As I sit here reflecting on 2025, I am very pleased with the success that we have had as an organization, but more than that, I am thankful for the Synergy Team, and I am super excited for the future.
When I analyze where we have been and where we are going, I realize that what has been accomplished has been very “on purpose”. We have set out to grow, to honor our employees and be a valuable resource to our clients. I believe that we have achieved all these objectives, but in order for us to continually grow, we are going to have to continually change. I do not mean change for the sake of change but change to better compete in the evolving world in which we live. We are faced daily with new technology, new marketplace competitors and a challenging labor market. While these challenges exist, they are also opportunities for our organization to adapt and become better.
Our goal has always been to stay “ahead of the curve”, but what does that really mean? To us it means we spend adequate time working “on” our business, while being laser focused “in” the business. I coined a phrase that I call “The 5% Factor”…which simply states that if you spend 5% of your time working “on” the business, you will be much more successful in the 95% of the time you work “in” the business than you would be had you spent 100% of your time working “in” the business. We have found this to be true for us and we have been very intentional in setting aside that 5% of our time on a weekly, quarterly and annual basis. It does require discipline to set the time aside, because there are always competing issues and fires to put out, but when we spend the time working “on” the business our execution and results become measurably better.
While I am talking about business in this example, you can apply this to a church, a non-profit organization or even your personal life. As you are staring at 2026 and you are setting goals and thinking about what you will accomplish, I encourage you to spend 5% of your time working on your plan of attack. You will be glad that you did because, when you plan your work and you work your plan…Your plan will work!
My hope for you is that 2026 is your best year yet!
