2023 The tough year ahead – So best you put a plan in place
As a business owner in South Africa in 2023, the year ahead is looking tough.
That may be true, but is that your truth?!
We just had a first Goal Setting workshop of the year, and when looking back at it, each business that attended was facing different challenges, yet all have the same underlining challenge. Similarly looking at the responses I get each week when I host “The Weekly Chat with Kenny” questions. The challenge that there is, is a certain amount that we cannot control. As a business owner in South Africa, we cannot control the political environment, the load shedding, the corruption, the rand, the potholes, that poor service deliveries in the various municipalities etc. However, what we can control, the number one thing that we can control is our attitude. You have this opportunity everyday when you wake in the morning, you can decide to Blame the above issue, use them as excuses and denies yourself the opportunity to focus on what really matters. That is do what you do best, focus on what you can control, decide if you want to succeed or roll over and give up.
So, who wants to succeed? I know I do, and I also want each and every client that is working with myself and/or any of our coaches to succeed. The second most important thing that you must have in place is a realistic plan. Because if you don’t have a plan, and you are just facing what comes up each day, well then how do you even know if you are succeeding or not, you get through the day, no! You must have a plan, so that you can measure it step by step, so that you can make small adjustments to the plan to keep it going to where you need it to succeed. By having a plan, and no it doesn’t have to be a master piece, but it must be a plan, that you can test and measure continuously.
What type of plan should you have in your business?
A Vision of where you want your business to be in the future, because if you don’t have a destination, well what are you aiming for then? You must have milestones that you would like to achieve, but certain dates. You need to be focused daily on these milestones, to measure your performance to achieve them. Some examples of these milestones can be, Turnover, Cashflow, number of employees, number of clients, average client spend, hours worked, etc. it should all be in the plan.
Yes, life happens, and it will feel like the plan will never work, but that is because we are not learning from the plan. Review continuously your businesses results, alter, manage the plan, based on the results you are achieving to the results that you need to achieve.
Your business is the life line to your personal life, take care of both. You should have plans for the following: marketing, personal growth, team members growth plan, financial plan, growth plan, a products plan, a service plan, a downside plan, sales plan etc.…
You have to focus on all aspects of your business every day, yes every day, what are the key areas that measure your success? Measure them, test them, alter them and if needs be change them. If you keep doing the same thing every day and getting the result every day, well then you will remain where you are.
I have seen businesses and large companies, who hit a winning formular and stop testing and pushing the results, they just enjoy it, well nothing last forever and neither do they.
So, you can decide now what will the rest of 2023/2024 be for you and your business? Are you going to do the same thing you did in 2022, and for a lot of companies that was just to survive, well survival is no longer just enough.
Is there a need for your product or service that your business offers? Yes, well then do the best that you can, don’t settle for it’s enough to get by on. Strive to be the best. Nobody goes into a game saying we are happy to lose, before the game starts. You have a game plan, you have a strategy, you have best and worst case scenarios, so why not in your business, plan, learn and act, repeat, repeat, repeat.
When I started as a business coach, I was trying to do what all the other coaches where doing, but that didn’t fit with me, so I challenge the way of thinking, I tested and measure what really worked and what didn’t. I challenged why I was in business, I knew that the way it was going, would never work, I knew what my vision was, however I was going about it the wrong way, so I began altering it step by step, until I was ready to make a directional change.
Making the change because I tested and measure and still test and measure every day. I remain true to who I am, not what everyone else thinks I should be.
Put your plan in place, test it daily, learn from the results, alter to see if that improves it or not alter, and Take Action, each time, otherwise your will never know if it works.
If you’re not sure, get in touch with us, one of our coaches are ready to assist.
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