If you are running a business and are tempted by the growth bug, the first priority is to take a close look at your business and decide whether you really want to expand. If you love what you do and your small business, at its current size, meets all of your needs, there may be no reason to expand.

However, if you do want to increase capacity, customers and sales, there’s no time like the beginning of a new year to kick your business into gear.  Here are a few things you can do to prepare yourself to ride the winds of change.

1. Update Your Business Plan. Groom your vision and mission. Set your strategy and goals. Once you’ve initiated your expansion, step back from the plan and handle what’s in front of you. The true value of your business plan is what it teaches you along the way.
2. Hone Your Leadership Skills. Prepare yourself for a wild succession of role incarnations. With each increase in the size of your business, your role changes—in the beginning you’ll do everything yourself, but as your business expands, you’ll need to get comfortable delegating tasks to others, hiring more people, and outsourcing. Prepare by reading, consulting with advisors, taking on mentors or coaches, and taking courses, workshops and webinars.
3. Grow Your Network. The bigger your business the larger your network. Identify the individuals and organizations important to your business expansion, strengthen existing relationships, and open the door to building new ones.
4. Cultivate Financial Relations. As the business grows, you will need to rely on others for money—family, friends, angel investors, lenders, venture capitalists, and shareholders—look after your financial partners, maintain a stellar credit rating, collect receivables promptly and pay your bills on time. Prepare for growth by minding your financial garden.
5. Develop Systems. When you own a small or micro business, every minute not spent working in the business must be invested in working on your business. As you grow, you will need reliable systems to build upon—administrative processes, operational procedures, marketing tools and practices, human resource guidelines and standards—and the list goes on. You will need a policies and procedures manual to deal with all nature of processes within your business and to mitigate the many liabilities any business encounters.
6. Get Rid Of Bad Customers. Make room in your schedule to deal with new business by offloading bad customers. A good place to start is with your accounts receivable—have a heart to heart with any of those who are unwilling to pay and cut your losses and cut the ties.
7. Get Out Of The Way And Lead. Once you’ve selected the right people, turn your attention to being a leader. Done properly, delegating and outsourcing should extend your capacity in a safe, cost-effective way. Engage good people and trust them to do their jobs.

Business expansion growth is rarely a linear, tidy process. More likely it’s going to be a donnybrook, your survival contingent on your street fighting skills. By all means write your business plan and read the books on growing your business. But when your business takes off, be ready to roll with the punches and take a few on the chin. With the right blend of planning and reacting, you can also expect to enjoy the fruits of your labour.