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How do you set and achieve business goals?
In this video, you’ll learn some simple steps you can take to map out goals for your business and reach them.
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Teach Kids to Set Financial Goals
www.kidnexions.com Practical advice on how to teach kids to set financial goals by Karyn Hodgens, author of ‘Raised for Richness’.
Managing your money wisely is the best way to make sure you and your family gain financial security. Money management is also extremely important if you own a business. All business owners need to understand how money comes in and goes out of their business-if you ignore budgeting details, your venture might not be successful. There are many similarities between budgeting for yourself and budgeting for your small business. When you understand the basics of money management for yourself, you will be more prepared to set up a budget for your company.
To manage your money wisely, start by setting financial goals and establishing a budget plan to help you achieve those goals. Financial goals are simply statements about things you wish you could afford; for example, you may have a goal to establish an emergency savings fund of $2,000 by the end of the year.
What are your personal financial goals? If you had $2,000, what would you do with it? Would you invest it in your small business? Would you buy a car? Would you make a home improvement?
You will be able to accomplish your goals if you manage your finances and put money aside on a regular basis. The key is to setting financial goals that are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Trackable (SMART):
Specific. State exactly what you want to achieve, how you’re going to do it, and when you want to achieve it. For example:
General Goal Statement: I want to improve my finances.
Specific Goal Statement: I want to pay off my credit card bill in 8 months by negotiating a payment plan with my creditor.
Measurable. A financial goal should be measurable so you know when you have achieved it.
General Financial Goal Statement: I will pay off most of my credit card debt soon.
Measurable Goal Statement: In the next six months, I will pay three of my five credit card bills in full.
Attainable. Make sure the financial goal is within reasonable reach.
General Goal Statement: I will save money.
Attainable Goal Statement: I will save $1,000 in a year by putting aside $3 each day.
Realistic. Is the economic goal realistic for you? Don’t ignore your limitations. Your economic goals need to be tasks that you can reasonably accomplish.
General Goal Statement: By managing my money well, next year I will become a millionaire.
Realistic Goal Statement: By managing my money well, next year I will be debt free and will have an emergency fund equal to three months of living expenses.
Trackable. Being able to track your progress encourages you to keep going and reach your fiscal goal.
General Fiscal Goal Statement: I will increase my savings goal every year.
Trackable Statement: Each year I will save 10 percent more money than the previous year.
If you are SMART about setting financial goals, you will be well on your way to managing your money in a way that will provide financial security for you and your family for years to come.
Every business talks of goals. No business can run without goals and no business can achieve anything without goals. The goals give direction to the business about where to head and what to achieve. Therefore for every business, goals are most important. Generally businesses set SMART Goals – specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-based. What about our personal goals in career and work? Are we to follow the goals of the organization and try to achieve them or set some more for ourselves that help us in our personal growth. What about having satisfying goals for ourselves? Let us discuss this further.
As a member of a business organization, all of us have to try and achieve the larger goals of the organization. That is true even for self run businesses. But can we reach the goals of business in a way that helps us achieve our own satisfying goals? We can. Let us see how? In the beginning, decide about what gives you satisfaction in your career. It can be – to learn something new every month, or to increase efficiency of ones work every month, or to work in a relaxed manner always, and so on. Each one of us will have his/her goal that satisfies ourself. So you will have to draw a list of goals that are desirable for your satisfaction and try to achieve them one after another.
For example, my first satisfying goal can be that I learn something new every month this year. I may be handling any work, but I want to learn something new about that work every month. That will make me feel personally satisfied. How do I do that? I can work on my given job, try and achieve my business goals and learn something new along with that. This new learning can also help me achieve business goals in time. Now if my organization makes and sells detergents, I will not only achieve the goals on quantity of sales but also about how as a sales person I learn one more sales method every month (This provided I am working as a sales person).
Setting my own satisfying goals and achieving them will not only make me happy and more confident but also make me move along faster in my career. Many of us are centered only on organization goals. Once we add our own satisfying goals to them we will be moving much faster in all the directions. Trying to achieve personal goals can also help remove lot of frustration and if a management can discuss satisfying goals for every employee and guide him/her about achieving them, the organization will have more of satisfied employees. The only care to be taken is that satisfying goals should help achieve business goals and not distract from them. So start defining your satisfying goals from today.
Goal setting is equal parts art and science. Many people create goals that simply don’t work. If you’re in business, you don’t have the luxury of creating goals that don’t work. You need to work effectively and you need goals you help you do it.
Here is a great way to create good goals that work? that keep you on track. They’re called SMART goals and the acronym SMART will help you to remember the things that each goal needs to be:
* Specific: Your goal needs to be stated in a way that is clearly defined. Saying, I should work more, is not a goal that will be kept. However, saying, I am going to work a total of 8 hours each day, is a goal that is much clearer and specific.
* Measurable: This is closely related to the above attribute except that it also includes a way to make sure you are on track. A goal that says, I want to make more money, isn’t measurable. However, a goal that says, I want to earn $6000/month, is a far more measurable goal. It’s easy to see, at the end of the month, whether or not you achieved it.
* Actionable: This means that your goal should be something that you need to do yourself in order to accomplish it. If you want to increase your income this year, it’s not realistic to say, I’m going to win the lottery this year, because you have no control over whether you will win the lottery or not. However you might say, I’m going to increase my sales efforts by cold calling 10 people each day, which is something you can take action on yourself.
* Realistic: Goals that are actually achievable are much better and far more motivating. You’ll feel better about yourself when you do hit goals than if constantly shoot for them and fall short. Realistic goals should not be so easy that you hit them every single time but should not be so hard that you never reach them at all.
* Time-oriented: Similar to the measurable attribute, your goal should have a timeframe for you to accomplish it in. Deadlines help people achieve their goals. If you anchor your goal to a time, you’ll be able to watch your progress.
You can remember this with the acronym, SMART, so that when you’re creating goals, you can create better goals for yourself. This is a popular goal-setting acronym in business, although occasionally the words are changed slightly to reflect the needs of the business.
