A List of New Year’s Resolutions for Small Business Owners

One of the most exciting and most important tasks to do before the New Year comes is to create our New Year’s Resolutions. This is the time that we look back what we have achieved and what we have failed in the year that has just passed by. This is also the perfect moment to create and plot our goals and plans for this new and promising year. We aim to attain growth and improve ourselves in many ways, such as by learning new things, quitting bad habits and strengthening our relationships with others. For small business owners and entrepreneurs, a New Year’s resolution is not just a mere promise to do better next year, but it is a more strategic desire to develop specific matters related to their businesses and life at its entirety. The following is a list of 44 New Year’s Resolutions for small business owners and entrepreneurs. You can choose some of the ideas below to start your own list.

1. Grow your net profit by at least 10% in the first quarter. You can also set specific goals to increase your sales and reduce your specific expenses that you think should be reduced this year.

2. Make a financial budget and stick to it. This includes making a simple set of budgeted financial statements, such as balance sheet, income statement and cash flow. You can hire the service of an accountant to help you on this.

3. Establish an emergency fund. This doesn’t need to start with a big amount of fund. The key is to start small and make it consistently grow. You can save a realistic amount of money every week to form as your emergency fund.

4. Have a dinner with your employees at least once a month. This will make you closer and will make your employees more comfortable to work with you.

5. Conduct an in-house professional training for your employees at least once a month. This will improve efficiency and productivity inside your organization.

6. Conduct a team-building activity once in two months to continuously encourage and motivate your people. You should also track the improvements of your team’s performance.

7. Perform personnel evaluation and assessment every six months. If you can’t handle this task, you can outsource an HR professional to perform that task regularly.

8. Make a list of your employees’ birthdays and celebrate with them. This will inspire them and will make them feel that you care.

9. Smile to your customers. This will make them feel warm and this will also make you feel happy. But be sure to smile for real.

10. Change the passwords of your social media accounts including your emails. This is to ensure security of your precious accounts online.

11. Create a Facebook page for your business and gather at least 100 likes in the first month. You can also delegate this to a social media strategist.

12. Unfollow all your Twitter connections who are inactive. This is to clean your Twitter profile and give way to new friends and followers.

13. Increase your Facebook friends by 50%. If you think you need to expand your timeline.

14. Create a viral video for your business or brand and promote it in Youtube, Facebook and other social networking sites. You can also delegate this to a freelancer. But be sure to coordinate successfully.

15. Create a blog for your business and publish at least 2 quality blog posts per week. This is if you haven’t made yet a blog. You can also hire quality content writers to write for you and ensure that your readers will be provided with fresh contents.

16. Promote your small business on the mobile world. Promote your brand on FourSquare.com. Utilize the market power of the mobile phones.

17. Run or walk for 45 minutes, 3 times a week. This will depend on your health condition. Remember that a healthy body gives you a healthy brain, as well as a healthy business.

18. Reduce drinking of soft drinks and junk foods. If you can learn self-discipline, you can also learn business and work discipline.

19. Organize the files and folders in your personal computer, laptop, tablet and smart phone. This is to avoid wasting time and hours in searching for your lost files.

20. Read at least 6 business articles in a week. Reading online can be more efficient. Choose different quality business blogs to follow. You can also subscribe your email to this blog to receive fresh articles on business, marketing and entrepreneurship

21. Participate in at least 3 business events, seminars, conference or training in a year. Check out your professional organizations, and inquire for the schedules of trainings and seminars for the current year. Make a budget for that.

22. Read at least 3 business books in a year. This is if you like books.

23. Share at least 10% of your net profit to the poor or to the charity. Remember that it’s more blessed to give than to receive. So it’s up to you.

24. Learn how to read financial statements by attending accounting seminars. This is if you don’t know accounting. It’s good to learn the basics of accounting (the language of business) if you’re a business owner or an entrepreneur.

25. Plant a tree. Plant more if you feel the love of the nature.

26. Consult with a tax expert and plan your taxes for the year. Also keep your books and records updated and organized.

27. Make sure to create happy moments with your family every Sunday. Make it exciting. You can also make it everyday and every night.

28. Pay off all your maturing debt. This is to avoid penalties and surcharges. You can pay your non-maturing financial obligations on their due dates in the future. To make it more achievable, make sure to always maintain cash and cash equivalents to match your current maturing debts.

29. Forgive those who have sinned against you. It will help you achieve inner peace. Start from forgiving one person, then continue and continue until you can forgive them all.

30. Learn how to pray everyday. You can pray before you sleep, after you wakeup, before you eat, whenever you’re sad, or you can also say thank you to God when you’re happy.

31. Quit smoking. Reduce your usage gradually. Remember that it could detriment the health of the people around you, yourself, and even the health of your business. What will happen to your business if you will get a cancer of the lungs?

32. Find an answer to at least one of your long-reigning questions about life. Start with “who am I?”

33. Get out from a bad relationship, find the right partner. A wrong love life lived by a business person can affect his or her business drastically. But this is if you’re not yet married. If you’re already married, just focus in being a good husband or wife.

34. Get rid of at least 20% of your bad clients. Apply the Pareto Principle, also known as the 80–20 rule, the law of the vital few, and the principle of factor sparsity. It states that, for many events, roughly 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes. If you can get rid of your trouble causing clients, you might open a wider door for good clients, which can bring you less expenses and more profit.

35. Find at least 5 more quality clients. One great way to finding more loyal customers or clients is through the word-of-mouth marketing. The key to this kind of marketing is simply to continue on providing quality and satisfactory products.

36. Determine at least one of your greatest fears and overcome it. Are you afraid of giving speeches in front of a live audience? Get rid of that fear this year. Practice and practice, until you can’t be wrong.

37. Be on time on your first 10 appointments this year. If you can do that 10, you’re on your way to be on time for your succeeding appointments.

38. Read and practice at least one Bible verse a week. That is if you’re a Christian. Read the equivalent if you have other faith.

39. Learn how to say no to the first 7 persons who will ask you something you really don’t want to do. This is a challenging task. But if you can succeed on saying no to 7 persons, you’re up to be used to it. Make it a habit.

40. Make a list of 10 powerful quotes and display it in your working area to motivate you everyday. This is simple but can be so helpful. If you find a more powerful quote in the future, you can update your list.

41. Find a local market and conquer it. Since you are operating a small business, don’t jump to a wider market yet. Find a local market which you think you can succeed. If you can conquer a small market, you’re on your way to conquering a bigger market.

42. Incorporate. If you have just evaluated that your small business needs to expand and incorporate, then incorporation can be a good move within this year. You can hire a corporate lawyer or a business professional to help you in the process of incorporation.

43. Delegate at least 25% of your old tasks this year. Consider hiring additional employees or outsourcing your other tasks. If you can’t already handle the bookkeeping or accounting of your small business, consider a retainer-paid bookkeeper.

44. List down all your new year’s resolutions and eliminate those that are not achievable. Organize and simplify your list of New Year’s Resolution. When making a New Year’s Resolution or a plan for the New Year, don’t forget the S.M.A.R.T. (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-bound) Plan. After taking note of the SMART, add EST (Enthusiastic, Scrutinized and Tested) to make it the SMARTEST plan. It’s up to you if you want to go further.

The list above is meant to give you a couple of New Years Resolution ideas for you to choose. There are many other resolutions that might also be just perfect for your journey to business and personal development this brand New Year. To ensure you success, remember to stick to your game plan. Have a Happy and a successful New Year!