Planning for the year ahead is the best way to set yourself up for success. Defining clear objectives and meaningful goals are only part of the process. It would help if you created a plan for achieving them, and I’m going to show you how.
In this very special episode of The Mindset Coach, you’ll discover how you can plan your year using the 90-Day Planning Framework to help you accomplish each of your personal and business goals. Whether you want to get fit and healthy this year or scale your coaching practice to new heights, this is the episode you’ve been waiting for.
So, this is your chance to finally sit down and actively plan your year. I suggest grabbing a cup of tea, coffee, or a glass of wine and join me as we work through your plan for the year ahead.
Listen to the episode below or keep reading.
Why is planning so important?
Whether you consider yourself a planner or not, everyone can learn to plan. I’m a huge fan of physical planners because writing my plans down on paper cements them in my mind and helps me accomplish the goals I want to achieve.
I can’t count the number of planners I have owned throughout my life. Some planners were filled so much that they could hardly close over, while others were left with more blank pages than I’d like to admit. As I look back on planners of the past, I noticed a direct correlation between the years I regularly used my planner and the success I achieved compared to the planners left to collect dust.
So, what does it tell me?
Well, it shows me that taking the time to write a plan, set goals, and record progress influences success. If you plan for the year ahead, you will smash your goals before the new year ends!
How to find the motivation to accelerate the achievement of goals
Motivation levels hit new heights in January. We often see a surge in people who want to lose weight, join the gym, pick up a new hobby, and so on. However, that spike of motivation to achieve a goal is often short-lived. Over time, the initial enthusiasm wanes until the goals people made at the start of the year become nothing but a distant memory.
This cycle is also seen within organisations. In January, businesses are buzzing with enthusiasm to scale and accelerate. But motivation dwindles over time until it’s the final quarter of the year, and there’s another surge as businesses realise they’re falling short of achieving their goals.
If you want to keep motivation and enthusiasm levels strong throughout the year, you must plan ahead. If you procrastinate a lot, setting deadlines is an effective way to get things done within a specific timeframe. To help you prepare for the year and achieve the goals you desire, I suggest using the 90-Day Planning Framework that I use with my clients inside The Mindset Coach Academy.
What is the 90-Day Planning Framework?
The 90-Day Planning Framework gives you a container of time with shorter deadlines. So, every three months becomes a year, every week is a month, and every day is a week. With this change of perspective comes increased motivation because you know you have to complete specific tasks (or goals, milestones, etc.) within a certain timeframe.
90 days is an excellent period of time to help you focus on key projects within your business. It’s not so long that everything feels like it can wait until next week or next month, and it’s not so short that you feel like you don’t have enough time to complete the project.
Splitting goals and tasks into 90-day time slots is a great way to start and finish things. If you leave everything to “fall into place” as you go, you’re more likely to struggle to achieve your goals because your attention and focus are so diluted. When your attention is diverted, it takes time to get back into something. By focusing solely on a few things, you can put all of your focus on those things and be much more successful at actually completing them.
The 90-Day Planning Framework will help you accelerate your own productivity and level of achievement. The first step to start planning the year is to identify your business’s five most important areas. Then, you need to write down your goals for each of the five areas and use that as the basis for your decisions to identify what goals you will achieve within what 90-day period this year.
Here are the five key areas within your business that you should plan ahead for:
1. Finances
How much revenue do you want to generate in your business this year? If you can provide a specific answer, you will find it easier to make plans to achieve your financial goals. You might even want to answer more questions such as how many sales you want to make and how much you want to pay yourself. You also must consider any significant expenses coming up in the next 12 months.
Once you have answered these questions, think about how you will achieve your financial goals. What do you need to do to make your financial goals a reality this year? If you need to make some cuts, think about areas in your business that you can tidy up. Stop paying for things you no longer need, including subscriptions!
2. Marketing
Marketing helps to make you and your coaching practice visible. So, what are your marketing goals this year? What’s going to help you attract and engage with your ideal clients? Can you pinpoint marketing opportunities that could potentially help you increase your business’s visibility? Some of your marketing goals for this year could include building your email list, attracting new leads to your business, and so on.
When identifying your marketing goals, think about how people come in contact with your business. Do you need to create an opt-in for new leads? Should you start blogging or recording weekly videos to help grow your audience? Think about your actions to help you reach your target audience and plan the specific tasks or actions you need to take to help accomplish your marketing goals.
3. Your product and services mix
As you plan for the year ahead, you must think about the product and services you are offering. What will you offer clients this year? If you have a vision for a new service or product, write it down and start planning how you will roll out that new product or service. Think about products you want to retire or offers you want to combine. An example would be to combine a coaching programme with a mini-course and offering that as a bundle product.
Whatever you decide to do with your product and service mix this year, always ensure that it reflects what your ideal client wants from you. Think about how you can deliver the outcome your clients wish to achieve with the product or services you provide.
4. Systems and technology
Many people forget to set goals and plan for ways to improve their existing systems and technology. However, it is so important to identify your goals concerning your systems and tech. Perhaps you need to create a new website or focus on your SEO to help increase traffic. Or, maybe you want to build a new onboarding process or a framework to help your team better understand what they need to do within their roles.
When thinking about your systems and technology, think about ways to leverage those things to help meet your business goals.
5. People and self-leadership
If you’re running a solo coaching practice, it’s worth coming up with ways to hold yourself accountable for achieving your goals. If you want to build a team, plan who you need in your team and what those people need to do to work effectively within your business. Think about what you want your team to become over the next 12 months, and don’t forget to include yourself in that plan. What changes do you need to make as the leader of your business? Write down your goals for both your team and you in terms of self-care, energy regulation, and monitoring.
Use the 90-Day Planning Framework to help achieve your goals
Once you have written down your goals for each of these five areas, it’s time to go back and pinpoint the main goals you want to focus on first. With the main goal in mind, consider if there are any projects within that goal. Projects can be anything from tasks such as creating a new website to launching a new product, which might take weeks to complete.
When deciding where to place goals within your 90-Day Framework, think about your overarching theme for the next 90 days. Your theme might be something like visibility, which means you’re likely to choose goals within the marketing and visibility area. You will have one main marketing goal and a number of projects that will help you achieve the level of visibility you want. Increasing visibility is your main goal, but the related projects are the things that will help you achieve that goal.
The main goal or category is where you will focus most of your attention over the next 90 days. Of course, you will have other things on your 90 day to do list but accomplishing the overarching goal will be your main priority.
When planning exactly how you will accomplish that big goal in 90 days, you can plan in smaller chunks. Plan what activities or tasks need done and when. A time blocking system is a great way to help organise your time properly between clients, meetings, self-care, and so on. It helps to assign time to the tasks and projects to help you achieve your goal in 90 days.
I hope that this post helps you to plan for the year ahead, achieve your biggest goals, and succeed in all areas of your business and personal life.
Need some more help getting set for the new year? Head over to my Resources page for help growing your coaching business and achieving your biggest goals this year!