5 Business Calendar Must Haves

In the old days you'd spend New Year's Day transferring data from last year's paper diary to this year's one.

I'm a big fan of paper for business planning. For me it's just so hard to see the whole picture using an online calendar but then I know I'm a bit old-fashioned.

My daily diary is on my phone, meetings, birthdays, appointments, hair, dentist and work. That works brilliantly for me when I only need to look a week or two ahead.

But....

When you're planning a business you need to see the bigger picture. Business planning, whether you're a solopreneur a side hustler, lifestyler, crafter, micro or SMEs business it isn't easy to plan on an Outlook or Google calendar. It just doesn't give you enough future vision.

My preferences is an A1, preferably bigger, wall planner for the whole year. One client has her calendar pinned to a board which slides under her bed at night. It's brought out each morning so she always has a clear view of what is coming up in the future.

It's all very well having a calendar but what should go on it?

Here my suggestions in priority order

1. Your holidays. As the boss you get first choice of dates, time out of the office, etc. Add your training and personal development time plus conferences, exhibitions or events that you will be attending. Next make sure that your key staff holiday dates are also on the calendar so you can check resourcing.
2. Talk to your accountant and overlay your financial calendar. Know your deadline dates, especially those that attract a hefty fine if you submit or pay late. Date should include your year-end and pre-year end tax planning, VAT payments, corporation tax both deadlines for submission and payment dates.
3. Without sales targets you wont stay on track. The annual sales target should be a large number at the top of your calendar. Then note monthly sales target as a minimum taking into account seasonality and the number of working days per month and staff availability.
4. Overlay marketing campaigns, business events and key product focuses for the business. Naturally if you are running or attending an exhibition there will be a specific date on which that happens but you should also indicate the pre and post work that needs to be done.
5. Finally businesses are run on a multitude of projects and being able to show project delivery dates as well as sprints (not just for software development) alongside your 90 day re forecasts will also help you have much more clarity.

With everything mapped out on the calendar can you deliver it? Do you have enough resources at the right time or are you trying to do too much at once?

Your team can also see everything that is coming up and get ahead too.

The best New Year present to yourself, in my opinion is a wall calendar. That way you'll stand a chance of keeping your business on track and getting ahead of the game and delivering everything your business needs.