This fall, take your organization’s finances to the next level by creating a clearly defined set of goals and a plan to achieve them.
“Financial goals provide your team with a sense of direction,” said Dr. Manjula Jegasothy, Co-Founder at MiamiMD. “They act as a guide to help you identify the steps you need to take to continue to thrive and build your business.”
This comprehensive guide will prepare you to determine and realize your financial goals and put your business on a path to future success.
Before looking ahead, you must examine the past to see where your company has made and lost money. Reviewing your company’s finances will determine what’s possible going forward.
“Look through your organization’s profit, expenses, and debts closely,” advised Bob Craycraft, CEO of Cadence. “Use money management tools to make sure you have an accurate picture of your business’s financial health.”
Once you’ve compiled all the necessary information, try to simplify your summary into an easily digestible format. Creating graphics and a concise report will help you strategize with members of the C-suite and key stakeholders to develop the next steps.
After reviewing your finances, it’s time to consider your objectives for the fall. This will help you clearly identify the areas where you want to improve your business.
“The first step in setting financial goals is to identify the objectives that you want to achieve,” stated Melissa Houston, founder of She Means Profit. “Do you want to increase sales? Lower expenses? Increase profits? By identifying your objectives, you can create a plan of action to reach them.”
It’s important to include the members of your leadership team in this process. They may have insight into specific parts of your business’s financial health that you are not exposed to yourself.
One of the most damaging errors that a company can make is creating a vague set of goals. While for-profit organizations are almost always looking to improve their bottom line, you must be specific about what it will take to make that possible.
“Setting specific financial goals can help you and your employees stay motivated and focused,” noted Greg Hannley, Founder and CEO of Soba Mesa. “Specificity will provide everyone with a sense of direction and help them attach their work to a larger purpose.”
As soon as you and your leadership team have created a set of specific financial goals, share them with the rest of the team. Transparency in your goals can create a sense of shared investment in achieving them and cultivate a sense of loyalty to the company.
If you’re setting financial goals for the fall, they inherently will be short-term. Although that’s extremely important, make sure you outline how these fall goals will help you achieve your business five- and ten-year goals, as well.
“On a practical level, connecting your short-term goals to your long-term goals will give you a big-picture perspective on your financial planning,” highlighted Shaunak Amin, CEO and Co-Founder of ByStadium. “Psychologically, this connection can provide a source of motivation.”
Seeing how the sacrifices and choices you make this fall will benefit you and your business in the future can help your team feel like their efforts are worthwhile. Share this long-term perspective as much as possible to inspire them to keep up the good work.
After you’ve solidified your goals, you’ll need to rank them in terms of priority. Prioritization will help you create a plan of action based on your goals.
“When you have several financial goals that you want to achieve, it can be hard to know where to start,” shared Brianna Bitton, Co-Founder of O Positiv, a company known for their MENO menopause supplements. “Prioritizing them will let you know where to direct your energy and resources first.”
Remember, the low-priority goals are still goals and may become higher-priority further down the road. Also, keep in mind that your priority ranking is flexible and subject to change as you execute your plan.
A large part of financial planning involves recognizing your company’s tolerance for risk. Assessing whether or not you want to adopt a more conservative or aggressive financial plan is integral to goal setting.
“Generally speaking, risk tolerance is defined as an organization’s ability to deal with the negative effects of risky choices that may impact its goals or operations,” noted Justin Soleimani, Co-Founder of Tumble, a company known for their washable rugs. “In terms of finances and specifically investments, it refers to the level of risks an organization can take to achieve their goals.”
Every company will have a different risk tolerance. As a leader, your job is to work with financial advisors to determine your company’s specific risk tolerance and create a strategy based on that information.
Your fall goals have been set, and your business’s risk tolerance has been assessed. Now, it’s time to adjust your budget. Going into the fall, your budget should directly reflect the goals you set at the beginning of the season.
“Think of adjusting your budget as what gets the ball rolling on your fall financial plan,” underscored Lance Patterson, CEO of Juice Beauty, a company known for their CC cream. “Making your employees aware of the changes to your budget can help everyone feel a sense of investment in meeting these goals.”
Regardless of your market, it will change and evolve throughout the fall. Because of this, you may need to continue tweaking your budget to stay true to your goals and market conditions.
Delegation is key in financial planning. While you may want to be directly involved in goal-setting, you will need to assign different team members to specific goals to guarantee that they are met.
“Part of the reason you need a management team that you trust is because they will be the ones helping you achieve your goals,” added George Fraguio, Vice President of Bridge Lending at Vaster. “Make sure to check in regularly with these employees to see how each part of your organization is working to achieve your objectives.”
If you’re truly focused on improving your business’s financial health, it may be wise to schedule weekly meetings with the people working most closely to achieve your outlined goals. To provide this team with direction, create milestones that must be met along the way.
Once you’ve set your company’s goals and implemented your plan to achieve them, you must track your team’s progress. This step is crucial because you may need to make changes to your plan as the situation evolves.
“If weekly meetings are too frequent, consider scheduling bi-weekly or monthly calls,” detailed Scott Chaverri, CEO at Mito Red Light, a company that specializes in devices for red light therapy at home. “In these meetings, you can see how close you are to meeting your goals and, if need be, discuss what adjustments are needed to get closer.”
Communicate the results of these meetings with top stakeholders and team members lower on the corporate ladder. When you get close to meeting your fall goals, share the news with them to celebrate the hard work that has led to positive results.
Aiming for total perfection in achieving your goals will set you up for failure. Instead, clearly articulate to your team that what you’re looking for is progress and improvement.
“Worrying about doing something perfectly can stop you from doing anything at all,” remarked Jeremy Campbell, CEO of Black Isle Group. “Recognizing this barrier is the first step to overcoming it.”
This final step is essential for you to remember as a leader, but it’s just as applicable to your team and the company as a whole. After all, your business will always encounter obstacles, and your success will be determined not by perfection but by resolving them.
Setting and achieving your financial goals for the fall will undoubtedly be challenging and require flexibility and adaptation on the part of you and your team. Still, it’s a worthwhile Q4 pursuit.
“Setting meaningful financial goals demands a close look at where your business is at in the present moment and clearly articulating where you want it to go,” observed Leah Francis, Head of Growth at Postable, a company known for their customizable Christmas cards. “You’ll need to get your whole team involved in the process to achieve these goals and recover from the bumps along the way.”
As you begin to meet our short-term goals this fall, take the time to celebrate your team’s dedication and achievements. Don’t lose sight of the fact that meeting your short-term goals will put your business on track to reach your five and ten-year goals and become as successful as possible.
Alexia is the author at Research Snipers covering all technology news including Google, Apple, Android, Xiaomi, Huawei, Samsung News, and More.
