Webinar replay – Year-end planning
Strategy planning for the new year is critical for a successful launch in the new year. Take 25 minutes to watch this master class in year-end review and list building in preparation for the new year.
Make your Year End lists
As a team or alone make a list of all the things you have not yet gotten to this year. Time to purge that guilt and get it all on paper for all to see. This is great therapy for a team to share the items that were not done. IT is not a guilt trip, but a time of celebration of what was not done because you were too busy doing other things.
Then cross off the items that are now no longer relevant to the business or team. This leaves you with a new list that will feed into next week’s plan.
Year-End Planning 1
It is that time of year again when we begin to see Christmas decorations in the stores and people begin to wind down for the holiday seasons. But there are still some very important things to do before we close off 2017.
This series of 5 videos will walk you through a process we do ourselves and with clients each year at this time. A process that helps you reflect back on the past year and then begin to map out a way forward for the new year.
This first video will give you a set of tools to use to look back over the past 10 months and map out some of the notable achievements and those all-important non-achievements and then what to do with each.
Take some time with yourself or your management team to do these exercises each week to give your business the unfair advantage in the starting blocks for 2018.
Enjoy. Your comments and ideas are most welcome.
Year End Planning – Final
At the end of each season, we need to take some time to rest. Rest the body, rest the mind and rest our souls.
But too often we are so used to working in the fast lane that when it comes time for a bit or R&R, we feel guilty and put ourselves down. We need to give ourselves permission to put sown the tools of our trade and do something different. Read a book, go to movies, spend quality time with friends and family. Take a walk in nature, up a mountain, along a beach.
We were never designed to work and work and work. Even God took time to rest after creation. This models a way in which we need to live our lives. Please find time, even in this busy time of year to chill out and rejuvenate ready for the year that lies ahead.
From the team at EM-solutions to you, your staff and your family members. Congratulations for getting this far. Have a very blessed Christmas and we will pick up things in the new year as we talk about dashboards, development canvases and Wildly Important Goals.
Year End Planning part 3
So, now that you have that list of things left over from this year, what do we do with it?
Add to it. Add the new items for the next 12 months. Look at the areas required to get you and your business to the place you most desire. What do you need to be to get there – add this to the list? What does your staff need to be? What new tools, equipment and knowledge need to be within your business? Keep adding until you are satisfied that you have enough to equip and empower yourself for what lies ahead.
New we will have to deal with this list….. in the next part of this series.
Year End Planning Part 2
Take some paper and make a list of all the things you have not achieved or got around to doing this year. This is not a guilt trip or a way to highlight your failures, but a way to acknowledge all the things just not yet done.
List the big stuff and the small items that you planned or just hoped to do, then go over the list and scratch out the ones that now seem irrelevant or unobtainable. Often we plan to do things, but circumstances change, yet we fail to change our goals. Cross these off and forget them.
The left over items can be used to determine a new list of new carry-over goals for the next year and the next exercise in this process.
Year End Reflection Time
And into December we go. And as predicted there are always a bunch of memes, blogs and articles telling us to pause, reflect and plan. Some of them good and some not so.
But here is an exercise that could literally change your business and your future. It is so important that we have put together a short video course on the process that we will post over the next few weeks and we ask that you follow along and do the short exercise for each lesson.
Doing is different from just listening and thinking about doing. I want to encourage you to get that paper and pen out and do the work. Just 10 minutes per day over 5 days will see significant changes in your future. Guaranteed.
It has been a busy year – goodbye 2015
It has been a busy year
Over the last 12 months we have had 196 coaching appointments resulting in just over 400 hours of strategy development with individual entrepreneurs across all sectors.
To add to this we have been privileged to complete 145 hrs of mentoring to groups of Entrepreneurs as well as run 31 different workshops and had the honour of presenting 12 different key note addresses to various groups of people.
Over and above this we have developed curriculum for a School based Entrepreneurship programme with 10 modules, an Idea Generation workshop, a 12 module Supplier Gap Analysis programme for Shanduka Black Umbrellas and a new, yet to released, Start-Up School programme.
As you can tell it has been a busy year for the whole team. Next year brings a huge work load as we begin a new internal business strategy that will not only increase our business and staff size, but bring a vast new array of service offering to all our current and new clients.
So between now and the start of 2016, we will slow down a bit, rest a little, take time to refocus and then hit the new year road running.
Many blessing to you all our clients, readers and supports for this Christmas season. We will see you on the other side.
Looking back to plan forward Part 4
This week we will take a short journey through a series of exercises that we use to cement the leanings from the past year and prepare for the quantum leap into 2016.
The final part to this planning exercise is to make a list from your outstanding issues that needs and can be addressed in the remaining time this year. So many of us just write off December as down time and spend far too much time playing Angry Birds and not getting the small items off the list.
Take your list from Part 2 of this series and write out all the A items that need to be addressed and sorted before the close of the year. Add to this any items that need to be done. Often small items around the office such as backups, cabling, lights or equipment servicing can be included and done during this time.
Then allocate resources; actual names and dates to each item. Good time for a staff coffee meeting and let everyone have a copy of your list. Communication, feedback and accountability is always a great way to get things done. Celebrate when the list is done and take the afternoon off to do your Christmas shopping. Do not forget to get me something.
Looking back to plan forward Part 2
It is always said that the best way to keep focused while driving forward and looking through the windscreen is to keep an eye on the rear view mirror for the lessons learned.
As the year winds down, this week we will take a short journey through a series of exercises that we use to cement the leanings from the past year and prepare for the quantum leap into 2016.
The first exercise is to rid yourself of any guilt that you may carry into the festive season and holidays.
Make a list of all outstanding issues, programmes and unaccomplished tasks that you have been meaning to get done with this year.
This could include simple things such as replacing the kettle to setting up your new website or carrying out office renovations. This list is your ‘Parked’ list. We are not throwing these items out, just parking them to identify them as not yet fully addressed.
Too often we set our sights on a task that is outside our main focus and when reviewed it just seems not urgent anymore. Now is a good time to kill these babies and get back on track. Go back over them and cross out any that are no longer relevant or required.
For the issues left, mark them with an A or C – A being those that are important and still needing to be done this year and C being those that can wait until next year.
Then take the afternoon off. Just by doing this simple exercise, you have already gained enough motivation to get cracking on any outstanding issues.