Are You Operating on 90-day or Similar Goal Setting Cycles?

In my last article, I asked the question: Have we established 1-year goals and are they moving us closer to the long term goals? But what about the plan to get us closer to our 1-year goals? Given the busyness of life and work, it’s nearly impossible to stay on track for the entire 12-month period.

Things come up and life happens, and once you get off track from your 12-month plan, it’s can be hard to rally your mindset back to feeling like you’ll accomplish everything you want for that year. Many people simply give up after month 1 or 2. Whenever it happens, it feels like a failure which isn’t good for your productivity or mindset.

The flip side of this is when you work in 90 day cycles you can plan for success milestones in a more reasonable chunk of time.

Fast Company?recently published an article that provides five reasons to set 90-day goals.

1. 90 Days Isn’t Too Long.?Annual goals (12 months) seem so far away that you assume you can always start on those goals?later. Ninety days, however, can hold you accountable to the long range goals, but in smaller chunks.?In other words, I have to get started on my goals, today, if I’m going to achieve it in 90 days.
2. 90 Days Isn’t Too Short, Either.?Ninety days allows you to look just far enough into the future to make it challenging, but still be achievable.?It also helps to eliminate the lengthy to-do list and forces you to focus on what’s really important.
3. You Can Reset Quickly.??I’ve seen clients set annual goals and when they realize it wasn’t the right goal, they wait until next year to reset.?Who has time to wait a year to reset goals?!?As I’ve heard other clients say, “We’re going to try new things and fail fast.”
4. You Don’t Spread Yourself Thin.?Having lots of goals isn’t necessarily a bad thing.?But, when you give yourself 90 days, you focus on a few at a time, because you know there’s another 90-day period arriving shortly to focus on other goals.
5. You Can Make Personal Goals Part of the Mix.?When you’re working on two to three goals four times per year it can allow for space to think about other areas of your life as well.?Integrating goals for vacation time, exercise, reading, spending time with friends, etc. can help to achieve the work-life balance you’ve been dreaming about.

Some people love planning and setting goals. But remember, “A goal without a plan is just a wish”. What’s the best way to turn our wishes into plans that eventually become reality? Many people, including myself, have had great success setting 90-day goals. But why 90-day’s? There are a few reasons many people agree 90-day’s is the perfect time frame for certain goals.

90-day’s is long enough to make meaningful progress while remaining short enough to stay focused. Often when a goal is set so far in the future it’s easy to lose sight of the deadline. With a 90-day goal the end is in sight. When the end is in sight it’s harder to procrastinate for even the most intelligent among us! All kidding aside, 90-day goals can be just what some folks need to break out of any old habits they might have of procrastination. If we start setting manageable 90-day goals, and the key word is “manageable”, we can collect some quick wins under our belt to help us break the cycle of procrastination, and the feelings that come along with missing our goals.

When I succeed in meeting a goal it motivates me to achieve even more in my personal and professional life. Nothing makes our big goals seem more achievable than the feeling of moving forward one step at a time. Ask yourself, “What can I do today to get closer to my goals?” If I keep this simple question in mind while focusing on the little incremental steps needed to achieve my 90-day goals I can be confident I am getting closer to my big goals. The advantage of focusing on 90-day goals will allow you to channel your efforts on a few things and make progress faster than if you had to tackle the larger goal without this structure.