Don’t forget your business goals, you set them for a reason.

Whether you’re starting a new business, doing a strategy review, want to launch a new product / service or even break into a new market, it’s important to set some relevant and challenging goals.

But why should you go to the hassle of setting goals and metrics to track your progress? Well, there’s no high level mind blowing business insight reason which I’m going to impart to you as to why they are important, but rather a few simple but really important reasons why i feel goals (and tracking them) are positive for your business, for example (and i know there are a lot more):

Goals

• You can use them to help you focus your efforts
• They can support your decision making when you need to decide how to allocate your business resources (which might be limited)
• They can help identify skills gaps in your business
• You can use them to identify target customers and / or strategic partners

Metrics

• When you commit to a business decision e.g. to enter into a new market, they can help you to track your business progress and quantify if you made the right decision
• To identify if your business strategy is paying off, and if not, adjust accordingly
• You can use your metrics to present to potential investors and funders so that they can build confidence in your business

When setting your goals it’s important that each one is clear, easy to understand and achievable. However it’s also important that your goals are challenging and encourage your business to be innovative and proactive. It is also vitally important that your goals are actually going to bring real benefit to your business in the form of, for example, increased efficiencies, an increased flexible and skilled workforce, new sales and increased profits!

There’s also no point setting goals that you you know aren’t achievable, or goals which you have to explain time and time again to your team because they are too complex, or they’re the complete opposite and are way too woolly.

To avoid this, it’s important that each of your goals is SMART.

There are a range of definitions for each of the letters in SMART, but I like these ones:

• Specific – Keep it clear and concise so you know how to resource it
• Measurable – If you can’t measure it, you won’t know you’ve achieved it
• Achievable – There’s no benefit in setting an unrealistic goal that can’t be achieved
• Relevant – The goal should bring a positive impact to your business
• Time bound – Have a target date to focus your efforts

The SMART philosophy is a very effective and simple tool that can be used by everyone in their business to help deliver clarity, focus and motivation.

Don’t listen to the pessimists around you who are content with where they are. If you want to aim higher, have the confidence to push forward and set challenging goals that will force and encourage you to think differently, be creative and take your business to the next level.

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