Year-end has always signified a few things to me: the start of football/basketball seasons, the leaves changing color (and subsequent raking them into piles when they fall…), and sweater/hoodie-weather, to name a few. As business owners and leaders, it’s also a great time to reflect on your company’s performance and to plan next year’s undertakings and initiatives. I’ve found that this is critically important for any business, as it provides clarity and direction for all involved. Even if you’re operating a one-person business, it prescribes a plan on how you operate and succeed in the future.

I’ve helped dozens of independent financial professional offices with this process – I’ve also seen a dozen different ways to do this. Regardless of how you execute your planning meeting, it’s important to ensure you are following a consistent method and addressing a few key areas. 

This article offers a SIMPLE five-step framework to guide your year-end planning:

1. Clarify Your Purpose
2. Create Your Vision and Mission
3. Review the Year
4. Define Influences
5. Create Goals and Strategies

We have a tendency to want to start strategic planning by diving into goal setting, but by following the steps above, you’ll set yourself up for success. Let’s dive into each of these. 

Clarify Your Purpose

Defining your purpose is important from an alignment perspective. The more aligned your actions are with your purpose, the more genuine your actions become and the more effective you’ll be at delivering on your promises. Simon Sinek in his bestselling book, “Find Your WHY”, challenges leaders to discover their purpose before detailing the “how” and “what” they do. This is both important from a personal perspective as well as a professional perspective.

If you’ve not gone through this exercise, start by contemplating what motivates you the most by defining your values. Think2Perform’s Values Card Exercise is a great way to distill down to your most important values. A simplified way to get to your top five values is to:

• Identify Values: Write down 20 values that are important to you
• Narrow Down Your List: Select the top 10 values from that list
• Identify Your Most Important Values: Select the top five values as those that are most important to you

With these five core values in mind, write a one sentence statement that articulates your purpose – this sentence does not have to contain each of these values but it should be aligned with them. If you have partners, everyone should go through this exercise individually. 

Now from a company perspective, use a similar exercise to define the company’s core values as well as its purpose. If you have partners, go through this exercise together by comparing values – similar values (or derivatives thereof) should make it to the list automatically. Narrow it down to four or five values that you want your company to operate by and write a one sentence statement that articulates the purpose of your company. 

If you’ve taken the time to do this in the past, simply review to see if anything has changed. This can often be an overlooked step, but changes in business cycle, personal health, and other factors can influence your values or priorities. If there are changes, acknowledge them and adapt your planning process around it. 

Create Your Vision and Mission

With your purpose and values defined, ensure you are aligned from a vision and mission statement perspective. These two types of statements can often get confused for one another. The best way to differentiate is to start with the purpose of each.

A vision statement should answer the question, “what do we want to achieve?” It should be addressed to employees and shareholders and should inspire and guide them in making decisions that help achieve the desired future state – in other words, the vision of the company. 

A mission statement should answer the question, “what do we do and for whom?” It should be addressed to employees as well as end customers, clients, and the general public. It should define the business and its objectives by focusing on the “what,” “who,” and the “how.” 

Again, if you have partners, this should be done in a group exercise. If you already have vision and mission statements, review these to see if anything has changed and adapt accordingly.

*Alignment Check! Make sure there are no conflicts or misalignment between your mission/vision statements and your purpose/values. If there are, you should revisit these items and take the time to understand why. 

Year In Review

An important part of planning for the new year and beyond is understanding your current capacities and being honest with yourselves in your ability to execute. These exercises can help you to refine your value promise by leaning into your strengths, bolstering your weaknesses, and help you focus on high-value activities. There are many ways to incorporate past performance into these future-focused meetings, but like to hit on these elements:

• Financials Review
• Grade Your Notable Accomplishments for the Year
• Stop/Start List

Planning future initiatives is dependent on understanding how well the company is positioned from a financial standpoint. An in-depth review of the financials by partners should be done as prework for the planning meeting, but a high-level review of critical measures should be observed during, especially if you involve staff (who may not have access to the company balance sheet) in your planning process. It should also set the stage for the rest of the meeting, as you’ll need to tie in strategies and goals into your budgetary process. 

Citing notable accomplishments, especially in group-moderated formats, is a fun exercise in reflection of the successes experienced throughout the year. It should be inclusive of all goals set and strategies from the previous year’s planning session (if one was held), but can also include other things, such as milestones and unexpected wins. Start a list of the prior year goals and strategies and add in any other notable achievements. 

After listing all notable accomplishments, go back and give a letter grade for each – or at least for those that you had control or a measurable level of influence over. Be honest with yourself during this process – if planning with partners, gather consensus on the grade. This should not be a very complex or metric-driven process though it should factor in things like budget alignment, impact/results, as well as quality of work and effort. 

After grading the list, go back through and ask the question, “how would we have improved the grade?” for each. This process can help identify those incremental improvements that stack over time or illustrate where future investment in your company is needed. When going through each item, make notes of any trends. This effort should help to address the question, “how do we get better at what we do today?”

Lastly, identify the things that are on the list that shouldn’t be – these items go onto a “Stop” list – and identify items that aren’t on the list but should be – this is the “Start” list. The Stop list helps to narrow your focus to the things that really matter and move the needle. It could be that you don’t stop something entirely but recognize that outsourcing may be a more cost-effective solution or the task should be automated using an existing application (both of which would be items for the Start list). Your Start list should feed into future strategies and goals. 

*Alignment Check! Especially when looking at your past accomplishments and your Stop/Start list, make sure you are aligned with your purpose, values, mission, and vision. In fact, accomplishments that are not aligned with your purpose, values, mission, and vision should be evaluated to be moved to the Stop list, especially if they are a drain on resources. 

Define Influences

Undergoing environmental analysis is necessary when making strategic decisions. You should understand any shifts in the landscape, trends, cracks in the foundation, etc. that can complicate or support your strategies and goals. A common technique to do so is to use SWOT (Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, Threat) analysis, and I like taking this approach through external and internal lenses. 

Start by examining external factors that will shape your decision-making process. These can be broad trends or very specific elements that may affect your strategy. Create a list of these external factors and identify each as a strength, weakness, opportunity, or threat. 

Next, examine any internal factors that will impact your decision-making. This can be human resource related, tied to the current or future business cycle, or succession focused. Create a list of internal factors and identify each as a strength, weakness, opportunity, or threat. 

Finally, review both lists and evaluate the control factor – this is a determination of your level of control or influence. Items should be categorized into one of three buckets: items you have control over, items that you have influence over but have no control, and items you have no control and no influence over. This should be used to factor in the strategies you employ to address an item, as well as how much time and energy you should spend on it. 

Create Goals and Strategies

Creating your goals and strategies is the crux of strategic planning, and it’s where you should spend the bulk of your time and energy in the planning process. However, the process we outlined above will position you to identify goals and formulate strategies to achieve those goals more efficiently. 

Since goals and strategies are often confused for one another, let’s start by defining each. 

Goals should define “what” you want to achieve and should be longer-term and specific. They should motivate employees to get to a predetermined endpoint. Strategies should define “how” you want to achieve a goal and should be more of a step-by-step path to accomplish that goal. 

I recommend creating SMART goals – Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. Start by creating a list of the most important goals by answering the question, “what do you want to achieve and when?” Make sure to use the SMART methodology and reflect on the exercises above (such as the Start list items and addressing internal and external influences). If you have partners, ensure owners are established for each goal (strategies that support that goal may be owned by others, but a goal should have an executive owner). If you have any carryover or multi-year goals, ensure they are included. 

Be careful about setting too many goals – I recommend no more than FIVE goals be set for the company. Remember, you can employ multiple strategies per goal, so narrow this down to the most important things to accomplish!

*Alignment Check! Make sure you are creating goals that align with your purpose, values, mission, and vision! I like to tie goals to corporate values. If using this methodology over multiple years, you can use this as a test to ensure you are furthering all of your values in your initiatives (if you haven’t created a goal that centers around a specific value, perhaps you need to ask yourself if it’s still a value for the firm or pivot to focus on untended aspects of your firm). 

Once your goals are clearly defined, it’s time to build the strategies that will bring them to life. Strategies are the actionable steps that bridge the gap between where you are and where you want to be. They should be specific, aligned with your values and purpose, and designed to be executed within the timeframe of your goals.

Here’s a simple approach to strategy creation:

• Start with the Goal: For each SMART goal, ask “What needs to happen to achieve this?”
• Break It Down: Identify 2–5 key strategies that support each goal. These should be practical, measurable actions.
• Assign Ownership: Every strategy should have a clear owner. This ensures accountability and momentum.
• Sequence and Prioritize: Some strategies may be dependent on others. Map out the order of execution and prioritize based on impact and feasibility.
• Resource Check: Determine what resources (time, budget, people, tools) are needed for each strategy. This helps align your planning with your financial review.
• Track and Adjust: Build in checkpoints to evaluate progress. Strategies should be flexible enough to adapt as conditions change.

*Alignment Check! As with goals, ensure each strategy reflects your purpose, values, mission, and vision. Strategies that drift from these anchors may lead to misalignment or inefficiency. Use your values as a filter — if a strategy doesn’t support at least one of your core values, reconsider its place in your plan.

Closing Thoughts

Strategic planning isn’t just a business exercise — it’s a reflection of who you are, what you stand for, and where you’re headed. By following this simple framework, you’re not just setting goals; you’re building a values-driven roadmap for growth, impact, and fulfillment.

Whether you’re a solo advisor or leading a team, this process creates clarity, fosters alignment, and empowers you to make intentional decisions. It’s not about perfection — it’s about progress, purpose, and staying true to your vision.

So put on a sweater, pour a cup of coffee, and carve out time to reflect, plan, and dream. Your future self — and your clients — will thank you.