Last year, over 90% of the clients I worked with had never created any kind of plan for their business. Yet, every single one of them was struggling in one way or another in their business.
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Many of them were having trouble attracting enough of the right clients, successfully selling their services, filling their programs and creating a consistent flow of income into their business to support themselves. And, if they were achieving some level of success they were often doing it at the expense of their health, happiness or their personal relationships.
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They were working harder than they needed to because they had no plan.
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Running a successful business without a plan is a lot like trying to find your way to a hotel in a foreign country without a map or directions. Can you get to where you want to go? Sure, but the odds are that you’ll get lost along the way, have to circle back through streets you’ve already travelled and spend a lot more time trying to get there than you would have if you had a clear set of directions.
If you’ve ever been lost, you know how frustrating and stressful the whole experience can be. So why is it that so many small business owners navigate their business like the traveller in a foreign country trying to find their way without a map, without direction and without a plan?
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If you are ready to end the anxiety, stress and overwhelm in your business, you need a plan!
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Planning is the key to your success because it helps you to create a pathway from where you are to where you want to be. When talking with clients about planning, I know it can be a touchy subject. Many of them are afraid of planning and feel instant overwhelm at the mention of the word, you may experience a similar reaction.
To help you overcome these stumbling blocks and ease into the idea of creating a plan for your business, I’d like to give you SIX simple steps to planning by using an analogy of your car’s GPS.
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Step # 1 – Begin With The End In Mind
Before you can begin moving forward and before your GPS can provide you with the right directions, you must plug in an end destination. If you aren’t clear where you are going and don’t know your end point, you will never be able to get there. Planning is the same thing. If you don’t have clear understanding of the goals and expectations for your business, it will be impossible for you to reach your destination.
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Step #2 – Identify Where You Are Right Now
In order to successfully navigate from one place to another both in life and in business, you have to be really clear about where you are right now. When you are embarking on a trip you plug your destination into your GPS and then it calculates where you are to begin building a set of directions to take you from where you are to where you want to go. Without an accurate starting point, your GPS wouldn’t be able to provide you with accurate directions for your journey. The same goes for planning.
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Step #3 – Break Your Plan Down into Manageable Steps
Just like your GPS simplifies your road trip by breaking it down into a series of simple right and left turns, you need to develop a series of simple, action oriented steps that you can take to get you from Point A to Point B in your business.
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Step #4 – Identify the Resources Needed To Make the Journey
Most GPS systems will provide you some basic information to help you make your journey a pleasant and successful one. For example, it will tell you if you are going to encounter toll roads, it tells you how many miles you can expect to go, how long it will take you and many GPS’s even monitor the speed you are travelling against the posted speed limit on for the road you are on. All this information allows you to plan ahead and make sure you have the right resources available for the trip. Do you have money for tolls, do you have enough gas, enough time etc. In order for your business plan to be successful, you must also take the time to identify additional resources you might need to gather in order to successfully execute your plan. Make a list of what you need and commit to getting the right resources in place to achieve your goals.
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Step #5 – Focus on The Next Right Step
Your GPS only provides you with one turn at a time, which makes navigating your trip easy and enjoyable. You trust this process because you know it has calculated the best route and if you follow the step by step directions, it will get you where you want to go. If it were to hurl all the directions at you at once, you’d probably get lost and feel overwhelmed. There is a huge lesson in this when it comes to executing the plan for your business. Don’t let the list of steps you need to take overwhelm you, instead, focus only on the the next right step. Trust yourself and your plan – this one practice will help you achieve your goals faster and with a minimal amount of stress and overwhelm.
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Step #6 – If You Take a Detour, Recalculate Your Journey
Sometimes when you set out on a road trip, you decide half way into the trip to add a stop or two. Perhaps you need to get dinner or you decide to visit old Aunt Millie, whatever the diversion, it can take you off your charted course, but the beauty is, your GPS will automatically recalculate the directions for you based on where you are in that moment. The reality is, priorities do change sometimes and new goals replace old ones. You need to give yourself permission to make additions or deletions to your plan if your priorities change. The important thing to remember is that a change in goals will mean a change in your plan. In order to successfully navigate the change you’ve made and still arrive successfully at your destination, you also need to take the time to re-calculate the right steps to achieve these new goals.
