10 Entrepreneurs Share Their New Year’s Resolution

 

Saige Driver

 

With the new year comes a surge of gymgoers, people tracking their money and salad eaters. While it’s great to improve your personal life, there is always room for improvement in your business as well. The new year is the perfect time to evaluate your strengths and weaknesses, and create goals or resolutions for the upcoming year.

 

Need some New Year’s resolution inspiration? We asked 10 entrepreneurs to share their resolutions for 2019.

 

1. Take a vacation.

 

“My 2019 resolution is to give myself permission to take a vacation. I started my own company so that I could be my own boss. I knew this would require discipline to enforce my own schedule, but I was not expecting to feel guilty for even taking a single day off.” – Jackie Webster, founder of Jackie B Writing Company

 

2. Engage with your social media followers.

 

“My New Year’s resolution is to spend more time on our social media channels engaging with our customers and audience, with a specific focus on Instagram and YouTube... I would love to connect more personally with our audience by sharing our story, learning from our audience, and hearing from them what they want to see more of and which products they want us to carry in the future.” – Liat Tzoubari, co-founder and CEO of Sevensmith

 

3. Connect with your employees.

 

“As a founder, one of your resolutions for 2019 should be to connect deeper with your employees. It’s beneficial to build more of a personal relationship with each of your amazing staff members.” – Brandon Leibel, co-founder of beach accessory retailer Sand Cloud

 

4. Stay healthy.

 

“As a personal resolution, I would say staying healthy is the most important to me, because you need a lot of energy to run a business. That means letting go of the little stuff and remembering why I became an entrepreneur in the first place: to create sustainable products and reduce climate change.” – Anne Carlson, founder and CEO of Jiminy’s

 

5. Evolve and grow.

 

“As a business, Boxy Girl’s resolution is evolution. To evolve as a team, to grow, mature and scale further – that means reflecting and letting go of the things that don’t work anymore and embracing the things that do. January is a new season and new time, and what matters is laying the foundation for your business and evolving, whether that means setting up more meetings with investors or growing product innovation.” – Hannah Serimian, founder of Boxy Girl

 

6. Plan out your day.

 

“One is to make sure I plan out all of my days the night before. This is a productivity resolution, and I’m doing it because I’ve noticed that I’m more productive when I plan out my days this way. Because I struggle to get started in the morning, having a list on my desk allows me to hit the ground running.” – James Pollard, owner of TheAdvisorCoach.com

 

7. Say no.

 

“Say no often. As small business owners, we are afraid of saying no to customers or potential customers, and we end up doing work that is outside of our expertise or our businesses’ desired activities. Our resources and time could be better utilized attracting our ideal customers.” – Dr. Ajita M. Robinson, CEO of Friends in Transition Counseling LLC

 

8. Show more gratitude.

 

“Showing appreciation not only makes you feel better, it makes your community stronger, and, therefore, can help your business grow and thrive. At the start of the new year, I always take a minute to send a heartfelt handwritten note letting the people who make my business what it is know that I appreciate everything that they did last year.” – Alexis Monson, CEO of Punkpost

 

9. Offer learning opportunities to your employees.

 

“Learning and development programs play a vital role in engaging and retaining employees, so, even if you already have a program, look at how you can expand it. You should also see if there’s more you can do to make it appealing to your employees. Millennials, for example, would really benefit from training that’s available online so they can access it anytime, anywhere.” – Adrian Ridner, CEO and co-founder of Study.com

 

10. Work outside your comfort zone.

 

“Our New Year’s resolution as an agency is to spend some time working outside of our comfort zone and across disciplines. Pushing yourself and your team to think outside the box can lead to unexpected and business changing results.” – Deanne Yee, co-founder and partner of Avant Collective