions for the coming year to focus on the most efficient activities.
Of course learning isn’t all about number crunching. Even if you have had the worst financial year you may still have realized goals, made progress and learned lessons that will translate into a foundation of knowledge that you can build on in the coming months.
It is vital that you recognize your accomplishments in order to stay positive. In the face of all of the economic doom and gloom, your own hope and determination to succeed may be the best resources that you have to keep going.
Try asking yourself these questions:
- What was your biggest financial success?
- What was your most rewarding moment?
- What do you consider your failures from this year?
- What can you learn from them?
- How can you prevent them from happening or plan to minimize the consequences?
- Did you have goals or dreams that went unmet?
- Was this down to a lack of resources dedicated to them?
- How can you allocate more time and attention to your goals for this year?
Look Ahead
Now that you have taken stock of the year, it’s time to stop looking over your shoulder and grasp the new year with both hands.
What do you want for your business this year? What do you want for yourself and your lifestyle? If there are conflicts or choices to be made, face them head on. Someone once said that stress is simply knowing that something needs done and not doing it. More often than not you have all of the information you need to make a difficult decision, and spending lengthy periods of time debating the pros and cons repeatedly only drags out the worry that you feel.
Split your plans into three sections:
- What does your business need to succeed this year? This is your reality check. It includes sales projections, bottom lines and the cold hard facts.
- What do you want from your business this year? Too many business owners forget to take their needs into account when running their business, but most people work best when they are happy. You are the biggest cog in the machinery of your business, so what will keep you running smoothly? Perhaps this means more time off or taking on less profitable but more rewarding projects.
- What are your goals for the year ahead? This is where you reach for the sky. Set targets that represent your ideal performance. Dream big! When we start our business these idealistic goals and dreams are normally what inspire and motivate us, but somewhere along the line most people get caught up in day-to-day details and lose that inspiration. Take advantage of the psychological fresh start that the New Year provides to start dreaming again.
