We are at the beginning of a new year, a time when we traditionally set goals and establish objectives that will guide the company’s path throughout the year. However, those who think it’s enough to come up with the first ‘big idea’ that comes to mind are mistaken. On the contrary, to do this correctly, you need to evaluate the company’s history, starting with the 2024 balance sheet.
I know this may seem a bit obvious, but many companies still don’t follow this process. Some managers believe they should wipe the slate clean on the previous year as soon as the break ends and the real work begins. And well, based on my experience, unless it’s a new organization in the market, it makes no sense to pretend nothing happened before.
You might be wondering: why? The answer is simple: starting everything ‘from scratch,’ ignoring the existence of prior work, eliminates all chances of your business thriving. After all, even if you give up on it and start another company, change fields, or want to do the same work differently, you need to understand the past to succeed in the present and ensure a better future.
In this sense, the recommendation would be to have a document containing the data from the previous year’s balance, to understand the current situation of your company, identifying mistakes and successes, as well as knowing where you’re doing well and where you need to improve. Without this, it’s hard to know where to go. And as the grinning cat from the classic storyAlice in Wonderlandsaid, if you don’t know where you’re going, any path will do.
However, be aware that ‘any path’ is not a good option when we have a business we want to grow, especially with employees who depend on us and their jobs. That’s why using OKRs—Objectives and Key Results—can be a great solution to define the best path at the moment, both for the year and, especially, for the next three months.
Yes, three months is an ideal timeframe—after all, a year these days feels like a decade—and OKRs help us work better with shorter cycles. This way, you can adjust what went wrong if necessary, working toward results. Once you set the goals and objectives—short, medium, and long-term—to achieve these expected results, it will be easier to determine the right path forward.
And remember: it’s okay to admit that the chosen path wasn’t the best or wasn’t what you expected—these things happen and are more common than you might think. It’s always possible to recalculate the route and take a new direction. We can make mistakes, as long as they are new ones.
It’s okay to make mistakes along the way
