A Fresh Approach to Goal Setting

The New Year is an ideal time to reflect. It is a new opportunity to think about the future and set meaningful goals. You may be kicking yourself for not accomplishing the goals you set out to do a year ago. If that is the case, I recommend a new strategy for the year ahead.

My approach to start 2024 was inspired by the top goal planning book that I read last year: The 12 Week Year: Get More Done in 12 Weeks Than Others Do in 12 Months. As you can tell by the title, the book completely upends the idea of setting annual goals. Instead, the focus is to break those goals into 12-week periods and focus on daily execution of what you need to do to accomplish your goals. Perhaps more importantly, the whole concept narrows down the key steps and forces you to have accountability. This can be through weekly check-ins with yourself, a partner, or a more formal accountability group. 

It sounds simple, but where most of us get tripped up is in the daily actions required to move us closer to our goals. In fact, the authors point out that most of us know exactly what we need to do to accomplish a specific goal, but we fail to do the required actions to achieve them. These little failures add up, and that is why most people quickly give up on New Year’s resolutions and other goals, which are typically set with little planning or focus on execution.

The Twelve Week Year starts with the vision of what you are trying to accomplish and why. The stronger and more powerful the vision, the more likely you will stick to the plan and make progress during the 12-week period.

The Power of Periodization

Why does the program reduce the time frame from a year to 12 weeks? It goes back to how we are wired to accelerate our efforts when deadlines are looming. You may have observed how things magically get done the day before you go on vacation, or how your house looks fabulous right before a big party. It is the same concept. More importantly, the book describes the concept of periodization, and how it was originally used by Eastern European Olympic athletes who focused on one skill at a time for a period of 4-6 weeks (Moran, page 13) to improve their competitive edge.

What I love about this concept is that you may find out during your first 12 weeks the reasons you aren’t gaining traction. For me, it was obvious during my first 12 weeks that I was trying to knock out too many goals at once. I ended up with a jumbled mess of activity, and little progress on my goals. Of course, the book addresses this, and the real benefit of this approach is the opportunity to reboot with a new 12 week period. 

You may find that instead of feeling like a failure if you don’t accomplish your goal in 12 weeks, that you will feel energized by the opportunity for a “do over”, with a stronger vision and the ability to narrow down your steps to success in the next 12-week period. The whole approach ends up strengthening your determination over the calendar year, instead of feeling defeated within days or weeks of working on a new goal.

If you have ever had a fear of succeeding (or simply a fear of taking a step that would move you to the next level), The 12 Week Year addresses that as well.

While the book offers the ability to buy software or do formal training, you can adopt the principles with a spreadsheet or simply paper and pencil. You don’t have to have the perfect system to get started. In fact, your system can evolve as your thinking changes, and you develop your own mental tricks to propel yourself forward. You can use the system for long- or short-range goals, and multiple goals if needed, but I recommend you try it out on just one goal for your first 12 weeks. 

Fail Up

Also, don’t be afraid to fail! The best part of this system is that it will push you forward, and if you do fall short on whatever goal you set, you can re-work your daily tactics for another 12-week period. It really is that simple. 

Legendary college basketball coach John Wooden famously said, “Never mistake activity for achievement.” This reinforces the idea that your daily actions need to move you in the right direction. As you prepare for the year ahead, I hope the concepts outlined above help launch you forward in whatever goals you may have. Happy New Year to you, and may the best be yet to come.

Kristina Bolhouse, CPA/PFS, CFP®

Vice President/Shareholder

© 2023 Kristina Bolhouse and The Arkansas Financial Group, Inc., All rights reserved.

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