End of the quarter already! What! Wow that was fast. Do you remember the well known saying from Ferris Bueller –
“Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it…”
Ok, so that was coming from a High Schooler eager to seize the day, but the words carry wisdom for everyone and applies across the board. Especially into your business world. Why not take this punctuation of quarter end to ‘look around’ and look back on the last 90 days of business. How are you tracking towards your big 2019 property and business goals?
Last year I discovered a great monthly review process, courtesy of Peter Voogd from the YEL 2.0 podcast, that I like to use for a quarterly review instead. It’s called the 7-figure review’ and it provides a great framework.
Firstly, the rationale behind this- Peter Voogd says that, “the best way to predict someone’s next 6 months is to look at their previous 6 months. So, putting that into a quarterly context, we can say the best way to predict our next 90 days is to look at our previous 90 days. Habits trump everything, mindset, decision, network and so on. So if you had a mediocre last 3 months, the takeaway here is that the next 3 are likely to be the same unless you really get conscious about what you’re doing, what info you put in your head, and every single day you do things to get you closer to your goals.“ Is that hard to hear?
This post borrows from Voogd’s teachings and is all about how to purposefully review the previous 90 days so you can set yourself up for a rock solid next 90, and so on.
Most people want to have a great year, they think they will but they don’t take the necessary daily steps to ensure that they will. It’s easy to plan, but executing when you really don’t feel like it is what separates the champions from the mediocre.
This process is about using your reflection as an awareness tool, on what’s worked for you in the past and what you can do differently/reinforce going forwards.
Reviewing each month and quarter is about investing past experience into future preparation and focus – ie your past decisions, successes, failures, lessons. That’s where the good stuff comes from.
Here are a selection of questions to help you reflect on the previous quarter so you can carry on with momentum. Use these prompt questions to help you reflect and free flow write for 30 mins or so each quarter about the previous 90 days. [By the way, I used the accountability of writing this post to get my own review done before hitting publish and it does only take about 30 mins].
Section #1 – OVERVIEW
- What went well, what didn’t?
- When was I in my zone, when wasn’t I?
- When was I at my emotional energy peak?
- What caused me peace of mind?
- What frustrated me?
- Did I do what I said I was going to do?
- What systems have I put in place?
Section #2 – PSYCHOLOGICAL
- What have been my biggest breakthroughs?
- What have been my biggest frustrations?
- What have been my mind-shifts?
- What have been my biggest disappointments?
Section #3 – TACTICS
This section looks at what were my top 5 wins from last quarter: financial, family, adventure…?
Getting down to business metrics ask yourself:
- Did I hit my business income goal last quarter?
- What were the top three marketing campaigns or sources of income last month?
- What were my top income producing activities?
- What are the biggest ways I’ll be producing income this next month?
- How did I add value to the marketplace, could I have added more? (In these property communities and we talk a lot about fair exchange of value, because that’s ultimately how we get paid.)
These will likely be related to your highest values but only you will know.
- Did I leverage technology?
- Did I maximise my reach?
- What will exponentially grow my reach this next quarter?
- What did I do to stay adventurous and feel fully alive?
To help keep you from the nitty gritty march of each day it’s important to mix it with the things that energise you. It might be something small ie for me it’s getting in a game of tennis once a week, or maybe you had planned a mini break with your loved one. For those with freedom in their highest values this will be particularly important. Can you mix your passion and profession and link up travel to fun destinations with your work?
If you aren’t consciously making a decision to put things in your diary that will keep you alive and vibrant, you will become complacent.
Section #4 – RELATIONSHIPS
I love this one:
- Who did I you connect with and reach out to last quarter?
- Did I take care of my current relationships and did I reach out to people who can cut my learning curve in half- i.e. people who I can partner with in some way that’s relevant to your business?
- Did I leverage partnerships?
Section #5 – TEAM
Think about questions that will help with your team review:
- How was my team engagement?
- How was my speed of communication?
- What feedback can I give them?
- What do they need in terms of skill development?
Section #6 – LEGACY
- What did I work on that was legacy focused? In other words something that you work on now but won’t get paid until long into the future, or something that you don’t reap the benefits for until way later, ie it creating things that you value but that you get paid 6 months or more down the road. Note that if you just do this kind of work for the rewards/benefits you will lose steam, it’s important to engage in legacy work for other reasons, for something bigger than you. As a side example, part of my family legacy work last year and ongoing now is taking conscious time with my boys to teach them one key life value each month.
Voogd recommends spending 80% of your time on profit making activity, creating systems etc that makes sure you have the money coming in for you and your family now. Then 20% of your time on legacy focused things. Eventually when you have built the business you want you can switch focus to investing 80% of your time on the legacy side of things. Isn’t that an exciting prospect? To spend 80% of your time on something that helps a cause you believe in or adds value to the world in some way, and not worry whether it pays you or not.
Conclusion
I challenge you to invest 30 mins each month or quarter to do this. WHY? Because high achievers always ask better questions, and they are always investing their past mistakes/lessons into their future preparation.
Ask yourself the tough questions because the better the questions you ask, the better the answers, and the more clarity you will gain.
With this exercise completed, your task is now to look at how you can use your insights to course correct for the next quarter.
If you have any practices you’d like to share of how you review your months and quarters then please share it.
Here’s to a great Q2