Hi Reader,

This is the last Tuesday in 2025. This week is all about getting a great start in 2026. To help you with this, I'm including a Free digital copy of my book One New Habit, One Big Goal: Change Your Life in 10 Weeks. I hope it helps.

Happy New Year!

The Problem with Annual Goals: They're Too Long (and Too Short)

​Read on the Blog​

"When you're impatient with results, every day feels expensive. When you're impatient with effort, every day feels like progress."Shane Parrish

As we begin a new year, you might be thinking about annual goals. This could be personally or professionally. It could take the form of the dreaded New Year’s resolution. Or it could be part of an annual plan that you’ve developed at work. Regardless, a year is too long.

I’ve made annual goals before. My problem was two-fold. One was that life happens. Other things would pop up that demanded my time and attention. The other was a lack of urgency. A year seemed like a long time. It was easy to rationalize putting off getting started or making progress because there was plenty of time.

A decade ago, I came across the concept of the 12-week year. The book, by Brian Moran and Michael Lennington, is subtitled, “Get more done in 12 weeks than others do in 12 months.” Full disclosure: I didn't read the book or buy any of their resources. But I learned enough about the concept listening to a podcast that it changed the way I thought about planning. Even if I made annual goals, I decided to break them down into quarterly goals.

At about the same time, I read the book, The One Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth behind Extraordinary Results, by Gary Keller and Jay Papasan. This book changed the way I thought about time management. My main takeaway was to focus on the few things that matter most and make regular incremental progress toward achieving my goals.

So between the two, I developed my own quarterly goal system. Here’s how it works.

Begin with the End in Mind

The One Thing reminded me of something Stephen Covey taught in The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. Begin with the end in mind. I started writing down where I wanted to be in seven to ten years. With the ministry I serve, with my personal and spiritual life, and with, at the time, a budding idea to share what I’ve learned about leadership. Then I worked backward and set milestones that might be one, two, three or more years out and would indicate that I was moving in the right direction.

This is why annual goals are too short. They aren’t as meaningful if they don’t fit into a larger vision for your life. Without context, they are easier to put off. Set in the context of an inspiring personal vision, annual goals can make sense because they are part of a bigger picture.

Set Quarterly Goals

This is where I got energized. Annual goals are too long. They are easily put off. Three months is a long enough time that you can achieve something significant. But it’s short enough to create a sense of urgency.

I limited the goals to three areas. Two ministry-related and one related to sharing about leadership, which was to launch this blog by the end of September. That was a decade ago and resulted in this blog, a weekly newsletter, four books, and 360+ podcast episodes, among other things.

Three is probably the max that I can handle and may be too many. The problem with setting too many goals is that it’s hard to stay focused. That’s the premise of The One Thing. Or, as Covey wrote, “The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.”

And, the premise of my book, One New Habit, One Big Goal: Change Your Life in 10 Weeks, is that you should only focus on one thing at a time in terms of habit formation. It's better to do one thing well, than to try to do too much and accomplish nothing.

Focus on Effort, Not Outcomes

This was where things really changed for me. Rather than making lists of things that kept getting put off, I focused on blocking out time for my three priorities. This was most important in launching this blog. I have a day job, so if I was going to make any progress, it meant putting in 30-60 minutes in the morning before I got ready for work. I didn’t do it every day, but I knew if I was going to achieve it in three months, there was no time to waste. Finding a domain name, choosing a blog platform, learning how to set it up and learning how to set up an automated subscription list were just some of the things that had to happen for me to reach my quarterly goal.

Some people might find it helpful to set weekly goals to achieve their quarterly goal. This is great, but it’s not my style. I’m a “perceiver” in the Myers-Briggs Type Inventory (MBTI), which means I don’t like to get boxed into a prescriptive set of plans. So instead, I kept a list of all the things that needed to happen and every day that I could, I did something to make progress.

If you’re the type of person who likes lists and plans, a “judger” in MBTI, then you can break down your quarterly goals into smaller goals and check them off. This will make you happy. Either way, by focusing on effort, you’ll make progress.

The important part of this for me was that I focused on putting in the time and the effort, not the results. I believed that if I did that, I would achieve the goal. And I did. I launched the blog on September 3, 2016, about a month ahead of schedule.

The following spring I started writing my first book. I had a manuscript in two quarters and a published book in a year. It's amazing what you can do when you focus on incremental progress toward short term goals.

Journal

Finally, I started journaling a few weeks before I started working on my quarterly goals. I didn't journal every day, but I did it enough to make a difference. It helped me to reflect on what was working and to stay focused on what matters most. I wish I could remember where I got the questions that I used as a framework. In any event, I adapted them to fit my own situation. Here are the questions:

What did I learn today?
What did I do today that was really important/energizing?
What didn't I do today that I should have?
What could I do without?
For what am I grateful?
Where did I experience God today?
Three things I will accomplish tomorrow are...

The last question is the one that’s most relevant to this topic. The three things weren’t always from my three priorities. A lot happens in life and sometimes you just have to get things done that aren’t a part of your main thing. But, in general, focusing on three important things each day moved me toward my quarterly goals. I found that if I spent just a few hours each day, no more than one before work, and a couple at work on my ministry-related priorities, then I would make progress. It wasn’t that I didn’t put in a full day’s work, it’s that there are thousands of other things that are part of the job but aren’t the main thing. For the most part, all these other things got accomplished, as well. More importantly, I spent quality time on my most important tasks. Time that could easily have been gobbled up by less important priorities.

The important thing is to think through how you want to accomplish what's most important for your vocation, relationships and well-being. You don't need to follow my approach. But figure out what you can do to make consistent incremental progress. You'll be amazed at what can happen.

Questions for Reflection:

What is your vision? For your life? For the ministry you serve?

If things went well, where would you be a year from now?

What can you do in the next three months to make significant progress?

Recommendations

This week's recommendations keep with the theme of focusing on what matters most.

​The 4 Ways to Balance Short and Long-Term Action - Matt Norman This article shows how to foster positive action through agency and optimism, as well as how to develop the three key mindsets needed to do this. If nothing else, view the graphic to see where you fall on the quadrant.

​After the chores | Seth's Blog This one-minute read is a reminder to do your most important work first.

Podcast

Episode 363 of The Non-Anxious Leader Podcast, 5 Tips to Start Your New Year Well (updated), is now available.

That's it for this week. Thanks for reading.

Peace,

Jack

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