Making Calm Your New KPI: How to Set Goals That Truly Matter

Beyond Margins: Designing Calmer B2B Agencies & Consulting Firms

In this episode of Beyond Margins, Susan dives into the heart of goal-setting, breaking free from default metrics and focusing on what truly matters to your business and life. She shares her own approach to prioritizing calm as a core business metric and gives a behind-the-scenes look at how she set and tracked a single impactful goal in 2024—taking 12 weeks off to rest (spoiler: she surpassed it).

Susan explores:

• Why default metrics like revenue targets may not align with your values.
• How to set meaningful goals rooted in your priorities.
• A practical framework for choosing Calm KPIs that guide your decisions.
• Why setting fewer goals—or none at all—can work for demand-avoidant or overcapacity business owners.

Stay tuned for the rest of the series, where Susan will share insights from other business owners about their Calm KPIs, including an upcoming live workshop to develop a custom KPI for one business.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

• The pitfalls of measuring default metrics that don't serve your goals.
• How Susan structures her business to prioritize rest and calm.
• Tips for evaluating and tracking your progress towards intentional goals.
• Real-world examples of unconventional metrics driving success in calmer businesses.

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Grab the Calm Service Design + Delivery Swipe File here