With a new year approaching, it’s time to set goals for 2019. As fleet managers reflect on 2018 and look ahead to a new year, it can be tempting to set ambitious goals for the next 12 months. However, committing to unrealistic goals can ultimately set yourself and your team up for failure.
Instead, try to set achievable goals that will push and motivate you and your staff, and put your fleet in a successful position for next year.
Before setting goals for yourself and your operation, it’s important to first know what the company’s overall goals are for 2019. This allows you to ensure your fleet operation is aligned with the company and is helping the organization achieve results. You can take each overall company goal and determine how the fleet operation can contribute to it. These can then be turned into department and individual goals.
To determine additional fleet-operation specific goals, identify the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats for your operation. Completing this SWOT analysis will help identify where your fleet operation needs to focus its time and energy in the coming year. Determine what competitors are doing and how that threatens your business. Know where there is room for improvement and identify what is going well and how you can keep pushing in the right direction.
After determining your set of goals, the next step is to articulate exactly what that goal is and how it will be measured. By creating SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Timely) goals, you will ensure that each one is attainable and measurable. Examples of SMART goals can include:
These goals identify a specific task that will be achieved and establish a timeline. Instead of saying “I will hire more drivers” or “I will trim the budget,” these SMART goals identify exactly what will happen, and by when. This holds you and your team more accountable and gives you a specific target to aim for.
Once you have created SMART goals, the next step is to create a plan for how to achieve these objectives. This will help solidify if these targets are truly achievable, and it will help you prioritize the goals, budget for them, and map out a timeline for execution. For example, if the goal is to hire 10 drivers in the first six months of the year, then you can plan to attend recruiting fairs and determine if you need marketing materials created or ads placed. This helps identify additional work and resources that could be needed to achieve the goal and allows you to start planning to ensure it’s truly achievable.
Once the goals are set you should share them with your team, if applicable. Sharing the goals more broadly will be helpful to hold you accountable for achieving the objectives, and to help the rest of the team set their own goals. Ideally, goals should cascade from the top of the organization on down. By aligning the fleet operation’s objectives to the overall company targets, and then having your staff align their goals with yours, the entire company is working together to achieve success in 2019.
To learn how RTA Fleet Management Software can help you achieve your goals in 2019 and beyond, contact us today to schedule a free demo.