How do you create + Manage goals for your business?

It depends on your team size.... Early on (i.e. under 8 team members), I would keep things really simple:

[1] You should definitely have a long term goal. 2 years is a good time scale, IME.

I.e. your goal might be "in 2 years, avora will be the largest indie music distributor in Europe"

---

[2] For each role in the company, make sure there is an overarching goal/objective. This objective should have a 6-12 week timeline. You can use OKRs, but that might be overkill.

FAST goals are great, IME. https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/with-goals-fast-beats-smart/

i.e. for SaaS companies, you might use any of:
Finance
HR
Marketing
Operations
Product
Sales
Website

You generally don't want any one person to be part of more than 3 or 4 objectives at a time.

So if it's just you/a small team, pick the 3 or 4 that are most important for the next 6-12 weeks (this is why a shorter timeline might be better for early startups, IME).

i.e. Using OKRs for Avora, your sales objective might be "double our subscriber base"

"contact 1200 potential users"
"get 300 new users"
"contact all current users for referrals and feedback"

(just making up numbers)

---

[3] Every week do a review:

review your previous week and what you accomplished
rate yourself out of 10
list out what you could have done to improve that rating (these are probably the most important/pressing tasks, so you can add them to your calendar for the next week)
pick one of your objectives, and review that objective. rotate this every week, so that you are reviewing each objective every 3-4 weeks.

---

[4] Plan for the next week:

set up your goals for the next week by looking at your objectives and deciding on some relevant outcomes for that week.
brainstorm a list of ways to accomplish your weekly outcomes, i.e. what are some tasks that you can do to achieve the outcomes you want.

i.e. if your 12-week objective is "contact 1200 potential users", one weekly outcome might be "find 5 new communities of potential users"

---

[5] Every night, break your weekly outcomes into "next steps" that you can work on the next day (this is kind of like the 'Getting Things Done' approach).

I like to focus on at most 3 next steps/highlights per day. Once those are done, I will add more to my list.

---

Some apps that you could use:

weekdone (free for up to 3 users)
range.co (free for up to 10 users)
Omnifocus is popular
trello works too
I just use Bear (a simple note-taking app), but that wouldn't work for everyone.

---

If you have any questions, I'd be happy to help more.

Cheers.

Say something nice to KaranAvora…

1
It depends on your team size.... Early on (i.e. under 8 team members), I would keep things really simple:

[1] You should definitely have a long term goal. 2 years is a good time scale, IME.

I.e. your goal might be "in 2 years, avora will be the largest indie music distributor in Europe"

---

[2] For each role in the company, make sure there is an overarching goal/objective. This objective should have a 6-12 week timeline. You can use OKRs, but that might be overkill.

FAST goals are great, IME. https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/with-goals-fast-beats-smart/

i.e. for SaaS companies, you might use any of:
Finance
HR
Marketing
Operations
Product
Sales
Website

You generally don't want any one person to be part of more than 3 or 4 objectives at a time.

So if it's just you/a small team, pick the 3 or 4 that are most important for the next 6-12 weeks (this is why a shorter timeline might be better for early startups, IME).

i.e. Using OKRs for Avora, your sales objective might be "double our subscriber base"

"contact 1200 potential users"
"get 300 new users"
"contact all current users for referrals and feedback"

(just making up numbers)

---

[3] Every week do a review:
- review your previous week and what you accomplished
- rate yourself out of 10
- list out what you could have done to improve that rating (these are probably the most important/pressing tasks, so you can add them to your calendar for the next week)
- pick one of your objectives, and review that objective. rotate this every week, so that you are reviewing each objective every 3-4 weeks.
---

[4] Plan for the next week:
- set up your goals for the next week by looking at your objectives and deciding on some relevant outcomes for that week.
- brainstorm a list of ways to accomplish your weekly outcomes, i.e. what are some tasks that you can do to achieve the outcomes you want.
i.e. if your 12-week objective is "contact 1200 potential users", one weekly outcome might be "find 5 new communities of potential users"

---

[5] Every night, break your weekly outcomes into "next steps" that you can work on the next day (this is kind of like the 'Getting Things Done' approach).

I like to focus on at most 3 next steps/highlights per day. Once those are done, I will add more to my list.

---

Some apps that you could use:

weekdone (free for up to 3 users)
range.co (free for up to 10 users)
Omnifocus is popular
trello works too
I just use Bear (a simple note-taking app), but that wouldn't work for everyone.

---

If you have any questions, I'd be happy to help more.

Cheers.
sobbuh

·
7 years ago
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1

Y Combinator Podcast episode #149 (Adora Cheung on Prioritizing Your Time) the first half speaks to this question in a way. Not entirely what I think you’re looking for, but it’s a 15 minute listen.

SLUzer07

·
7 years ago
·