I’ve been spending a lot of time this month and last with startups on business planning and goal setting for next year.
The balance in a hypergrowth business between doing and business planning is a razor’s edge.
Too much planning, and you lose your trajectory and get bogged in navel gazing and second guessing. Too little, and you get lost in the insane busy-ness and miss goals. You look up, and the business is stagnant relative to where it was a year ago without effective goal planning and execution.
Business planning annual template
So I’m a fan of the simple one sheet Verne Harnish first presented in Gazelle’s, which I first encountered about a decade ago reading Rockefeller Habits. Since then, I’ve also become a fan of the simplifications contributed by David Cummings, and added a couple of my own details.
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If your company is scaling from $1-$5 million like so many early stage startups are, this business planning worksheet helps the leadership team get their hands around who’s responsible, for which goals, by when, as visible where (system of record).
Any other great shortcuts, templates or tools for getting the team together around annual business planning efficiently?