Evaluate Last Year and Plan For the New Year 

In December and January of each year, successful business owners and managers spend time reflecting on the previous year’s performance and planning for the coming year. The information gathered from assessing last year’s outcomes helps develop the foundation for setting goals and creating strategies for improvement in the coming year.

Performance evaluations should include financial statement analysis, a review of operations, a look at marketing and sales, and an assessment of personnel. Financial statements are the scorecards on how effectively we managed our business. A review of marketing and sales results measures our efforts to generate revenue. A review of operations looks at our ability to deliver our products or services, as well as control costs. And finally, we must review the most critical element in any company’s success ─ personnel.

Put together a good team with a well-thought-through plan and you dramatically increase opportunities for success. The key is, “You win with good players” and without them, no plan will produce the results you want. I once heard a college football coach say, “I’ve never been able to throw a playbook on the football field and have it score a touchdown. Only players score touchdowns.” In the business world, employees create our successes, not our plans, strategies or management genius.

What constitutes a good employee and how do we find them? My experience has been that success breeds success. Look for individuals that have been high achievers in previous positions. If they were productive, there is a reason for it. These employees are probably self-motivated and internally set high performance expectations. When reviewing résumés and checking references, look closely for results of a candidate’s work, not just their purported skills and experience. Be less concerned about what they know and more interested in what significant accomplishments they achieved.

Find good people, give them a sense of direction and a purpose for what you ask them to do and help them develop strategies to get the job done. Then give them the responsibility to accomplish agreed upon goals. And lastly, monitor and hold them accountable for results. If you’ve hired winners, they will usually meet or exceed your expectations under normal circumstances. If they miss the mark, you either have a flawed plan or the wrong person. In either case, something needs to change.

Did you meet your expectations last year? If not, why? Whatever your answers might be, ask yourself how can you improve this year. Remember, our challenge and responsibility as managers are to Plan, Motivate, Monitor, Evaluate (Performance and People) and Adjust or Change. These are also key elements in growing a successful company.

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