10 Lists Every Entrepreneur Should Make

Being an entrepreneur is very challenging. You are always busy, trying to manage everything in the company, to attend as many important meetings as possible, to spend time communicating with your team, to work on your product, to look for opportunities, to relax and still be able to keep your focus on point. This is just a small part of the things, which serious entrepreneurs do with their time.

Time is your most valuable asset, so if you want to always be on the top of your game, you should set clear, measurable goals and work hard to achieving them. To make that easier, here I’ve put together the top 10 lists every entrepreneur should make, which will help them to organize their main goals and important tasks better.

List for your long-term professional goals

This list have to be regularly updated, because we all know how fast the business world changes and how these changes may bring many more opportunities, ideas and problems to solve. But, knowing what you would like to achieve in your professional life in a long-term, will help you to stay focused and to follow the path to achieving it.

List of short-term professional goals

Here you may include the goals that you have, related with the growth of the startup you are working on right now. What problems are you solving? How you can improve the direction of your company? What do you want to achieve by growing your startup? These and many other important aspects should be included in this list. It is important to evaluate how the things you put into this list match with your long-term professional goals list. Remember, the future is built one step at a time!

List of personal goals

Here you can include the things that you would like to achieve for yourself. Traveling the world, buying a dream house, writing a book, creating a family… Everything that you would like to do for yourself, apart from becoming a successful entrepreneur, has its place in this list.

List for improving your personality traits

As an ambitious person, who is aiming to change the world (because this is what all entrepreneurs are doing, right?), you should know how important is to keep learning and improving not only your business knowledge, but also to understand better your emotional intelligence and feelings, encouraging yourself to become a better person than you were yesterday.

List of people you would like to meet

In business and in life in general, having mentors and people, who are able to inspire you, to motivate you and encourage you is very important. Keeping a list with people, whom you would like to meet and with whom you would like to stay in touch, is a great way to increase your chances of being surrounded by the right company.

List of events you would like to attend

As a busy entrepreneur you don’t have much time, which is very understandable, considering the fact that you are building and growing a company, making it very difficult to keep track on all the events, conferences, and meetings, which you would like to attend. Keeping a list of the important events that you want to go to is a great way to easily create your daily and monthly schedule without missing out anything important.

List of books that you want to read

Successful people read! This is well-known fact. In order to improve your skills, to get more ideas and to find inspiration, keep a list with all the books that you would like to read and regularly update it.

List of ideas

We have already talked about the importance of keeping a journal where you can write down and collect all the ideas that come in your mind. Sometimes, even the craziest ideas can become the seed that will grow one amazing, valuable company that is going to change the startup scene.

List of investment opportunities

You know how important is to keep track on your spending and you probably are using some of the amazing available tools, which help you to organize your personal and business finances. But it is always a great idea to keep a list with the investment opportunities that come in mind and you don’t want to forget. Update regularly this list, because you never know when the right time may come and you can take the risk and the chance to invest in something huge!

List of failures!

Now you may wonder why you would want to have a list of all the failures you have experienced in your life and all the mistakes you have done! Before you decide that you don’t need this list, remember that failures are what make you better entrepreneur and also a better person. Learn from your mistakes so you will never again let them happen. Often go over the things you have done wrong and the bad decisions you have made, so you will never again make the same mistakes. Failures are important source of information, very valuable lessons and motivation, so keep that in mind, be realistic when you create this list and remember that your failures don’t define you! They just make you stronger.

Bonus: List of things that inspire you! This one is very personal and important list. Entrepreneurship is hard and you will always need to look at something that can lift your spirit up when you are feeling down, desperate and unmotivated. Include here all the things that make you feel good: books, movies, art, museums, photos, famous quotes… Make it personal! And get to it when you need to cheer up.