Stop working IN your business and starting working ON it.

Author: Cameron Moses

Many of us are so busy fulfilling the day-to-day requirements of our business that we neglect to pay any attention to the big picture. We are consumed with figuring out how to deliver a product to a customer, dealing with the little emergencies that crop up and basically jumping through hoops that we have little time to left to focus on where our business is heading.

The problem with running a business like this is that we will never achieve anything more than coping with the demands of today.

If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.

Have you ever jumped in the car, late for an important function and started driving with no clear idea where you were going? You probably didn’t even bring a map along, so sooner or later your will be driving the wrong way down one-way streets and yelling obscenities at innocent streets signs.

Stupid really, yet many of us attempt to run our businesses the same way. No clear direction, no goals except to get over the latest hurdle. No matter what type of business you are in, you need to stop, take a step back and look at where you want to go in the future.

What goals do you have for your business and how are you going to achieve them? How well are you moving towards the goals you have already established? And just a word on warning, ‘Making Money’ is never a very good goal on its own.

One easy way to understand how to set appropriate goals, both for your business and personal life, is to set SMART goals.

S – Specific
M – Measurable
A – Attainable
R – Realistic
T – Timely

Goals need to be clearly defined and measurable – answer the what, how, who and why questions. Instead of saying you want more money, clearly define how much money you plan to make and how, for example we plan on increasing sales by 35% through expanding our distribution to regional towns.

Goals should be realistic – Yes we would all like to be swimming in great pools of money, but sometimes it takes a little more than a week to achieve such financial freedom.

Goals need to have a timeframe – by the end of this year I want to open three new stores.

Harvard Business Press has an excellent book called Setting Goals that they claim will help you identify your strengths and weaknesses, hone critical skills and develop long-term vision that motivates you and your employees to reach even the most challenging objectives.

Take time today to start working ON your businesses so that in the future you can spend less time working IN the business.

About the Author:
Cameron Moses is an experienced software developer and business analyst who specialises in developing software to better manage small and medium sized businesses.