Achieve Business Success Faster Than You Ever Imagined: Unlock the Power of Business Goals!

Transcript:

Introduction: Inspiration from Everyday Tasks

Hello there, I hope you all had a really good weekend. This weekend my darling wife handed me a list of tasks she wanted me to do around the house. You know, such as putting up a new shelf in the kitchen. And this got me thinking, how this task list was very succinct. By being clearly defined, it enabled me to meet her goals.

So, I thought, today we’ll discuss setting up your business goals. And the first steps to successful business.

Shall we start?

The Essence of Business Goals: Definition and Importance

What are really business goals? Well, business goals are targets, another business or individual set to achieve in a set period of time. They can be split into short term goals or long term goals.

Distinguishing Between Short-Term and Long-Term Goals

Short term goals are usually bound by a specific time period.
Well, the long term goals are visions that you want to achieve further in the future. However, the short term goals can be the elements of the longer term goals. So you can meet the long term goals. I suppose a good example of a general business goal is the mission statement. The goal is more of a guided principle for your team to strive towards rather than a specific metric of success.

But on the other hand, specific measurable goals are easier to track as your team progresses towards them. You know, once you’ve sorted out or decided on your long term goals or short term goals, for that matter, this would include the project managers, who would generally tally out the tasks to individuals required to support those tasks. But generally short term goals are often used as a building block towards the larger goals.

By setting multiple short term goals, you can make the long term goals more achievable. If I was to say what a short term business goal included to you, um, let’s say increasing net score by 10 points in a quarter. Maybe hiring 12 new support representatives by the end of the year and increasing employee satisfaction by, say, 25%. Whilst long term goals are bigger visions that you want to achieve further in the future, a common long term goal is a, say, a 10 year goal. We often use this as a compass for our business to help us move in the right direction.

You know, part of our long term goal is creating more content such as these podcasts. So each podcast is a short term goal to achieve the long term goal.

Case Studies: Successful Companies and Their Goals

Let’s bring a few companies into the mix here. You know, Nike set a goal to bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world. Whilst Patagonia’s goal is to save the planet and Google’s goal is very simple, to organise the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.

The Importance of Setting Business Goals

This brings down the point of why a business goal is so important. Setting goals is the best practice for a reason. Goals help drive businesses in the right direction. There are a few reasons why companies take the time to establish strong goals.

Key Strategies for Defining and Achieving Goals

Point one would be to confidently define success. One of the easiest ways to know if your team is successful is by clearly outlining what success looks like.
When you set your goals, take into consideration what you know your team is capable of and push them slightly further than they expect. There are quite a few common frameworks used to define goals. One that our project manager is very keen on utilising to create, you know, measurable and actionable goals is objectives and key results.

Linking Daily Work to Business Goals

Point two would be connecting work to goals. I think a good business strategy to get into the habit of doing this, it’s connecting your business goals to the work your team is already doing. When you connect daily work to short and long term goals, individual team members have a real clear sense of what they need to do, when they need to complete it, and the strategies they’re doing to achieve these goals.

This is all done through our project management tool. But not only are the team members more confident in what they need to do, but it gives them a sense of pride and ownership, especially over their work. Team members are confident in how the work they’re doing impacts your business and how they’re contributing to that success. And that’s what we want. We want our team members to contribute to that success.

Aligning Teams with Common Business Objectives

Point three would be keeping your teams aligned. You know, there’s a key benefit of Using business goals to align teams towards the common goal: it establishes clear business objectives, allowing your team leaders to define which tactics their individual team members should be using to achieve the company’s goals.

You know, if we were to give an example, imagine your company’s overall business goal is to increase profitability by 10 per cent in this situation. This is an overarching goal, but there are many different ways your company can achieve this. By establishing smaller, more tailored goals business leaders can define the specific strategy you plan to take to achieve this goal.

Let’s say your sales team may increase their sales quota, or your marketing team may implement new outreach strategies. These are two different tactics that can be implemented to ultimately reach the same goal.

Maintaining Accountability Through Goal Setting

Point four would be Maintaining accountability. This is extremely important. You know, once you set business goals, you can then break them down to their individual levels, as we discussed earlier. Using a technique like this can help maintain accountability from the leadership level all the way down to be individual team members. When individual team members are responsible for their individual goals, it’s easier for managers to gauge how they’re performing and when they might need further support.

Informed Decision Making Based on Goal Tracking

Point five would be about informed decision making. If your company regularly tracks its business goals, you can use the past goals as a way to inform Your decision making process. So, for example, if your team sets up a new marketing strategy, which tracks your goals and progress, you can use that information to set your business’s strategy for the next year based on the performance of that specific marketing strategy.

Tips for Establishing Effective Business Goals

I’m sure you can see the reasoning why business goals are important. But here are a few tips to enable you to establish them.

Utilising Goal-Setting Frameworks for Clarity and Focus

Look at using frameworks like smart goals or OKRs. They’re a really good way to establish your first set of business goals, make sure they’re challenging, but not so complex that they’re not achievable.

Co-Creating Goals with Team Leaders for Comprehensive Strategy

I think it’s great to co-create my business goals with the team leaders in the company, as the work that your team does can have an effect on other departments within your company, which in turn affects the business strategy as a whole. This is why co-creating with what I would call stakeholders is extremely important.

And this is where you can utilise your team’s unique knowledge and experience in creating a really sound business plan.

Starting with the Big Picture: Vision and Mission Statements

You know, we can start with the big picture when you’re establishing your goals. Choosing numbers and tactics can feel overwhelming. To prevent that, start with the bigger picture first, then focus on answering the small questions.

You know, what do you want your company to stand for? Why was your company created? Where do you want to be in 10 years or say 25 years? Once you’ve defined this really big mission statement, break it down into smaller, more actionable goals. Which steps you can take to get there, what new products you need to introduce to help achieve that overall big picture mission.

Implementing Goals in Project Management Tools for Tracking Progress

There’s no point creating this big mission statement with all these goals and then dumping it in some document that sits hidden in a folder that nobody opens in the end. So we must transfer these goals within project management tools that can track the goal progress. It’s incredibly important, so it all goes to the project managers and they’ll put it into, say, the likes of Zoho Projects or Twillow, whichever one you specifically like, and then it can be checked on a continuous basis.

Conclusion: The Roadmap to Successful Business Growth

So, to summarise what we’ve been discussing, setting up your business goals is an important part of growing a successful business. By defining what success looks like, Connecting to daily work to short and long term goals, aligning your teams towards a common goal, maintaining accountability and using past performance to inform decision makers what your business is and how your business is moving in the right direction.

Remember to use goals, setting frameworks, co create with stakeholders, start with a really big picture and manage goals using software to achieve the best of results.

Closing Remarks and Call to Action

Anyway, that’s all we have time for today. I hope you’ve really enjoyed it. Do remember to subscribe, like, and leave a comment. I love receiving comments from people.

If you have any questions, contact me. Otherwise… Thank you for tuning in to the Ecommerce Insiders Podcast. Bye for now.