The beginning of a new year is a great time to set goals and plan out your yearly budget. If vehicle upfitting is on your to-do list this year, use the S.M.A.R.T. philosophy to help you set and meet your goals on time and within budget.
What is S.M.A.R.T Goal Setting?
One of the biggest reasons why people (and organizations) fail to achieve their goals is a lack of specificity. You know it’s hard to measure success if you make vague, general resolutions like “eat healthier” or “lose weight,” not to mention nearly impossible to hold yourself accountable. The S.M.A.R.T. method is a way to set concrete goals with measurable objectives and improve your success rate overall. The plan is simple: you need to make sure each goal is specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound. When you set S.M.A.R.T. goals for your upcoming fleet upfit, it makes it easier to get the work done in a timely manner and within your budget.
In this blog post, we’ll talk about the first two aspects of setting S.M.A.R.T. goals. We’ll continue the discussion in our next blog post, so stay tuned!
Success Starts with Setting SPECIFIC Goals
Setting the boundaries of your vehicle upfitting project is an essential part of the process, and it’s best to do it right off the bat. Do you want to update your whole fleet or just a few vehicles? Will you be outfitting all of your upfits with communications solutions, weapons mounts, emergency response gear, etc., or will you be focusing on one aspect to improve (e.g., updating your vehicle communications with top-of-the-line solutions)? Are you adding new vehicles to your fleet and starting from scratch with complete upfit kits or packages?
Once you determine the scope of your project, take a look at exactly what your personnel need to succeed and the ROI for your budget. New technology is available almost constantly for vehicle upfitting, so you need to decide exactly which features you need and which are unnecessarily extravagant. Products that exceed your needs and incorporate all the latest bells and whistles can add up to a greater cost per vehicle than your budget will allow.
Making Your Progress MEASURABLE
Being creative and conscientious can help you get the most for your vehicle upfitting budget. Once you’ve set your specific goals about items you want to upgrade or replace, your upfitter can help you create a plan to find the best products at the best prices, allowing you to stretch your budget without sacrificing safety or quality. This may involve options like taking advantage of quantity discounts, choosing pre-coordinated upfit kits or packages, planning gradual upgrades over the course of the year, and choosing a vehicle upfitter that is pre-approved for Iowa state contracts (which removes the need for and expense of the bidding and RFP process).
Make sure that your overall vehicle upfit plan includes measurable benchmarks during the course of the year to ensure that you are making progress at the anticipated or acceptable rate. For example, a target of installing new LED bars on 50% of the fleet by the end of March and 75% by the end of August can help you reach 100% by the end of the year.
Setting measurable goals for your organization not only helps you make your fleet safer, more efficient, and more effective as quickly as you can, but it helps you show exactly what progress you have made and what your ROI has been. This can help when preparing reports or requesting additional budget allocations.
What Is an Upfitter’s S.M.A.R.T. Responsibility?
A quality vehicle upfitter will help you identify your goals and work with your annual budget to check off as much of your “wish list” as possible. Keltek’s team has more than 20 years of experience in upfitting thousands of product combinations for Iowa safety professionals and first responders.
Contact us today to get a quote or begin planning your next vehicle upfit project. Our experienced vehicle upfitting team is here to help!
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