I was with my CA last night to wrap up the financial year (FY) stuff and we were talking about how Q1 was and our plans for the remaining quarters.

Until 2023 I never had any Q1, Q2 kinda goals, I used to sit down on my birthday which comes on Mar 30 and plan what I would do in the next 1 year.

For me it's like, set 1 year goals on b'day and 24 hrs later it's new FY so stress about aging and finances together in one batch instead of 2 diff. sessions.

I have seen all the worlds.
Yearly, Quarterly, Monthly, Weekly & Daily Goals.

In 2018-2020 never cared about anything else apart from just surviving which was a good thing.

2020-2023 used to do yearly because it was easier.

2023 onwards I made yearly, broke in quarters, then in monthly, weekly and daily.

The biggest difference I can tell you that improved everything for me was having Quarterly goals.

Why Quarterly?

See yearly is too long and daily is just too much, weekly is tiring and monthly is too less to analyze.

Quarterly just sits in the right balance.

4 Quarters. 25% each. Every 90 days you can see are you even moving closer to your yearly or not and improvise.

All the big businesses and anyone with decent money follows this because it just makes so much sense.

Where most people you know have no idea what they wanna do with their life imagine you having a blueprint of doing things you need to do to reach where you want to.

Such an unfair advantage it is.

Sadly not many people use it, I myself wasn't using it for the longest time but now I can't see myself without Quarterly goals

It's super simple (hardly 15mins if you already know what your yearly goal is)

Take you yearly goal, see what all you need to do to get there, divide the steps in 4 parts.

How To Set n Track?

Say your yearly goal is that you want to double your income by April 1, 2027.

How can you do that?
You either double your rates or double your clients.

Good. We have a starting point now think which one is easier for you to do?

Doubling rates or doubling clients?

Why would someone pay you 2x more? If you make the 2x more money!

For that you need to 2x your output and to do that you need to 2x your knowledge info input.

So here's the 1st thing: acquire more skills and info
2nd: implement and sell that skill/info.
3rd: see/track if it's working or not
4th:  if it works, scale it. If it doesn't, reiterate and keep doing until it does

Now if you want to keep the same rate and get more clients then?

Well then? Yup. 2x your effort in outreach, content creation and visibility overall.

Here your steps become: choose a platform, create a plan, follow that, see what's working, double down on that and done! 

The Result

Your FY Quarters would be like:

Q1 - New skill acquisition

Q2 - Skill implementation and tracking

Q3 - If skill acq. works scale it. If it doesn't decide whether to pivot or reiterate. If pivot, Q3 target becomes landing more clients on the same rate or an increased rate with the help of those new skills.

Q4- Close more clients / make more money

Done. It's that simple (well it is only simple if yearly goal exists otherwise it can be the most tedious task on the planet which is why most people you'll talk to won't have a Q goal)

P.S: You read this whole thing and still don't have a Q2 goal? Bruv-- 90 days goes faster than you think.