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Let me describe a situation and see if it sounds familiar:
You're busy every day. Your team is doing something all the time. You're making decisions, solving problems, putting out fires. But when you step back and ask, "Is the business actually better than it was a year ago?" the answer is... unclear.
Each year, I talk to hundreds of business owners who invest everything into their companies. And here's what I see over and over: It's like driving a car as fast as you can without knowing where you're going – just that you’re going there fast.
Everyone running a business has an expectation, a picture in their mind of what should be. A goal. But here's the thing most people miss: a goal doesn't have to be right or wrong. It just has to be important to you. Because if it's not—if it doesn't really matter to you—it will be too easy to settle when things get difficult.
And things always get difficult.
If that's you, here's the uncomfortable truth: "I want to grow my business" is not a goal. And it might be the biggest thing holding you back.
The Most Common Goal Small Business Owners Set (And Why It Fails)
Every January, owners say some version of "This year we're really going to focus on growth."
Sounds responsible. Sounds ambitious. It's also useless.
Why? Because growth means nothing without definition. More revenue? Better margins? Less dependence on you? A team that actually owns their roles? If you haven't answered those questions, your business has no idea what you're aiming for—and neither does your team.
Busy Does Not Mean Progress
Here's what vague goals create: lots of activity, constant motion, endless meetings, a feeling of "we're doing something."
And yet, six months later, when someone asks how it's going... you can't really say.
Not because you didn't work hard. But because you never defined what winning looked like.
That's the trap. Vague goals allow you to stay busy without ever knowing if it's working.
Why Smart Owners Stay Vague (Even When It Hurts Them)
Most small business owners don't avoid specific goals because they're lazy. They avoid them because specific goals force accountability.
Saying "I want to increase revenue by 25% this year" means that, at the end of the year, the scoreboard is obvious. You either did it—or you didn't. That's uncomfortable.
So instead, we say things like "We made progress" or "The market was tough" or "We grew in other ways."
Vagueness protects your ego. It also quietly kills momentum.
Because here's the reality no one tells you: Vague goals don't prevent failure. They hide it.
You can spend an entire year exhausted and still end up in the same place—just without a clear reason why. If your goal is vague, your results will be vague. You're not avoiding failure—you're choosing a slower, quieter version of it.
The One Question That Exposes a Bad Goal
Ask yourself this: Six months from now, will I know—without debate—whether I succeeded?
If the answer is no, your goal is too vague.
Examples:
No: "Improve marketing"
Yes: "Generate 30 qualified inbound leads per month by September"
No: "Get better at sales"
Yes: "Increase close rate from 18% to 25% by implementing a new qualification process"
No: "Build a stronger team"
Yes: "Hire two senior leaders by Q2 and reduce owner involvement in daily operations by 30%"
Notice the difference? Specific goals tell you exactly what to work on. Vague goals just keep you busy.
What Real Goals Actually Require
Every goal that moves a small business forward has four things:
- A number
If it can't be measured, it can't be managed. - A deadline
Without one, it will always get pushed to "later." - A starting point
You can't improve what you haven't written down. - A clear owner
When everyone owns it, no one does—and it lands back on you.
Why Specific Goals Make Your Life Easier
When your goal is clear, decision-making gets simpler.
Should I take this meeting? Should we spend money on this? Should I personally handle this issue?
The question becomes: Does this help us hit the goal?
If yes—do it. If no—skip it.
Specific goals create focus. Vague goals invite distractions, shiny objects, and burnout.
The Missing Piece: Someone Who Speaks in Numbers
Here's where a lot of small business owners get stuck. They know they need specific goals, but they don't have anyone on their team who can actually set them—or track them.
You're great at running the business. Your team is great at delivery. But who's looking at the numbers? Who's saying "Based on our current margins and cash flow, here's what 25% growth actually requires"?
This is where a fractional CFO changes the game.
Most small businesses can't afford (or don't need) a full-time CFO. But they desperately need someone who can:
- Turn vague goals into financially sound targets
- Tell you if your goal is realistic given your current numbers
- Build the tracking systems so you know your score every week
- Connect your operational goals to actual financial outcomes
When you say "I want to grow," a fractional CFO asks: "Okay, what's your current revenue, what are your margins, what's your cash conversion cycle, and what will growth actually cost you?"
They translate ambition into math. And math is what makes goals specific.
The difference is night and day. Without financial clarity, you're guessing. With it, you're building. A fractional CFO doesn't just help you set better goals—they help you see whether you're actually hitting them, week by week, before you get to December and realize you're off track.
It's the difference between saying "We want better cash flow" and knowing "We need to reduce our days sales outstanding from 45 to 30 and increase our cash reserves by $50K by end of Q2."
One feels like a goal. The other is a plan.
Yes, You Might Miss the Goal—And That's the Point
Clear goals mean you might come up short. But missing a specific goal teaches you something useful: where the bottleneck is, what didn't work, what to fix next.
Missing a vague goal teaches you nothing—except how to repeat the same year again.
The business owner who says "I want to improve customer service" and never defines what that means will still have the same customer complaints in December. They've failed—they just can't see it clearly because they never drew the line.
At least when you fail at a specific goal, you know exactly where the gap is. You can adjust, pivot, or double down with precision. Vague failure teaches you nothing except how to stay comfortable in mediocrity.
Your Goal Doesn't Have to Be "Right"—It Has to Matter to You
Here's something that stops a lot of business owners: they're afraid of picking the "wrong" goal.
What if I focus on revenue but should focus on profit? What if I chase new customers when I should retain existing ones? What if I build the team but the market shifts?
Listen: your goal doesn't have to be perfect. It doesn't have to be the "right" goal according to some business book or consultant. It just has to be important to you.
Because here's what happens when you set a goal that doesn't really matter to you: the moment things get hard—and they will get hard—you'll settle. You'll compromise. You'll tell yourself "it wasn't that important anyway" or "there were other priorities."
But when you set a goal that's genuinely important to you? When it's tied to why you started this business in the first place, or the life you want to build, or the impact you want to make? You'll find a way. You'll push through the difficult parts. You won't let yourself settle.
That's why the specificity matters. Not just so you can measure it—but so you can commit to it. When you say "I want to grow," you're not committing to anything. When you say "I want to hit $500K in revenue by December because that's what I need to hire the team that lets me work less than 60 hours a week," now you've got something worth fighting for.
The goal doesn't have to be right. It has to be yours.
One Simple Challenge
Right now, pick one goal that actually matters. Not one that sounds good. Not one that you think you "should" have. One that genuinely matters to you.
Because here's the truth: your goal doesn't have to be the "right" goal. It doesn't have to impress anyone. It just has to be important enough to you that you won't settle when it gets hard—and it will get hard.
The business owners I see succeed aren't the ones with the most sophisticated goals. They're the ones who picked something that mattered enough to keep pushing when every excuse to quit showed up.
Then answer these five questions:
- What exactly do I want to achieve?
- What number defines success?
- By what date?
- Where am I starting today?
- What's the first action?
Write it down. Put it on your calendar. Tell someone who will ask you about it.
Yes, it will feel uncomfortable. You're trading the safety of ambiguity for the vulnerability of a clear target. You're opening yourself up to visible failure.
But remember: If your goal is vague, your results will be vague.
You're already failing—you just can't see it clearly. You're avoiding the fear of failure by guaranteeing a different kind of failure: the slow erosion of another year where nothing really changes.
Right now, you're driving as fast as you can. The question is: where are you going? And does it actually matter to you when you get there?
The most successful small business owners aren't the ones who never miss goals. They're the ones who aim clearly, learn fast, and adjust. They'd rather fail at "increase MRR from $50K to $75K by Q3" and learn that their pricing model needs work than drift through a year "trying to grow" and end up exactly where they started.
Stop aiming at fog. Pick a target. Pick one that matters to you. That's when your business finally starts to move.
Are you ready to stop guessing and start growing? At FocusCFO, we help business owners move from "busy" to "productive" by providing the financial leadership necessary to set, track, and hit meaningful goals.
