January is already winding down, but if you have yet to craft any New Year's resolutions for your business or individual teams, now is absolutely the time to do so. The following efforts are likely great ways to position yourself for a successful year:
1) Try to increase flexibility
If the novel coronavirus taught us nothing else, it's that organizations have to be nimble, so they can handle all the unexpected ups and downs they encounter, according to AllBusiness. With that in mind, you must strive to build a broad base of suppliers or partners that allows you to pivot from one to another when needed. This will help keep your company going even when things get tough.
2) Give employees more power
A big cause of organizational inefficiency comes when people have to constantly run Issue X or Concern Y up the flagpole and get it approved by a number of others in the company. Those individuals, who are trying to keep a lot of their own plates spinning, may not take the time to evaluate the issue as needed just because they're so busy. If your trusted workers are given a little more autonomy to undertake tasks, you might be able to see real improvements to your operations.
3) Be more diligent about promotion
Companies may not always do enough to "put themselves out there" in their communities, and that's especially true of smaller businesses, according to The Balance Small Business. Recommitting to active promotion on social media and in the real world are great ways to build your brand and ensure you have a strong customer or client base going forward.
4) Set aside time for short-term strategizing
While you may lay out plans for what you want the full year or the coming quarter to look like, it can be helpful to be a little more granular than that, The Balance Small Business said. If you're setting aside an hour or two every week, you might be able to be more accurate with your planning and forecasting on a long-term basis.
5) Update your website and social media
For many smaller businesses, a website or active social media page is an afterthought — largely because there's so much else that goes into running a successful company, according to DreamHost. However, the site represents how many of those unfamiliar with your business will first interact with it. A modern, easy-to-navigate site or social page will help ensure you make an excellent first impression.
6) Make customer service a central focus
You certainly want everyone to come away from interactions (and transactions) with your company thinking you provide a great product or service. Taking a better approach to customer service is a big part of that, DreamHost added. This is an area you would be wise to improve upon in 2021.
7) Hire the right people
Finally, when you're crafting the plans to build your ideal version of your company, you need to have all the right people in place at every level of the organization. That's not easy, but the professionals at YES Partners can help. To see some of the roles that we have already successfully placed, click here.
Finding people is easy, but finding the RIGHT people is not. YES Partners helps companies FIND the right people for all company functions, across many industries.
