By Nettie Owens, CPO-CD · The Sappari Group

Originally explored on Wake Up Women Leaders — Episode 29

It’s September. The plan you wrote in January, if you wrote one at all, might as well be from another lifetime. A human being could have been conceived and born in the time between then and now, and if that comparison lands a little hard, that’s the point.

In Episode 29 of Wake Up Women Leaders, Victoria Whitfield and I built a 90-day plan you’ll actually finish, one designed for exactly where you are right now, not where you meant to be back in January.

This episode follows Episode 28, where we talked about getting specific about your target market. This week we get specific about something else: what you can realistically build and execute in the final stretch of the year.

Why Most Annual Plans Fall Apart by September

“There’s so much that could have, that could have and probably did change for you from the time that the year started,” I said. In my work with clients, I run into two groups most often. One intended to write a plan in January and never got around to it. The other wrote it, then slid it into a drawer or a computer file and never looked at it again.

“If the plan isn’t down by now, it’s not going to get down on paper,” I said. “But all is not lost.” That’s exactly what a 90-day plan is for: a fresh, realistic runway instead of trying to resurrect twelve months of good intentions.

Victoria explained the reason annual plans stall out before the finish line. “The biggest stress is usually the lack of vision to be able to follow the plan. You run out of juice being able to come up with a plan or to know that you’re headed in the right direction.”

The Three Pieces of a 90-Day Plan

I laid out the framework on the whiteboard during the episode: vision, plan, and accountability, with review as the glue holding all three together.

“We have vision, plan, accountability, and the accountability is you showing up not just that one time in the year, but literally every day to reconnect to your plan and to reconnect to your vision,” I said. “When you have all 3 of these pieces, you are going to almost be unstoppable.”

The most common mistake at the vision-to-plan stage is simply taking on too much. “If you learn nothing else, 10 goals is too many,” I said. “You can take that away with you today.” A workable 90-day plan needs to be built around far fewer targets than most annual plans attempt.

Review is what keeps the whole structure from drifting apart. “Review is the glue,” I said. “If we want all of these to work together, then we have to review regularly so that we can see that we are still connecting these dots.”

Getting Unstuck on Vision

A lot of people stall out at the vision step because they don’t think of themselves as creative. Victoria reframed what vision actually requires.

“Vision is really about being decisive,” she said. “It’s not about being creative.” Her suggestion for anyone who feels stuck: write an “I hate this” list first. “The minute you know what you don’t want is the minute you know what you do want, and integrate that into your vision.” Once you know you can’t stand the way something feels, the thing you actually want tends to surface right behind it.

That exercise feeds directly into building a 90-day plan, because a plan without a clear destination has nothing to chunk down.

Working Backwards From 90 Days

The core mechanic of this 90-day plan is working in reverse. “I want you to imagine at 90 days the thing you most want has already come to pass,” I said. “And now I want you to think about how, what’s happening at 89 days. You can work back month by month.”

Using a concrete example, a $50,000 goal by mid-December: “By mid-November, what does that number look like? It may be that you’re putting some things in place now and it’s coming to fruition later.” The number doesn’t have to divide evenly across the months. It has to reflect how the work actually builds.

Victoria connected this back to her own experience with a $66,000 product launch. “The way those 3 months looked, it was zero, zero, $66,000, because all of that time leading up was marketing towards the launch and then delivering it.” A 90-day plan doesn’t require steady, even progress. It requires knowing which weeks are for building and which are for the payoff.

From Quarter to Month to Day

Once the quarterly goal is set, the plan narrows step by step. “What is the one thing that you could put your attention to that would allow you to get to that end goal by December 31st?” I asked, walking through an example focused entirely on building a launch plan for one month, nothing else.

From there it narrows further, to the week, and then to the day. “What’s one step that I could take that would take 15 minutes to execute on that is in alignment with that?” Every 15-minute daily task connects in a straight line back to the larger goal. “Not for nothing, 15 minutes is 1% of your day,” I said. “Tell me you can’t do that.”

That thread, from a single 15-minute task all the way up to the big goal, is what makes a 90-day plan different from a wish list. Nothing sits disconnected from the outcome you’re working toward.

Three Things to Do This Week

Write your “I hate this” list if you’re stuck on vision. Let it run for ten minutes without editing yourself, then circle what it tells you that you actually want.

Pick one dollar amount or outcome you want true by mid-December, and work backwards to what needs to be true by mid-November and mid-October.

Choose one focus for this month only, not five. Write the single 15-minute task you can do today that moves you toward it.

What’s Coming Next

Next week’s episode looks at what leadership looks like when the camera is off, whether you’re showing up for yourself behind the scenes the same way you show up in front of others. Join us Wednesday at 3:30pm ET on LinkedIn Live and YouTube.

If you’re ready to build your own 90-day plan in community, join us at Dreams to Action: The 90 Day Sprint. Details for the next sprint can be found here. If you want direct support with your business or leadership, comment CONNECT below and we’ll follow up with a three-way message. If you’re looking for live coaching on the show itself, comment COACH.

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