The new year is a time that we reflect on the past year and plan for the new. It’s a time of hope and rebirth, in a sense. I think we should never turn down an opportunity to evolve. And businesses should do the same.
In an effort to improve as a leader of the Vitality South team, I want to share a few commitments I’m making for myself, publicly, in an effort of accountability and, possibly, inspiration to others.
- Lead by example. No one likes to be asked to do things for someone who isn’t willing to do them them self. Work hard. Keep promises. Have a positive attitude. Good employees will mirror these.
- Be better about thanking employees. I already try pretty hard on this one. But my dad told me, “Treat an employee as if they’re only paid to show up. Everything else deserves a “thank you”.” And I agree.
- Reward employees generously as the business succeeds. Sure, sales reps already receive commissions, but we fail or succeed as an entire team. They will all feel the consequences if we fail. They should all feel the positive consequences as we succeed. Everyone.
- Don’t waste time. Even though employees are on the clock, that doesn’t mean their time isn’t important. Meetings should be concise and important. Employees can go home as soon as work is complete – there’s no reason to sit at your desk doing nothing – ever! Work-life balance can be a real thing.
- Have more fun. Yes, we’re here to work. And we work hard. But we spend almost half of our waking hours at work. If those hours are unpleasant, that’s a huge part of our life being unpleasant. So I’ll try harder to implement a culture of joy. Music at work. Jokes. Positive attitude. And we already mentioned appreciation and rewards for success.
In an effort to be the best Marketing Agency ever for our customers, here are some promises we are making to you, our customers:
- Continual training. You pay us to know what’s going on and do it well. We’re going to keep on keeping up with the times. For your sake and ours. When Google and Facebook changes their algorithms (again), we’ll know.
- Evolution. All things change, but digital marketing changes even faster. When we first started developing websites, for example, being mobile responsive wasn’t even a thing. And now we’re mobile first. I could give 1,000 examples of this, but that’s a whole different subject so I’ll refrain.
- Inspiration. You look to us not just to carry out your marketing dreams, but to also help dream the dreams on your behalf. We promise to not get too busy doing so we’ll always have time to for thinking.
And, finally, as a new business, Vitality South is an a season of growth. I’ll share with you the goals for our personal business we’re striving for this year:
- Launch 2 (TWO!) new business initiatives this year. In the first quarter, actually. Get ready!
- Team growth. We’re planning to add 3 team members in the first quarter of this year.
- More community involvement. We’ve been to Business After hours, Business Round table, sponsored a golf tournament, participated in PRAM, joined BNI, attended ribbon cuttings, and more in our first few months, and we’re just getting started! We love our Mississippi community and whole-heartedly plan to grow with it!
- Disney World. Yes. You read that correctly. We have a team incentive for 2020, and our prize is a team trip (with families) to Disney World if we hit it! You better bet we’re working hard to make that a reality.
Thank you, our dear supporters, for allowing us to dream these dreams. Thank you for following along on our journey. We are thankful for 2019, and are so thrilled for 2020! If you have ideas or dreams to share with us, please let us know!
-Ashley
