This is a great time for you to set your business goals, so that you have clarity on exactly where you want to go with your business this year.
If you haven’t already reviewed your previous year in business in 2020, then you might like to check out my blog, “It’s time to review your year in business”. So, you can get clear on the key lessons and learnings from 2020 that will help you successfully set your goals for 2021.
In this article I am going to guide you through my process to set your business goals for 2021….but before we dive into my process, I want to talk about why it is so important that you set business goals.
The first reason is that it is so easy to get stuck into the detail of running your business that you don’t give enough time to charting the course of where you want to go with your business.
When you set business goals (and life goals) it becomes a lot easier to move yourself and your business in the direction you really want to go in.
Having your goals mapped out can also make it easier to see when you are going off course, so you can course correct, and get back on track.
The second reason is that if 2020 didn’t go as you’d have hoped, then setting your goals for 2021 will give you clarity on what you need to do to ensure 2021 does go as you plan.
Okay, so let’s dive in to my 5 step process to set your 2021 business goals
Step 1 – Reconnect With Your Purpose
The first step that I’d recommend you take is to reconnect with your purpose for doing the work that you’re doing.
- What is the difference you want to make to your audience, and on a wider level in the world?
- How do you want to transform your audience’s lives this year?
By asking yourself these questions you will reconnect with your passion for the work that you do.
Step 2 – Get Clear on Your Vision For Your Business This Year
Once you’ve got back in touch with your passion and you’re feeling motivated about getting back in with your business this year, the next step is to identify the goals that you want to achieve this year.
The best way to do this is to get clear on your vision of where you want to be in 12 months’ time.
Ask yourself the question:
“At the end of 2021, what needs to have happened with my business this year for me to be happy with my progress?”
You can ask yourself that question in relation to key areas of your business, such as:
- Purpose – what bigger difference do you want to make this year to your audience and in the world?
- Fulfilment – what needs to happen this year for you to feel deeply fulfilled by your work and in your life?
- Financial – what revenue, profit, personal income do you need to make this year to feel happy with your abundance and wealth?
- Clients – what needs to happen in terms of clients you work with this year for you to be happy with your progress?
Then set yourself three key goals for each of these areas, so you have clarity on your business goals for 2021.
Step 3 – Get Clear on Your Vision For Your Life This Year
Once you’ve done that, you’re going to have a lot of clarity around your business goals for this year. But, you also need to know your personal goals.
Oftentimes we have quite a different set of personal goals from our business goals. So, we need to know our personal goals in case there are any conflicts between our business and our personal goals.
Ask yourself the question:
“At the end of 2021, what needs to have happened, for me in my personal life, this year for me to be happy with my progress?”
You can ask yourself that question in relation to key areas of your business, such as:
- Social & Relationship – what needs to happen in my relationships with my friends, personal life and family for me to be happy with my progress this year?
- Health – what needs to happen with my health and wellbeing for me to be happy?
- Wealth – what wealth and abundance do I want to be enjoying in a years’ time? What needs to have happened to make this possible?
- Personal Development & Continued Learning – how will I want to have grown and what passions will I want to have followed for me to be happy with my progress this year?
Then set yourself three key goals for each of these areas, so you have clarity on your personal goals for 2021.
You might have other areas you want to create goals on in addition to the four I have presented for your business and life. So, just go ahead and create titles for each area, and add your three goals in under each title.
Step 4 – Prioritise Your Goals
Once you’ve got your business goals and your personal goals written down review them to see if there are any goals that are in conflict with one another.
Ask yourself:
- Are there any goals you have that you can’t really do both goals?
- Or if you want to do both goals, what might you need to do to make this possible?
Once you have clarity on the goals you want to move forwards with for your business and personal life, you are ready to put these goals in order of priority.
Remember you don’t need to complete all your goals at once. Take a piece of paper and create four separate sections on the paper. So, you have a section for quarter 1 of 2021, a section underneath for quarter 2 of 2021, then quarter 3, and quarter 4.
Now you can start to plan which three business and personal goals you will focus on in each quarter of 2021.
If you are like me you will have a tendency to do them all at once, but this simply leads to overwhelm and nothing getting completed.
By breaking your year in to quarters you can start to see that there are 12 months to achieve your goals. You can also see whether some of your goals are less important than others. This will give you even greater focus and clarity.
You can ask yourself,
- “What’s my priority here?”
- “Which goal(s) is my focus in this quarter, and this year?”
- “What’s most important to me?”
- “Which goal(s) are going to get me to my ultimate vision of where I want to be at the end of 2021?”
As you go through this process try to keep that bird’s-eye view rather than getting too stuck into the details of how you will achieve your goals.
We just want to keep with that excitement, and that desire, and that motivation for what we want to create from that overarching kind of place this year.
Step 5 – Create Your 2021 Vision Board
The final step is to create a vision board for your big goals for 2021. You can draw your goals or cut up pictures from magazines to represent your goals. Make sure you put your images for your goals onto a single piece of paper.
Then, put your vision board up in your office or somewhere where you’re going to see it every day, so over this coming year, so that you can keep telling your mind that this is what you’re working on.
This is the direction you’re going….you will be telling the universe, this is what you’re wanting to achieve this year.
Okay, so I can’t wait to hear all about your goals that you’ve set for yourself for 2021. So please do let me know. And good luck with this process.
