What will stay and what will go
The blank canvas of 2021 offers us an opportunity for a fresh start. On both a personal and professional level, Impagination’s First Best Action Planner™ exercise will help you build quantitative goals and a set of tactics to achieve them in the year ahead. Let’s get started…
Review the events listed in your 2020 calendar
Look at each month of the past year, on your own or with your team, and assess the result of each action taken. Decide what will stay and what will go in the coming year:
- Did you initiate a new product or service offer, or introduce a virtual service? Did it result positively or negatively in achieving your objectives?
- Did you invest in new equipment or training? Did it pay off in terms of reducing costs while building growth?
- Did you join a new organization or network? Was it worth the time and effort in terms of the contacts and opportunities it delivered?
- Did you attend a specific networking event? Did it result positively or negatively in reaching your specific goals?
- Did you research new markets for potential expansion and diversification? Did you take steps to identify promising contacts within those markets? Did it result in new opportunities?
Reviewing what worked and didn’t work in 2020 will help you build a strong platform for growth in 2021.
Setting personal goals
This can-do strategy also works well for establishing realistic 2021 goals for yourself. SMART goals… specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time bound. Writing them down helps to make them tangible.
These targets might include:
- Downsizing
- Reducing expenses
- Saving more money
- Spending more time with family
- Taking more time for exercise
- Investing time in intellectual or creative pursuits
- Focusing on a better work/life balance
Setting goals for yourself puts you in the driver’s seat. It gives you focus and direction for 2021, and a benchmark for measuring your success in achieving what you set out to do.
