We live in a world of innovations and startups. It became easier to found a company and raise the capital by crowdfunding. We are all dreaming about embodying our ideas and selling them to the public. Whether you’re already a business owner or a newbie in this, there are some rules and questions you should follow.
It’s already a fourth quarter of the year, and it’s time for evaluation. Evaluation is when you ask yourself how your year went. Whether we made the best out of our year, or we need to work some more? If you wonder, how much will I pay in taxes as a founder? Continue and be prepared to answer these questions before the end of the year:
What are the first impressions at the end of the year?
Let’s make the first questions general. Ask yourself, what are your impressions of this year? Try to describe this year with few sentences. Can you call it a healthy year? Or is it another year that your business spent hibernating?
It’s important to answer general questions before we dive in specifics. Try to recall important things.
What important events occurred this year?
Take a pen and pencil, and write down all the positive and negative events that occurred this year. Think about their importance and realize which one held the most important place in your heart.
How do you feel about it? How do you feel when you remember all those good events? You should feel experienced. You might feel like you grew all the way to the person you are now. You might feel like your business grew to the success it has now. Correlate the important events with your company’s current state.
Ask yourself, what wins did we have?
For some companies, success and win can be, simplest things. What were your wins this year? Did you win the price of the best service in your industry? Whatever it was, list it down and think about it.
It’s important to know how you feel about things. This part is needed to repeat the feelings and achievements that bring you joy. First, you need to assess the situation and ask yourself:
What challenges did you overcome this year?
Challenges are tough, but they sculpt us and our companies into better beings. We need to overcome the challenges and improve ourselves. As we are the beings with constant development desire, we seek new challenges and the ways to defeat them.
Think about the challenges that made your business the business it is now.
What’s the difference between this and the previous year?
To see the results more clearly, you need to have an example to compare your results with.
It’s healthier to ask yourself these questions every year, as a small evaluation activity. Take the previous year and compare your current results with old ones. See what you improved and where your business developed.
Remember how scared you were to take that special step a year ago. And think about how happy you are now to have taken that step earlier. Think about your past self and the past of your company. See how everything changed once you overcome your fears and challenges.
After you have clear answers on these questions, you can proceed to the next step. These questions answer the practical issues:
What kind of customer feedback do you get?
Unbiased customer feedback is the best feedback to get. Try working on your clients. After finishing the job, ask them to give you a testimonial, or evaluate your services for future improvement.
If you can’t tell what kind of feedback you have, you will have to change the ways.
Do you have a team you can trust your business?
Ask yourself, do you have a team that you can be 100% sure about? Determine if you have an appropriate infrastructure for their future development. Ensure that your communication systems are working and nothing is misunderstood.
If you can’t find the answers on these questions, or your answers are mostly negative, try changing something. Create a better environment for your team and yourself.
Would you be a customer to your company?
This is the last questions on this list. Even though there are many others, you need to answer this. It’s important to have trust in your doings. Be sure that you are building a business that you, as a customer, would like.
At this moment, once you answered the questions, you might feel a bit overwhelmed. Try to keep this as a tradition. Keep this question session as your yearly evaluation.
