As a small business owner, you have got to have a plan for which you will work too. The starting point for this is having a very clear vision for your business and what you want it to achieve.

Ask yourself: What is my business going to look like when it’s finished?

It doesn’t matter if the finishing date is in five years-time or twenty years-time; you should at least have an insight into what it’s going to look like if you had the ideal business to achieve your dreams.

Now, what would that vision look like?

Try to encapsulate what your vision would look like in just a few words because you need to be able to share this vision with others.

On that note…

One of the most important things about vision is clarity of vision. You’ve got to be able to see your vision as clear as day in your head because you can’t hit what you can’t see.

So when you’re preparing this vision, try to have an absolute crystal-clear picture in your mind about what it is that you are trying to achieve. Then keep talking about your vision so that it becomes deeply ingrained within you.

Your vision needs to become part of you.

As Jack Welch, an American business executive once said, “Good business leaders create a vision, articulate the vision, passionately own the vision, and relentlessly drive it to completion.”

You will then find that the more you talk about it, the deeper you embed it and the more public it becomes. That will provide you with the drive to make sure you get there and achieve it. However, you also have to involve others to achieve your dream as we can only achieve our vision by working with other people.

So if your vision is fuzzy to you then it’s going to be fuzzy to everyone else. And if they can’t see what we’re shooting for then they’re not going to be a great deal of help to you in achieving your vision. This means that you have to build a team of people that can not only see your vision but buy into that vision as well.

They have to become part of what it is you’re trying to do.

So when you’re starting to look for staff, or other team members, make sure that those people understand your vision and want to be part of that vision. So much so that your vision can be part of their vision and they can see where they can fit into that vision and play a role. If you can achieve this then what you’ll get is highly motivated employees and staff members because they will want to achieve the vision as much as you do.

As Simon Sinek, a British-American author and organizational consultant once said, “If you hire people just because they can do a job, they’ll work for your money. But if you hire people who believe what you believe, they’ll work for you with blood, sweat, and tears.”