What are you hungry for?
A great way to start off 2024 is by reflecting on your current path and what you want to achieve by this time next year. This means working ‘on’ your work and not just ‘for’ your work. Ask yourself these four questions adapted from Chris McChesney’s book, The 4 Disciplines of Execution.
Q1: What is your wildly important goal (WIG)?
What do you want to achieve as a business owner by Q1 of 2025? It could be a revenue goal, a safety goal, a culture goal, a marketing goal, etc. Determine whatever you think is THE most important area you and your team need to improve in after this coming year.
Q2: How will you get there?
Plan out a roadmap to accomplish your WIG. You need to measure two areas for this: your ‘leads’ and your ‘lags.’ McChesney says, “A lag measure tells you if you’ve achieved the goal; a lead measure tells you if you are likely to achieve the goal.” So, a lag can be your market share, revenue report, or jobs sold. Those are helpful and easy to measure, but they aren’t predictors of success, only indicators. You also need to focus on lead measures; what activities will generate or predict success? This could be response time with leads, full demos, quality inspections, etc.
Q3: What rhythms do you need to establish?
The next step is deciding what needs to change and how often you will inspect it. The saying goes, “Every system is perfectly designed to get the results it gets,” yet often, we believe if we just work harder, we will get different results. The issue is often not your ‘work ethic’; it usually concerns the system you have in place. If the system isn’t getting the desired results, working harder won’t change the results. Change the system and create a scoreboard to diagnose your efforts.
Q4: What obstacle do you need to overcome?
James Collins said, “The enemy of the best is often the good.” Your greatest enemy may be overcommitment to perfection. In my experience, I’ve found the fastest way towards your goals is to slow down. Hitting pause allows you to reflect on where you are going, who or what is helping or hindering you get there, and then be intentionally ruthless with your time to prioritize the activities that help. Another favorite saying is from the One Minute Manager, “When I slow down, I go faster.”
We hope you stay hungry this year and set a wildly important goal for yourself and your company. We want to continue to play a role in any way we can to help you achieve that goal. When you succeed, we succeed.
Todd Miller has spent his entire career in the metal building products manufacturing industry. He is president of Isaiah Industries, an organization recognized as one of the world’s leading metal roofing manufacturers. Todd is currently Vice President of the MRA (Metal Roofing Association) and a Past Chair of MCA (Metal Construction Association). Through his website, he strives to raise the bar on standards and practices to provide property owners with the best possible products for successful roofing projects.
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