Goals For The New Year (and Gear) of Your Business

As the new year has begun, it is a time that businesses traditionally look at money matters. Budgets, profits, performance and compliance are all front of mind. It’s a busy time, but it’s also a great opportunity to set some goals and strategies related to your growth.

Here’s some things you can do to set your business up for success for 2023:

Your Strategic Plan is essentially your vision for the business, and the steps you will take to achieve the objectives that make up that vision. It’s not a set and forget document, it should be something that is regularly referenced, reviewed and adjusted.

Steps to help you develop or update your Strategic Plan include defining where you want to be; considering your current position and determining what your priorities and goals will be and why. It’s also important to establish who will do what and how results will be evaluated.

Your Accru Advisor can give you further guidance on this and also facilitate planning with your team – it’s not just the convenience of outsourcing that matters here. Having qualified and experienced but impartial input can be invaluable.  

The purpose of a Business Systems Review is to ensure that you are operating in a way that supports your goals and growth and have the tools and resources you need.

Data should be used to help you make informed decisions but it’s important to involve your employees and other stakeholders in this process in a meaningful way. There is often a lot of knowledge, innovation and potential that can be found from listening to their needs, ideas and concerns. 

We recommend doing this holistically – it can often be tempting to focus only on one area or solution but this can mean you miss other opportunities to streamline your business and create both time and cost efficiencies. 

This probably seems obvious, but we’ve all worked in or with those businesses who just copy and paste their figures over year on year with a small increase for inflation.

It’s often the part that people go into first when it comes to being ready for the new year, but often it’s actually the last piece of the puzzle that needs to come together because the work you do in the other steps like your Strategic Planning and Systems Reviews will potentially change how much money you have to work with.

Proper planning and preparation can help you accurately forecast revenue and manage your business budget in a way that keeps your business viable and growing at the rate you need for your future goals. 

Make sure you have a strategy in place to track your progress throughout the year.

There’s a reason the SMART anagram is still used some 40+ years after the phrase was first used. Making your plans, goals and objectives Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely is the, well, “smart” thing to do. 

Getting expert support can also be a really smart decision. If you would like to discuss how your Accru Advisor can help you prepare for the year ahead, get in touch today.