Everyone Needs a Simple 90-Day Action Plan, Especially Now

Q4 is right around the corner and most companies are getting ready to develop their strategic plans and budgets for 2017. Why not develop a 13 week Action Plan that helps you accomplish the goals you set for 2016 instead? 

Now is the time for leaders to work with their teams to ensure they are hitting their targets for 2016. After all, the completion of 2016 goals and milestones will keep you on track with your existing strategy and direction, ensure a more realistic budget for 2017, ideally increase your profitability, and impact performance reviews and the year-end bonuses of the heartbeat of the organization, those responsible for execution and action. 

You have 10 weeks in Q4 to close out the gap and accomplish your annual goals. I say 10 because there are 13 weeks in a quarter and generally 3 weeks in Q4 are tied up with holidays. That is why it is more important than ever no matter what your roles and responsibilities to complete an action plan illustrating how you are going to accomplish your annual goals within the few weeks you have left. 

Here is how you can develop your one page 90-day action plan to make sure you are on track.

1. 90 Day Goals - Start with the end in mind.  What’s the distance you have to go to accomplish the goals you set for 2016? Annual Goal - accomplishment to date = Gap/Q4 90 Day Goal.   Do this for every goal you have set for 2016. Then determine what the October, November and December goals are to accomplish the Q4 goal. 

2. Strategies - What strategies are going to help you achieve the monthly targets you have set for yourself in step one? What has worked in the past? Workshops? Site visits? Referrals? Team alignment? Collaborative cross functional workgroups?

3. Activities - What specific activity needs to take place on a monthly basis to hit the monthly targets?  Twelve phone calls and six meetings with existing or prospective clients? Assigned deadlines for specific projects you are managing? Select or interview members for working groups? Hire more staff? Systemize a process? Post on social media?

4. Timeline - What is the logical order in which the activity needs to take place in order to complete the monthly targets? How much of a particular activity and how often? Which specific actions needs to take place each week to hit the monthly target? All of this activity is to be recorded on a one page sheet that has the 13 weeks listed. E-mail me if you want a free copy of my template. 

5. Who - Identify who is responsible for taking action. If it's you, get to it! If not you, then who? If it is a team member, communicate the expectation immediately and help them incorporate the activity into their 90 Day Action Plan. 

So, how about one last push to keep your company on track and set your teams up for success? Are you coachable and disciplined enough to take the time to develop your Action Plan and help others on your team do so to achieve peak performance or are you just going to wing it and hope you hit your targets?

It’s not complicated.  It's actually pretty simple.  It just requires discipline. Give your team 2 hours of creative time to come up with their 90 Day Action Plan and build a high performance and well-disciplined team that knocks it out of the park in 2016 setting your company up for greatness in 2017.