Why do you make resolutions at the end of every year?
The answer is quite obvious. Most of you do it to start the new year on a positive note and to make positive changes in your lifestyle in the year ahead.
Resolutions help you resolve to change the things that need changing and enter the new year on the right foot. So does an 📝 Annual Operating Plan for businesses.
What is an annual operating 📜 plan?
An Annual Operating Plan is an annual layout or a roadmap🗺️for your business’s growth. It charts the course you should take to grow your business to desired targets. It is a blueprint of activities that you and your team choose to undertake to reach the annual milestone of the business.
Why is an AOP needed?
Benjamin Franklin once said, ‘If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail’. This quote sums up the fundamental importance of an operating plan. The plan is like a to-do list📋that helps the teamwork collectively to achieve business goals. Imagine having no plan. You and your employees would not know in which direction your organisation is headed.
An AOP is, thus, needed to chart a course that your business should take in the coming years. It gives shape to the objectives of your organisation, thereby removing any ambiguity.
How to create the best operating plan?
Taking a pen 🖊️ and paper (or powering up your computer) to make a list is easy. Anyone can do that. But to make an effective plan which would work is where the trick lies.
So, here are some quick and easy tips 🪄 to create an effective plan.
Create a vision board 📌
This is the first step. After all, you can’t go on a journey without having a destination in mind!
So, create a vision board-i.e. where you see your business 1 year from now. Set the annual objectives of your business to get a clear view of the goals.
Pro-tip: When making a vision board, don’t do it alone. Involve all the departments in the planning process. Each department will know its strengths and weaknesses. Moreover, every department, working in tandem, will make it possible to achieve the identified goals. So, brainstorm 🤯. Take the opinions of your employees about ways you can grow the business. You never know what useful idea can be born from an effective brainstorming session!
Moreover, start early ⏰. There is no point in creating an Annual Plan in the middle of the year. The planning should be undertaken 3-4 months before the next year starts. If you did not make a plan and the year has started, do it ASAP. Do not procrastinate.
Assess the feasibility 🧪
It is said that the goals should be S. M. A. R. T., meaning:
1️⃣ Specific
2️⃣ Measurable
3️⃣ Achievable
4️⃣ Relevant
5️⃣ Time-bound
If your business goals fulfill this criterion, you will be able to fulfill them. So, just creating the vision board is not enough. You need to determine whether the objectives listed on the board are feasible or just some far-fetched ideas. This is an important step that differentiates an effective plan from an ineffective one. Check out whether the goals that you have envisaged are achievable or not. This is a feasibility check which should not be missed.
Pro-tip: Here again, involve all the departments to assess the feasibility of the goals. This is because the departments know whether the goals are realistic or not. Moreover, achieving the specified goals is not a one-person job. It involves all departments’ collective efforts, so their involvement in the decision-making and feasibility checking phases is essential.
Go on a trip down memory lane 📑
The past gives you a glimpse into what went wrong. That is why it is essential to check how the business performed last year- the areas that need improvement and the areas that delivered a good performance. Looking into last year’s performance would help you weed out the problem areas so that you can take steps to address and resolve them. This would ensure that the business plan that you are making is effective as the possible leaks would be plugged in.
Pro-tip: Analyse business performance over the last couple of years to better understand which areas require your attention. Use Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to measure the business performance and measure these metrics against the industry average. If the metrics need improving, you would know where additional efforts are needed.
Create a budget 📑
Once the planning is done, reviewed, and assessed, it’s time for budgeting. Budgeting involves laying down the expected expenses needed to achieve the envisioned goals. Budgeting also gives you an idea of the expected business expenses over the year. You can allocate specific resources when you know how much you can spend. Moreover, budgeting also helps curb unnecessary spending and boost profitability.
Pro-tip: Don’t be too taxing when creating a budget. If you’ve envisioned grand goals for the year ahead, you would require a bigger budget. If your budget is small, the goals should also be realistic. Do not force your team to work on a shoestring budget and achieve great results.
Run it with your team
Once the outline for the year and the budget have been set, run it with the people who would make the Annual Operating Plan a possibility – your team. Tell them about the vision that you have created for the business and ask for their opinions.
Understand whether, in your team’s view, understand whether the plan is feasible or not. What you might consider achievable, your time might not. Since they are the ones that would be putting in their efforts to make your plan a reality, they should be in the know.
Pro-tip: Conduct a strategy meeting after the plan has been outlined and the budget set. Run the plan with your team and take their approval before putting it into the process.
Delegate
After your team has approved the plan and believes it is achievable, it is time to delegate. Divide the objectives into smaller tasks and allocate them to the relevant departments. Make them accountable for the tasks delegated.
Pro-tip: Delegate the tasks to each department and agree upon a mutual timeline within which the task would be completed.
Keep a contingency plan 🆘
The best-laid plans can go awry, and you need to be prepared for that. Even when you have taken the pains to revisit every detail with a magnifying glass, the plan that you have envisioned might not deliver the expected results. Be prepared for the same. Be prepared for your objectives or plans to fall through, for the budget to overshoot, and for any other contingency that might come your way.
Pro-tip: Invest in insurance plans to battle the financial repercussions of an emergency. Employee insurance plans provide financial benefits to employees in an emergency, while corporate insurance plans can help your business deal with unexpected losses.
Review and revisit 🧐
Lastly, a review is necessary because of changing business dynamics. Your organisation runs in a dynamic environment that might produce deviations from the set plan. A review is, thus, necessary to keep the plan in place and make amendments to the same, if needed.
Pro-tip: Be flexible with your operations. Leave room for adjustments and changes. Remember, change is the only constant. If your plan needs an amendment, do not fear it. Make the necessary changes and see how the deviation has affected the plan on an overall basis. Review the plan quarterly for checking the direction in which it is headed.
The Bottom Line 🔚
Be a pro when it comes to creating an effective AOP. There is no universal formula for creating a winning AOP. However, these tips help. Remember that an annual operating plan is not a one-person job. While you might envision great things for your business or organisation, you need to run your dreams with your team. They would be able to give you a third-person view of whether your envisioned goals are achievable or not.
So, when you envision the plan, go by the top-down approach. List your goals and see how they can be achieved. On the other hand, when you involve your team, give them a bottoms-up approach. Allow them to check how the envisioned goals might be achieved.
Also, do not delay creating a plan. Start the process before the year ends so that when the new year starts, you have an outline for your business that has been fool-proofed. This would give your organisation a head start in achieving the set targets.
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