Setting authentically-aligned business goals that you’re actually excited about
Have you reached the point where you feel like your business is running you?
You began your entrepreneurial journey with a vision. Doing work you love, working less hours, making more money. Spending evenings and weekends with family or friends. However, at some point, the dream turned into trading game night with your kids for yet another late work session; sacrificing your physical and mental health for another quarter of growth; and feeling like your time is no longer your own.
I’ll be honest, whenever I hear about goal-setting during this time of year, I tune out pretty quickly—and I’m guessing you do, too. Hearing yet another online business guru telling me that my goals aren’t ambitious enough or that I have to 2x my revenue next year makes me want to crawl in a hole.
The problem isn’t with goal-setting: it’s that we’re rarely encouraged to set goals that are aligned with our needs, values, and selves.
As someone who is not a goal-setter by nature, I’ve learned in my few years as an entrepreneur that setting goals is less important than setting ones that make sense for me.
If you, like me, are someone who naturally shies away from #newyearnewme goal-setting—or if you are a goal-setter but have a tendency to run yourself into the ground with your own ambitions—this post is written with you in mind. We don’t need another lesson on how to set goals, but I think we could all use some encouragement on how to align our goals with where we are today. In that spirit, let’s dive into my 5 best practices for setting more aligned goals in the new year:
1. Stop separating yourself from your business.
If you are actively involved in leading and running your business—which most of us are—you need to stop separating yourself from your business.
Of course, there is a separation to an extent. You are a unique entity independent of your business and your role in it! You have dreams and aspirations that have nothing to do with your work, and your company’s vision and goals may be very distant from your own. However, I see a lot of talk about setting business goals, and a lot of talk about setting personal goals, but rarely is there discussion about the overlap of the two.
If you’re involved in the running of your business in any capacity, you must take your personal priorities, needs, and aspirations into consideration when setting business goals.
For busy working mompreneurs, this means recognizing if you’re in a season where maintaining your business is more important than exponential growth. For entrepreneurs looking to their business as a second income to pay off personal debts, this may mean a season where more hustle is required. Whatever is going on in your personal life will impact your ability to show up in your business, and pretending that the two are completely separate is simply self-deception. When setting new year goals for your business, make sure to take your capacity, your health, your needs, and more into consideration.
2. Be honest with yourself about what’s been working—and what hasn’t
One of my favorite parts of goal-setting is beginning with an honest assessment about what worked well this year—and what didn’t work so well. Taking a moment to pause and reflect on how I’ve felt about my business in the past 12 months provides greater clarity into how I should approach the new year.
Start by reflecting on your wins:
What were some big or small wins from the year?
What did you do differently this year that made a positive difference?
What made me feel energized in my business this year?
Then spend some time assessing what didn’t go so well:
What challenges did my business face this year?
Where did I personally struggle this year, either in my role in my business or in my personal life?
What did I try this year that didn’t go as planned?
Getting honest with yourself about the ups and downs of the past year provides the clarity needed to inform your next steps.
As business leaders, we’re really good at reviewing the numbers from the year before, but how often do we review how we felt in our business this year? Where we personally struggled in leading our team well, or juggling a health crisis, or burning out after a busy quarter? Or how adding another employee, automating our processes, or finally outsourcing social media management made all the difference to our sanity (and our financial bottom line)?
The answers to these questions shed light on what needs to be continued and what needs to be improved upon in the next year, and bringing your personal well-being into the equation ensures your next steps actually make sense for you.
3. Decide what you’re not going to do next year.
I was recently chatting with my business coach about the goals we’d recently set for Author Brand Studio’s new year, and he asked a simple question:
“And what are you not going to do?”.
This brief question hits to the heart of goal-setting: it’s as much about what you are going to do as what you are not going to do.
Aligned goal-setting isn’t just what you are going to do, but what you’re not going to do.
Maybe there are specific tasks you’re ready to take off your plate so you can focus on, you know, actually working on your own business (we’re all right there with you!). Maybe some areas you used to focus on are no longer priorities for you or your business moving forward. Or maybe some things simply need to take a backseat for the time being.
For us, this looks like certain streams of revenue will get more love and attention in the new year while others are simply maintained. And for me personally, this means (finally) admitting the areas I’m weak in as an entrepreneur and asking others who are gifted with those talents to step up.
A crucial aspect to saying “no” in business is not simply determining what isn’t a good business decision, but deciding what isn’t working for you as CEO. This may lead you to say “no” to certain things that, on paper, would be good business decisions but simply aren’t aligned with where you are at right now. And that’s okay!
Setting aligned goals may look like saying “no” to certain things that, on paper, would be good business decisions.
Set boundaries around the spaces you’re saying “no” to in the new year. Settle upon what tasks monopolize your valuable time or sap your precious energy and either remove them entirely or pass them along to a better-suited team member or outsourced partner. In all, take your unique season of life, personal priorities, strengths, and needs—both as a CEO and as an individual—into account.
4. Keep the big picture in mind, always.
I have yet to meet an entrepreneur who doesn’t have a long-term vision for how their business will shape their future.
“I started my business so I can retire early.”
“I want to travel the world while making good money doing what I love.”
Or my favorite yet: “I want to do interesting things and meet interesting people.”
The reality is that while some of us start a business out of necessity or with small hopes, all of us continue in that business because we see the bigger picture of what it will do for us personally.
Keeping my big dreams in mind has been a crucial step towards setting aligned goals for my business. I started Author Brand Studio simply because it was the best option for me at the time, but eventually my husband and I got clear on our long-term vision as a couple and how our business could become a vehicle for achieving that dream. While I absolutely love helping other entrepreneurs create their own ideal lives and scale their businesses through branding, I also know what I want my own business to provide for my family long-term, and I align my goals around that big picture.
Knowing what I want my business to provide for myself and my family ensures our business goals are aligned with this big picture.
This year, keeping the big picture in mind looks like setting a revenue goal that is determined by the income I want to make next year—and not an arbitrary number set just for the sake of exponential growth. It also looks like keeping certain boundaries that don’t make sense from a business perspective but allow me to live the day-to-day lifestyle I value. Going back to the first point listed earlier, the goals I’ve set for my business are based on my personal long-term vision and my values.
5. Include others in your business goals.
Once you’ve set aligned goals, it’s time to strategize how they’re going to get done, and by whom.
If you’ve already marked some tasks or responsibilities as ones you’re saying “no” to in the new year, but they still need to be done, start there. Assign those goals to specific team members where appropriate, and give them ownership of seeing those goals met in the new year! If you don’t have team members that can step up, determine how you’re going to get others to help with those goals, such as outsourcing.
A crucial part of setting aligned goals involves letting go of what you can’t, or shouldn’t be doing yourself.
This is a hard one for all of us. Maybe there’s a fear that someone else won’t do the job as well as you do, or won’t know your business as intimately as you do. Maybe there’s that guilt all women seem to carry that we’re a burden to others by asking for help! Or maybe you tell yourself, “It’s not that bad,” and eight months later that goal still hasn’t been done (this one is me to a T!).
Our sense of pride, insecurity, or guilt in holding onto the goals we should be letting go of only harms our businesses and our personal well-being.
This year, get help where you need it in your business. If it’s time to stop going alone, bring someone else into your business or seek an external partner for that thing you’ve been putting off for far too long! The goals that are left will be the ones that are most aligned around your own strengths and capabilities.
If “finally leveling up my brand” is on your to-do list for the new year, we’re here to help. Your consultation call is completely free! Just tap or click the link below to get a head-start on your new year’s resolutions:
