I thought I’d share some of the things I’m aiming to achieve in 2011. I’ve tried to make them SMART goals, which means I’ll have no excuse not to look back this time next year and assess how far I’ve come. Goal setting can be very powerful when done right — I’m intentional about wanting to grow my business, so it’s a vital activity to make sure things are progressing and I’m not stagnating.

Release four unique games

This will be a big step up from the two in 2010. I want to make sure I’m outputting games at a reasonable rate, but not so crazily fast that the quality will suffer. I feel four is a good number for this, as it’s certainly stretching, but still achievable. I also want to do some fairly big updates to Brainz and Flying Cats Game.

Games to account for a minimum of one third of total income

Currently freelancing makes up about 95% of my income. One of my more short term goals for Rizer is to work on my own projects full time and ditch freelancing, but that can’t happen until I grow the games side of the business significantly. Getting more games out will help I’m sure, but I also need to improve my marketing skills and think differently to make this happen.

Submit a game to IGF

I can’t see any reason why this wouldn’t be a great idea. It’ll bring added coverage to future projects and also I think it will help the games themselves to keep this in mind. I want to build a business not by jumping on band waggons and producing crap, but by producing games of true creativity and quality, and I think keeping IGF submission as a consideration will help me to keep on this track.

Attend two developer conferences

I want to do this primarily to get out and meet new people. So much in life and business comes from the people you’re connected to, so I want to increase and strengthen these connections. Things seem a little bit limited in the UK, so the chances are these might both be World of Love – I’m already booked in for the one in January, so that’s a good start!

Spend money

The guys at Retro Dreamer did a great post about this a while ago, so I’m planning to make it happen this year. My laptop is nearly three years old and showing signs of age, so I think a new one would be a good thing to plan for. Also, planning an iPad 2 and iPhone 5, and a few enhancements to make make my office set up more ergonomic.

Consume more

I’m not talking about food – I think I do enough of that already! But I’ve realised that there are a lot of films I want to see, a lot of books I want to read, and a lot of games I want to play, but I don’t make time for that sort of stuff because I’d rather be working. The truth is that I’m limiting my creative input, and so limiting my creative output. So (being specific and measurable), I want to watch one film per week, play a game every week and read one book every month.

Looking forward to a great year ahead!