How I Plan My Year

First of all… *how* is it almost the end of 2021?! 

 

With my pregnancy beginning in January of this year, every month has simply flown by! And as the end of the year approaches, I get excited because that means that I get to jump into goal setting and planning for next year!

I know that not everyone gets excited about planning and goal setting, but I do. And whether it excites you or not, I want to share my best tips that I’ve learned on how to plan your year, both as a whole and quarterly. I have a special system that I use year to year and I can’t wait to share it with you!

 

In today’s post, I’m sharing how I plan my year

 

Here’s what we’ll be touching base on!

• Setting my big goals for the whole year
• Breaking my big goals down into smaller, niche goals
• Breaking my plan into quarters 

 

How I set my big goals for the whole year

 

The first thing I do is sit down (usually with pen and paper) and just brainstorm ideas for the following year. I think about what all will be going on with my life, how much (or how little) time I will have and what I am feeling called to. I will write down any ideas that come to mind and then circle the ones that I want to focus on. I try to only choose 2-3 BIG goals or main focuses to keep things realistic and to drive results. Then, I take those big goals and type them at the top of my yearly plan. Those are my big picture goals! Sometimes they are specific, like “hit XYZ figures in revenue.” Or, sometimes they are more abstract like “enjoy business more and work less.” It’s important to only have 2-3 big goals because they are *big* and will take lots of little steps to create progress over time. 

 

How I break my big goals down into smaller, niche goals

 

This next step is all about breaking down my big goals into smaller, tangible, reachable goals that I can assign to each month or so of the year. So let’s say my big goal is to hit 1,000 subscribers on my email list. Maybe I break that big goal down into three smaller goals: creating a lead magnet to obtain emails, setting up a youtube channel to drive email traffic, and signing up for a better email subscription service. From there, I could take those three smaller goals and assign them to certain quarters of the year. This makes the goal much more doable and tangible, rather than just having a big idea floating around with no distinction or plan.

 

How I break my plan into quarters 

 

As I said above, I take my smaller goals and assign them to certain quarters of the year. I consider what all will be going on each quarter, thinking about things like holidays and busy seasons. Being able to see what goals I will be working on each quarter helps me plan ahead and ensures that I will make progress little by little on those big goals.

There you have it! That is a simplified version of how I plan my year and break things down into smaller goals. Do you have some big goals this year? I’d love to hear about it. Message me on Instagram to chat more about this system!