Does Your Year Start with a Budget or a Vision?

We have found the answer to this question changes depending on the location and altitude of the person you are asking. What about in your own life?  Do you start with a set of numbers, or with a dream? Your financial position is a vital component of your decision-making process, money has rules and realities that are as consistent as the law of gravity. What you can afford to do and how to allocate your resources is a vital constraint you should have a handle on for 2018.

In the context of business, we have had a similar conversation several times in September. What does the budget look like for 2018? Who is getting more, who is getting less? It keeps your eyes down and it kills creativity. In this scenario you grab as big a budget as you can, and then justify how you are using it during the year to help the unit, and your compensation for overseeing the projects. We have come to call the people adept at this tactic BUDGET HOUNDS because they can smell the 

scent of a budget a mile away and think of little else once on the trail. 

Our observation is that being a budget hound maybe good in a crisis when you are just trying to get to the next year, but if you want to get somewhere different and better, you need to learn how to dream. We all need to practice dreaming, and then writing those visions down and turning them into action. 

Jeff Foley is a retired Brigadier General and a friend. In 2015 he gave a Ted-X talk (YouTube video above) in Augusta, Georgia where he walked the audience through how to script out a vision for the next five years.

Five years from today is October 1, 2022.
• Where do you want to be on that day?
• Who do you want to be on that day?
• How do you want to feel on that day?
• With whom would you like to be with on that day?  

Your budget will help you get there as a constraint for financial discipline, but without a vision and a written out target your chances of meeting those goals are slim. Enjoy Jeff’s video where he talks about Character, Attitude, Vision, Excellence, and Relationships and how they can all fit nicely on a yellow pad of paper. 

Next try our post on the Pace of Sales Dialogue