In our small businesses we have goals, create tasks which we accomplish or delegate, and we grow our businesses. These plans must be reviewed regularly, and we do that through a retreat. We might have one major retreat a year and then perhaps a mid-year check to ensure we are on track.
Just like in our goals, breaking things into pieces makes them more manageable and a business is no different.
Breaking Down the Business
I break my business into some high-level areas which all have separate goals which directly support the overall business goals. Not all businesses will have these same areas, but for my technology support business, I went with the following:
- Business Operations – The back-office efforts. This is where we might manage costs, make debt decisions, hire people, and other functions.
- Business Development – This is the creative side of the business; finding new products and services to sell. It might also include making changes to current offerings. This area works closely with the next area, which is similar but not the same thing. Once we decide on products and services, we must Market them!
- Marketing – The promotion of our business. What makes people want to come and work with us? The goal of marketing is to find and keep people interested in the business, so they will consider us for…
- Sales – This is the part of the business that gets the work. From the efforts of the last two areas, we now can move on to sales. I should say that in some businesses, you might not have Business Development since you just sell what you are signed up to, and they might even provide the marketing (like with certain small businesses doing Network Marketing or Direct Sales). Ultimately if you are in business, if any of the three, you will have sales.