My first six months as chief operating officer of Stokes Creative Group, Inc., 
has flown by and the New Year is the perfect time to reflect on what I’ve learned and accomplished so far as well as establish this year’s goals for both Stokes and myself.
New Year’s resolutions are promises we make. Promises to do something more, less or differently than we’ve done before. Broken promises. I call it resolution dissolution. We’re all guilty of it. We set our resolutions on the 31st of December – pumped, psyched and “gung ho” to do it now in our personal and professional lives, and then, by the middle of January, we start to drift.
Like a ship without a rudder … our goals initially had seemed so achievable but we got distracted by commercials, emails, texts, other colleagues saying it is impossible, others changing their minds and lack of enthusiasm by others on helping us achieve our goals. It’s no wonder that only 10 percent of people follow through on their New Year’s resolution goals.
Coming aboard during an exciting time of growth and change for Stokes is a challenge that I embrace willingly and wholeheartedly. I’ve joined an incredibly talented team of creative professionals that are dedicated to their craft. Through open communication and cross-support, together we will strive to achieve our collective goals.
Here are my 2017 business goals. Five to thrive – not just survive!
1.) Strong recruiting: hire 10 additional marketing and advertising professionals with entrepreneurial spirit and strong work ethics to help continue the steady growth of our business.
2.) Quality sales: define target market to three major areas; begin marketing to this target area in the right industries and going deeper with our current clients. Don’t waver from this goal when something appealing wiggles down the road and draws your attention.
3.) Adding value: continue to organize Stokes to make it more efficient and profitable so that both our clients and our employees can get more out of their time.
4.) Business networking: we have already become the leader in networking in the state of New Jersey and plan to grow networking in our other business divisions of Florida, Maryland and New York.
5.) Business leadership: Stokes will produce six marketing seminars to help business owners see success by sharing important growth strategies and hosting interactive workshops and training webinars.
Lastly, here is a simple idea that I will be implementing to assure we stay on course: establish milestones to track success. If we fail to plan, we are, in essence, planning to fail. We will set key performance indicators and milestones to stay the course for the dreams we want to wake up to. What are the dreams you’d like to wake up to? Call me at 609-859-8400 and share them with me.
I look forward to hearing from you soon. Happy New Year!
-Sam Capri (Chief Operating Officer)
