Today I was doing research on farm photography and came across Roger Overall’s blog. He is a photographer based in Cork, Ireland. In a recent blog post, Mr. Overall noted that he applied three measures to determine the success of his business day:
1. Did I take a worthwhile photograph?
2. Did I learn something valuable?
3. Did I strengthen my business relationships or start a new one?
How do you determine the success of your business day? Are there 3 measures you could use to assess your day? Perhaps there are more than 3, or only one. This question gave me pause for thought.

As a small business owner, it’s important to have metrics and measures to evaluate your operations. Annual sales goals, number of returning customers, bottom line profits are all periodic measures of the health of your business. But as small business owner – whether you are a farmer, retailer or restaurateur – you often perform many tasks yourself and a business day can pass quickly without assessment. Days turn into weeks and weeks into months, then years. Perhaps taking 5 minutes to evaluate the success of each business day will bring to light some small task, some opportunity, which will make your life easier or your business healthier.

In 2010, I vow to follow Roger Overall’s philosophy and apply measures to determine the success of my business day. After much thought, here are my final 4 measures:

1) Did I make a sale?
2) Did I strengthen my business relationships or start a new one?
3) Did I write something?
4) Did I complete my office tasks? (accounting, tracking marketing efforts, updating our business plan, developing new product)

There is of course a fourth: Did I make any money?

Excellent presentation and excellent photograph.
Well done to you both.