When it comes to planning for success, people don’t plan to fail. They just fail to plan. This should be a phrase taught to every business student around the world. Because of the time we spend making plans and organizing our life is vital if we want to experience successful living. I personally define successful living as the ability to reach our goals and dreams. This allows us to determine success on our own standards without relying on others to define it for us.

When I started my first company, I overlooked the importance of establishing a plan to handle finances. After a year of putting receipts in an envelope and using cash, checks, store credit and credit cards for purchasing supplies, I realized I needed some type of accounting plan.  To make a decision, I only spent a few hours putting together a rough plan. Then I made a quick decision to purchase this “new accounting software”. Thinking this was all I needed,  I spent a few months putting everything into my computer running the new Windows 3.0.

Well, lo and behold, six months later, the program crashed. And my wimpy little floppy disks couldn’t handle the back-up data. When I contacted the company, they informed me they were in the process of bankruptcy. There was nothing they could do. All those long hours lost because I didn’t spend the time doing the proper due diligence, nor thinking through a more comprehensive data management plan.  Of course, as in business and life, sometimes you have to deal with failure by going with the flow, changing your course of direction, and not crying over crashed programs.

When making plans we have two areas: Time & Activities.

1. Planning Our Activities

For this article, I want to focus specifically on the ability of the business owner plans for their lives. Not so much business planning, but personal planning. Because your business success really depends on your personal success. If we cant plan our life, how can we plan our company.

I personally break my activities into eight categories: Mental, Emotional, Family, Finances, Health, Business, Spiritual, and General. At the beginning of each year, I set a number of goals under each category putting them in a spreadsheet. Then I print three copies – one for my organizer, one on my wall, and one on my computer desktop. The reason I have so many copies is that the more we keep things in front of us, the more attention we will give to it.  Throughout the year, I choose various items and set specific plans to reach each goal.

I typically set 60 to 80 goals a year, and for the past 25 years, I have reached an average of 60 -70% of these goals.  Some I work on a single goal all year (like my goal to read 12 books in different Genres) and sometimes my goals are specific steps (like joining a gym, and setting a weekly work out schedule).

Now you may be thinking, “yeah it’s easy to reach 70% of your goals if their easy to do”. And that would be true if they were everyday things like brushing my teeth. However, I always set about 25% for more high reaching things. Larger goals, like traveling around the world, or setting up a new website.

I am proud to say that since I started, I have done more in 20 years than some in a lifetime. Since starting I’ve – traveled to 43 countries, started 3 different companies (two of which were sold), earned a BA and MBA, ran a licensed foster home, bought and remodeled/renovated 11 properties, lived in 3 different countries, took hundreds of young people on missions trips, built various website’s, became a college professor and even learned to paint.

Setting and planning these objectives has also provided opportunities to help more people as I widen my sphere of influence

This is why I share this list to anyone who will listen and built One Mean Dream,  as well as this website. Now, this is what works for me, you will have to experiment to find what works for you. If you need more information to help in this area, check out our Guide For Better Goal Setting (pdf doc)

2. Managing our time:

1-Year Planning

When it comes to Time Management, one can never make more time, one can only take the time they have. And use this time wisely.

One way is to spend time doing mid and long-term planning. For most of us, this basically requires buying a calendar and putting down all the important dates.  However, it’s easier to plan 5 to 10 years out, and then come up with organization ideas,  if we have the discipline and experiences of planning at least one year out.

 The only real way to achieve success is to plan our work and work our plan.

3 to 5-Year Planning

After setting our yearly planning calendar, it helps to look a few years in the future. Here are a few tips (order is not important).

• Start writing everything you would like to accomplish over this time (like a list of goals).
• Organize the list starting from the things that motivate you. Find things that capture your emotions, fills you with a sense of purpose, and what’s MOST beneficial to your family and business.
• prioritize them, by eliminating duplicates, impossible to accomplish ideas (yes we all have those), and things that have too many people involved. Then, whats remaining can be ordered somehow – i.e.most to least important, ranked by cost/time, by a number system etc.
• Break them into categories, like family, health, finances, work, mental, recreational etc.
• Set goals under these various categories.
• List the knowledge, skills, experiences, talents, abilities, connections and anything that could help you along your way.
• Take time to think through all the stuff you’ve written down.
• Get a calendar, and start to place each goal where you think they best fit – like getting a degree will take at least 4 years).
• Run it by your family, friends, counselors or anyone who can give you feedback or might be of help.
• Keep tabs and review progress monthly, because this is the best way to ensure you stay on the path.
• Build a system of routines to help keep you on track.
• Stop making excuses on what you can’t do and focus on what you can.

Some examples from past long-range plans.

When I set my 3-year financial goals, I established benchmarks to make sure my real estate holdings maintained at least 10% positive cash flow per year. If any of the units dragged this return down, they were put back on the market and sold.
For my family goals, I set up vacation targets each year to visit a certain amount of places (at least 2).  Planning activities for everyone to enjoy. Making sure I kept them in the planning process (more ownership and commitment when their all involved).
By planning 5 years ahead, it helped me plan my yearly activities as well. Because most long-range goals require a series of short-range goals if they are to be accomplished. This way, my yearly goal sheets could be organized to coincide with the long-range plans.

Making plans for 10+ Years

To establish a purpose for your life is really important, and helps with long-range planning. Believe it or not, I have ten-year plans all the way till I’m 100 years old.   For example, at 50 I became a professor. At 60, my plan is to travel internationally as a public speaker and guest lecturer. At 70, my plan is to become an author and real estate investor (commercial property). When I turn 80, it’s owning my own art studio (to sell my paintings) and starting a band to play in local clubs.  And at 90, it’s my plan to retire in a house with a beautiful view with my wife and great-grandchildren. Of course, this means I have to live this long and say healthy (which is in the plans).

A 10-year plan is more of a lifetime or business fulfillment idea. It also helps provide a big picture that can help us plan future endeavors. So…

• Pick just a few things you really want to accomplish and start making plans.
• Make sure you include your significant other (those it will affect the most) and get them on board, or modify your goals to include them.
• Spend time mulling it over in your mind. Looking at it from different viewpoints. Bringing in others for their opinions. Researching topical information and looking at support groups or others who’ve done it before you.
• Put it down in writing and then work your plan.
• Evaluate, Evaluate, Evaluate.  As you move along, it’s important to know when its time to change, modify or even stop what you’re doing. Blindly running along makes it easy to trip and fall. so evaluate regularly.

If you desire to be successful and want to have the business you’ve always wanted, then writing down goals and establishing plans is the simplest and easiest step we can take. There is no better encouragement than when you begin to check off your list one by one.

In closing, I realize this ability to make plans long-term is dependent on a variety of events (like still being alive). But just because we don’t know the future, it doesn’t mean we can’t plan for it.