JANUARY 2016 n National Mortgage Professional Magazine n
NationalMortgageProfessional.com
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A New Year’s Resolution to Make Your 2016 Unforgettable By Bubba Mills usiness news big hitter Bloomberg reports that eight out of 10 entrepreneurs who start businesses these days fail within the first 18 months. That’s a whopping 80 percent who circle the drain and disappear. Research also tells us why they fail: Lack of careful, methodical, strategic planning. A business plan is a must, period. And now is the perfect time to make a New Year’s resolution that could turn 2016 into an unforgettable year. I want you to resolve to make a business plan for 2016. But before you sigh and say, “I don’t have time for that kind of stuff,” just know the beauty of creating a business plan is that it doesn’t have to be some huge, formal chore. In fact, most good plans I’ve seen for mortgage lending are typically a single, simple page. And to make it easier, I’m going to use this
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article to get you started on the right foot. So here it goes. l Step 1: Assess where you are relative to where you want to be. Take a peek in the rearview mirror and ask yourself: How satisfied are you with the number of mortgages you’ve handled in 2015? What went right in 2015? What went wrong this year? What accomplishment made you most fulfilled as a lender? Asking the right questions about 2015 can put you on the right path to achieving what you truly want (and need) to achieve in 2016. l Step 2: Revisit the purpose of your business, its vision, its goals and keys to success. Take a step back and get a look at where your business fits in the big picture. Don’t be afraid to adjust and fine-tune what you want to accomplish by modifying your vision to fit where you want to go in 2016. And then use the answers to the ques-
researching sites you like and then tions in Step 1 to determine your finding the right tech person to do the goals for the coming year. I suggest work. Also, set deadlines for each tochoosing specific numbers for goals do. such as total sales volume, gross commission income or number of mortgages you handled so you can break l Step 5: Do what you said you needed to do in your new plan! Of course all them down into monthly of this is for naught if you don’t folportions and measure your progress. low up and actually complete the plan. Sure, when you look at the plan l Step 3: Establish objectives for each as a whole, it might seem a little main goal from Step 2. Decide on overwhelming—even at one or two the key priorities that have to be pages. First, break down your to-dos done to move you closer to the goals into smaller, more manageable you set. These priorities are bigger steps. Then get accountability. We items, for example, taking a social know why so many people break media marketing course, making their New Year’s resolutions: no your Web site more interactive or accountability. Get your family memdeveloping a better lead-generation bers or co-workers (or better yet, a system. coach!) to keep you on track. l Step 4: Break down your priorities into manageable to-dos. Each priority Bubba Mills is co-owner and executive from Step 3 needs specific to-dos to vice president of Corcoran Consulting & make the priority happen. Take the Coaching Inc. He may be reached by Web site example above: List the to- phone at (800) 957-8353 or visit dos to make that happen, such as CorcoranCoaching.com.
