The 12 Week Year: Get More Done in 12 Weeks than Others Do in 12 Months

by Brian P. Moran

Pitfall 1: You don’t plan each week.

Maybe one of the following thoughts has slowed you down: You have no time for it. You think that you’re just too busy and that you’ll get to it later, but later never comes. You don’t need it. The misguided thinking that somehow you’re the exception and don’t need a game plan for the week. Watch how quickly the time slips away! You’re above it. Thinking that a weekly plan is for beginners and someone in your position doesn’t need it. You already know it. The thinking that you already know what you need to do, so there’s no benefit to writing it down or planning things out. You don’t want to be accountable. For some, working from a written weekly plan creates a level of discomfort because it continually reminds them when they are not doing what they know they should be doing.

Pitfall 2: You include all your tasks.

Keep the weekly plan for only strategic items and commitments.

Pitfall 3: You assume that each week is the same.

Another mistake that many make is assuming that each week has the same activity so they create one weekly plan and then copy it each week.

Pitfall 4: You add tactics weekly. Keep in mind that a weekly plan is essentially a one-twelfth slice of your 12 week plan. Occasionally, you may add a tactic to your weekly plan, but this should not happen frequently. Most new tactics should be added to the 12 week plan first, and then flow through to the weekly plan. This prevents you from getting drawn into urgent activities that are not necessarily strategic.

Pitfall 5: You don’t use it to guide your day. Once you’ve created your weekly plan, you will want to use it daily to keep you on track with the activities that are most important to achieving your goals. Check in with your weekly plan first thing each morning, once or twice throughout the day, and before you go home. When you learn to guide your daily activity based on your weekly plan, you will begin to experience truly breakthrough performance.

Pitfall 6: You don’t make it part of your routine. Each of us has a routine. Routines are an important part of consistent success. Make the decision right now to incorporate the weekly routine.

In the best measurement systems, there are lead indicators and lag indicators, as we discussed in Chapter 6. The lag indicators are the end results, and your 12 week goals are the ultimate lagging indicators. If you are tracking progress

Lead indicators are the things that happen early in the execution process. They are the things that drive the lags. Most people are pretty good at tracking the lag indicators, but the opportunity for growth is usually the greatest with the lead indicators.

What are the lead indicators for your goals? Let’s say that you want to lose 10 pounds. The total weight goal of 10 pounds is a lag indicator because it happens at the end of the 12 weeks. A good lead measure might be the number of calories that you eat daily or weekly. Another might be the number of workouts you have each week, such as miles jogged, laps swum, minutes on the elliptical—you get the idea.

The more you use measurement to trigger negative consequences, the more your team will avoid and even openly resist measurement. Measurement is not accountability; it’s simply feedback.

Ideally, you want the performers to measure themselves. If they rely on you to track and tally their key measures, that is often an indication of a lack of ownership on their part. Think about that. If you were really committed to your goals and had a strong desire to accomplish them, wouldn’t you track your progress? You know you have ownership when associates measure and track their own metrics.

Pitfall 1: You think that measurement is complicated or unimportant. Too many people use the I’m-not-a-numbers-person excuse as a reason to avoid measuring. Don’t let that be you. If you are going to perform at your best and achieve your goals, you will need to measure.

Pitfall 2: You don’t schedule a block of time each week to assess your progress. Determine a time each week, either at the end of the week or the first thing Monday morning, and block this time to score your execution, track your indicators, and plan your upcoming week. For most people 10 to 15 minutes is sufficient.

Pitfall 3: You abandon the system when you don’t score well. Too often people abandon the system and stop scoring when they have two bad weeks in a row. Have the courage to assess each week and don’t back down, even when you have a disappointing week.

Tip 1: Review your weekly score with a buddy or a small group of peers each week. Studies show that when people leverage teams, they get significantly more done on their plans. See the section on WAMs in chapter 15.

Tip 2: Commit to make progress each week. Maybe you can’t improve your execution from 45 to 85 percent in one week, but you can move from 45 to 55 or 60 percent. Focus on making progress. The goal is to raise your level of execution each week. A weekly score that is increasing is a positive sign that bodes well for succeeding with your goals.

Tip 3: Remember that a weekly score of less than 85 percent isn’t necessarily bad. A score of 65 percent might be an improvement in activity from the past 12 weeks. Even at 65 percent most people will see an improvement in their results. The question you need to ask yourself is this: “Is an execution score of 65 percent enough to accomplish my 12 week goals?”

Tip 4: Don’t be afraid to confront what your numbers are telling you. If you are unwilling to confront reality, then you will never be able to change it. When you track leading indicators, your execution system will help you to identify the root causes of any performance breakdowns you may experience. When there is a breakdown in your results, you need to know if it was caused by a breakdown in your execution or your plan content. There’s a BIG difference and the only way to know for sure is by measuring both results and execution.

what most often keeps you from being exceptional is not a lack of time, but the way you allocate the time that you have.

A study conducted by Eric Horvitz of Microsoft Research and Shamsi Iqbal of the University of Illinois found that after being distracted from serious mental tasks by things like emails or instant messages, the typical Microsoft worker took an average of 15 minutes to get back on their original task.

Further, a 2005 time-use study published by Basex, a business research firm, concluded that 28 percent of the average professional’s time in a day was spent on interruptions and associated recovery time! That’s about 11 distracted hours in a 40-hour week!

In 2011, the average American spent 2.8 hours a day watching TV. That’s 12 percent of our lives—and that number does not include the hours spent on the newly available entertainment devices such as smartphones and tablets.

In order to allocate your time effectively, it’s helpful to create a picture of a highly productive week—a model work week. In the following exercise you will create a model week, using time blocks for your critical activities.

1. Block out 15 minutes first thing Monday morning to review the prior week and to plan for the current week. 2. Schedule your three-hour strategic block. 3. Schedule one to two buffer blocks each day, Monday through Friday, typically one in the morning and one near the end of the day (e.g., 11:00-12:00 and 4:00-5:00). Remember that the amount of buffer time varies by individual and administrative workload. 4. Schedule a breakout block. 5. Schedule all additional important activities. a. Client and prospect appointments b. Standing meetings c. Marketing and sales d. Planning e. Required administrative and operational tasks f. Preparation for client meetings and customer service g. Project work h. Referral lunches i. One-on-one coaching sessions j. Personal tasks

Strategic Block—Sample Agenda, 3 Hours Reconnect with your vision: 5-10 minutes. Review your vision and assess your progress. Are you advancing, are you making progress, is there still an emotional connection? 12 week review: 10-15 minutes. Review your metrics. Look at your results against your goals. Inspect your weekly execution score and your lead and lag indicators. Are you executing at a high level and is it producing? If not, what can you do this week to improve? Assess performance breakdowns: 10-20 minutes. Is there a breakdown? If so, what is the root cause? Do you need to adjust your plan, or just execute better? Work on plan tactics: 2–2.5 hours. Use this time to complete tactics from your 12 week plan.

Other examples of strategic block activity: Read a book. Take an online course. Plan for the next 12 Week Year (most often done in week 12 or 13).

Buffer Block—Sample Agenda, 30 to 60 Minutes Review and respond to email. Listen to voicemail and respond as needed. Make necessary outbound calls. Follow up on to-do list items. Take quick meetings with staff to answer questions or to plan follow-up. Organize and file work in process and completed items. Identify any new to-do list items and record.

If you assume that when you work fast enough, hard enough, or long enough you can do everything, you are in for an unpleasant surprise. A study from a few years ago found that the average professional has about 40 hours of unfinished work in their queue at any given point in time.

It’s important to realize the simple truth that you can’t do it all; otherwise you will continue to labor under the false belief that you will eventually catch up, and finally get to the important stuff.

If you frequently defer the strategic work to accomplish the urgent, lower-value activities, you will never accomplish great things.

Think about this: People earning $1,000,000 per year aren’t working 10 times harder than people earning $100,000. In fact, they are sometimes working less—but they are working differently.

Pitfall 1: You conduct business as usual. It’s unproductive to allow your old time-allocation habits to drive your activity. It’s easy to fall into your old habits because they are comfortable and you can apply them with little effort. To create new results you will have to be willing to pass through fear, uncertainty, and discomfort, and ultimately create new and more productive habits.

Pitfall 2: You don’t focus on one thing at a time in your strategic blocks.

Instead of increasing your effectiveness, multitasking actually slows you down and increases the chances of mistakes, according to David E. Meyer, Director of the Brain, Cognition and Action Laboratory at the University of Michigan.

Pitfall 4: You think being busy is the same as being productive.

Tip 1: Work from a written weekly plan.

Tip 2: Input your model week into your calendar.

As long as we continue to be victims of our circumstances, we will experience life as a struggle and others as a threat.

Make a decision to never be the victim again. Notice when you are making excuses and settling for mediocrity. Focus on the things you can control. Accountability is first a mind-set, then an action. To live your vision, take ownership of your thinking, actions, and results.

if you want something you don’t currently have, you need to do something you’re not currently doing.

The long-term benefits of accountability are clear: better results, an increased sense of control, less stress, and a greater general sense of well-being, for organizations as well as individuals.

Accountability cannot be imposed, demanded, or coerced. It is an inevitable outgrowth of freedom. As leaders try to hold their people accountable, it puts people on the defensive and unintentionally produces a victim culture. The very act of holding someone accountable leaves no room for the individual to own their actions or the result. Even the most accountable among us naturally push back. People deliver on what they own. As a leader, one of your main jobs is to foster ownership of the things that matter most. That won’t happen if you continue to try to hold your associates accountable.

Become aware of victim conversations. Take notice of how you and others in your organization talk about failure. Focus those conversations on first acknowledging reality and then on what can be done differently in the future. Remember that the results we get are directly linked to our thinking. Practice a way of thinking and speaking that recognizes ownership of your actions and results.

Model accountability. Actions speak louder than words. If you want others to be accountable, then demonstrate accountability in action. Be a role model by making it both expected and safe to embrace accountability.

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Given a choice, people choose immediate and certain short-term comfort over potential long-term benefits almost every time, unless there is a compelling reason to choose otherwise.