Taking the time to do a review will help you operate with more clarity.
Now is the time to stop and do an effective review of your business before you move forward! The benefit of pausing and reflecting on the past several months is to provide you with insight for better results as you continue to lead your business.
Business planning isn’t a static, once-a-year activity; it’s a process. So, dive into this article and make the time to truly evaluate, adjust your sails and point your bow to success for the rest of the year.
Your Business Review and Recommitment
It’s time for a check-up!
At some point, either formally or just in thought, you set an intention for what you wanted a specific period of time to mean in terms of your business. You are now able to reflect on and evaluate how well your business has done in the past. Where are you in relation to where you set out to be at the beginning of the year?
Let’s hope you took the time to perform a well organized business plan for the year. As a leader, when you create consistency with your planning, you and your team can dial in faster to identify the areas that require instant change or purposefully planned out goals. The combination of this will indeed support you and your team in achieving your goals.
In my book Snapshot Business Planning, I recommend that you review eight key facets. They are:
- Financials
- Products and Services
- Marketing
- Team Growth and Development
- Sales Systems
- Customer Retention
- Technology and Equipment
- Office
Firstly, ensure that you schedule adequate time to address each of the facets by asking the following questions. I encourage you not to try to do this review on the fly because you need to take the time to truly ascertain what changes are needed.
A) What worked in this facet of the business so far this year? Should this action be continued as is, or tweaked in some way?
B) What didn’t work? What needs to be changed to generate a different outcome?
C) What are the new or revised goals and action steps that need to be committed to?
Whatever changes you decide on, be sure to set timelines for completion and clearly communicate with the people you expect to help implement the actions. Remember to clarify your expectations, receive feedback that your expectations are clearly understood and then put an accountability system in place to measure the progress.
As I have always said, a Great Leader is NEVER shy to inspect what they expect.
There are many different ways to tackle your business review.
- You can facilitate the process yourself; however, if you do this, please ensure you don’t allow distractions to pull you away from this very important review of your business. Block out time on your calendar and make it happen!
- Schedule a Review meeting with your team members.
- You can also get support from a coach like myself. I am happy to do a 15-minute Complimentary Strategy Session to provide you with some tips on ways to manage and execute the mid-year review process yourself.
At McLean International, our mission is to help people reach their next level of living professionally and personally through strategic planning and processes. We developed this eBook, 5 Key Steps to Achieve Business Growth and Stability to give you a jump start on growing your business to the next level, whatever that looks like for you.
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