The needs of your corporate planning will vary depending on your business and industry. For example, for automotive giant GM, CEO Mary Barra’s corporate turnaround strategy included several objectives. The main ones included becoming a leader in product and technology, growing the Cadillac brand, continuing to grow the GM brand in China, continuing to improve GM’s finances and becoming more efficient from an operational standpoint. These objectives are, of course, tailored to GM’s specific needs as a company.

The following are a few examples of corporate planning objectives-

• Financial objectives: Presumably, you went into business to make money. Your corporate planning financial objectives are your money-oriented goals. These objectives can include growing shareholder value, increasing profits and generating more revenue, to name a few. However, not all financial objectives are about revenue and profits. There are also objectives on cutting costs, balancing budgets, maintaining proper budget ratios and more. Another financial objective example might be diversifying or creating new revenue streams. Your specific goals will depend on your company’s individual needs, but most corporate plans include at least a few financial objectives.
• Customer objectives: Your customer objectives center on what you plan to do for your customers. A customer-centered objective could be giving your consumers the best value for the price they pay. Or, you could aim to improve product reliability. Another customer objective is increasing your market share or offering the best possible customer service. These objectives will vary, but they all center around meeting customer demand.
• Internal objectives: It’s important to consider internal objectives when doing corporate planning. Internal objectives include three areas: innovation, operations and customer service. Innovation objectives might consist of improving a product or growing the percentage of sales of a particular product. Another innovation objective might be to invest x dollars in the innovation of products. Operations objectives focus on reducing waste, investing in quality, improving workplace safety and reducing errors in manufacturing, to name a few. Another potential operations objective is streamlining. Finally, customer service objectives center on improving customer service, retention and satisfaction.
• Learning and growth objectives: Every organization needs learning and growth objectives when corporate planning. Learning and growth objectives are those that involve employees, your company culture and your business’s organizational capacity. One possible example of a learning and growth objective is boosting company culture, increasing employee retention and improving productivity.