Welcome to 2016! This is YOUR year! What do you want to accomplish this year? In reflecting upon the past year, how can you do things differently for a better outcome this year? These are some of the questions I anticipate on New Year’s Eve and I’m eager to answer on New Year’s Day as I proudly announce my resolution.

What I love most about the new year is feeling invigorated to make changes for the better. But changes aren’t  always easy to make. We need tools and accountability to help nudge us along at times. I was encouraged to use S.M.A.R.T. Goals for my business planning this year. It’s such a powerful tool that I’m inspired to bring to your attention.

If you haven’t already heard of S.M.A.R.T. Goals, this is an acronym that stands for Specific Measurable Achievable Realistic Timely. Using S.M.A.R.T. Goals will help you set and achieve goals both in life and in work. The cool thing is that each task within that the goal can also be broken down in to smaller S.M.A.R.T. Goals. For example, a business sets a goal to increase sales this year. They hire me as part of their effort to ramp up their online presence. I then use  S.M.A.R.T. Goals as their project manager to complete the projects that relate back to their bigger goals.

If you’re not setting goals, I’m afraid that good ‘ol Ben Franklin was right when he said “If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail.”

Have you set goals for your year? If you need some inspiration, please enjoy this blog post and feel free to share your comments.

About the Author: Lynn Wenger is an enthusiastic entrepreneur, a painter, a loving wife and mother, and the proud owner of WebProdigy, creating websites and online marketing that attract more people and generate more sales. Online: webprodigy.com Twitter:  @webprodigy Facebook: /WebProdigyDotCom