#219 - My End of Year Roadmap for you to use
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In the early years of my career, I inevitably found myself in the end-of-year scramble. It felt like I was crawling to the finish line and was left exhausted with barely enough energy to enjoy the holidays.
Now, after becoming very intentional in the way I approach the end of year, I enjoy a very spacious final quarter. I dedicate time to reflect, plan ahead and glide into the new year rather than grind to the finish line.
This year, I've taken it even further and added a few more strategies into my end of year roadmap to make quarter four even more refreshing, motivating and exciting.
The "No November" Strategy
Here's the decision that's made all the difference: no new internal projects in quarter four. Client work continues as usual, but internally we've opted for simplicity and elimination.
My business manager, Heidi, and I have declared November "No Vember". It’s a time to politely decline new internal projects and defer them to quarter one and two in the new year. It feels really good to say “no” so we can say yes to more meaningful projects later with proper time and energy to execute them well.
This isn't about being lazy or checking out early. It's about being strategic with our energy and setting ourselves up for genuine success rather than scrambling to get everything done.
Simplify and Eliminate
We’ve also been taking a good look into our internal processes to enhance efficiency and eliminate what no longer serves us. We're asking tough questions about what we can simplify, what's creating unnecessary complexity and having the courage to let some things go.
Gone are the days of accumulating lists of things to "fix later." We're doing the work now in this season of simplification so our systems work really well for us and our clients.
Building Momentum Before January
I’m not really a New Year's resolutions person. Instead, I’ve taken a long hard look at the person I want to be in business and life in 2026 and I started implementing those changes in October.
Whether it's adjusting my fitness routine, tweaking my nutrition, or scheduling my workdays more effectively, I'm building momentum now. By the time January arrives, I'll have three months of progress already under my belt. It feels really empowering to already be building momentum in this way.
I've also started incorporating whitespace into my calendar which is something I've struggled with in the past. But because I’m building the habit now, I'm creating a rhythm that feels sustainable rather than too hard to maintain.
The Freedom This Creates
I feel a genuine excitement about gliding into 2026 with plans already in motion. It frees up December for quality family time and welcoming the new year with actual energy rather than forcing enthusiasm through exhaustion.
So as you approach your end of year planning, ask yourself: What would it look like to glide rather than grind? What could you say no to now so that you can really sink your teeth into it with enthusiasm in the new year?
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[00:00:00] Tracey: Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Rise Up in Business podcast. Thank you so much for joining me. I love this time of year. I talk about this often. There is just so much spaciousness for me around the well quarter four, but over the December, January, Christmas period. I look forward to it every year so much.
[00:01:08] That has not always been the case. If you're a longtime listener of the podcast, you may have listened to episodes where I've talked about gliding to the end of the year, not grinding, and and I've recorded these episodes.
[00:01:22] Over the last two years with my friend and business coach, Emma McQueen, where we spoke about what sets us up for success to glide to the end of the year. My process has evolved and I wanna share that with you in today's episode.
[00:01:38] I think everybody is well and truly into wind down mode or looking forward to wind down mode. Or if you're like me, you're well and truly planned for 2026. So diving into today's episode, the first thing I wanna share is. Earlier in my career, this was the most chaotic, hectic time of year where [00:02:00] it was very much a limp or a crawl to the finish line.
[00:02:03] That's what it felt like. Exhausted, so completely exhausted because there was no wind down, there was no slow down. There was no lead in to the end of the year in a calm, balanced fashion. It was go, go, go, intensity galore, and it was get to the finish line, collapse. Take two weeks to recover and then have to start work all over again.
[00:02:25] And I did that year after year after year. And I suspect that just about everybody listening to this would be nodding along, either recalling that that's what they've done in the past too, or worse. That's what they're doing now. which I hope not, but if it is, hopefully you can glean some little nuggets of gold from this episode to help that not be the case for too much longer.
[00:02:44] So after leaving litigation practice and really immersing myself in a NU teaching at the College of Law, some real work-life balance there and some time and spaciousness to focus on myself and my family, when I launched this business, I knew I wanted it to be different in so many ways. The end of the year was absolutely one of those ways, and I tried a few things, first few years to work out what's gonna work and what didn't.
[00:03:12] But the last couple of years have just been so delightful and lovely leading into the Christmas shutdown period because I've worked really intentionally to ensure that it's a glide, not a grind. Gosh. We all need more glide in our life as business owners. I think this year I've evolved that and I've upleveled it again, and I'm so happy to share that with you.
[00:03:36] I started planning for 2026 at the beginning of quarter four. I'd planned to plan, and those who know me know that that will be no surprise. I planned to plan, so I allowed time and white space in my calendar at the beginning of quarter four to give myself space to think about 2026. The process I've used is really simple and it [00:04:00] has been so fabulous, and the impact or the flow on effect to me just in terms of wellbeing and spaciousness has been amazing and I'm so happy to be able to say that.
[00:04:13] Because looking back to past Tracey, back in litigation days, if I had have told her that I would be in this position now, I think she wouldn't have even had the time to listen to me, but if she did, she would've just scoffed and walked away because it would've all just seemed like nonsense. But it's true. And here I am. Let me share with you how I've upleveled this end of year process. The first thing I did when I sat down early quarter four to think about planning for 2026, is I made a decision that we in the business, were not going to allocate any new projects in our workflow, internal projects, so client work and delivery, that all proceeds as usual and it's usually a very busy time for clients because they wanna get contracts and new things up and running for the new year, client agreements or employment agreements and things like that.
[00:04:59] That's all business as usual, and I have so much space to be able to do that. It's so lovely to be able to support clients with those sorts of needs. The projects I'm talking about are our internal projects. Heidi, my business manager and I made the decision that we weren't going to take on any new projects quarter four.
[00:05:15] So the context to that is we had launched our brand evolution in the first week of October. So that was a massive project in itself and I've shared about that on a recent podcast episode and there's lots of things that we are still working on to ensure the smooth rollout of that.
[00:05:31] So that's a big project and we're finessing the tail end of that project now, so that feels really great. But we decided together that we weren't gonna take on any new projects for quarter four so what that meant was that we weren't going to ramp up the intensity. We were gonna finish what we had to our standard to make sure that it's just the way we like it and we were going to, with all the projects that came across our desk or all the projects we decided that we wanted to work on next, we've allocated them [00:06:00] to quarter one and quarter two next year. So it feels so good to know that they're going to be taken care of. Nothing's being missed. We're not missing out on anything. We're not compromising on anything. We are just allocating it to quarter one and quarter two, and that's okay.
[00:06:15] We use monday.com for our workflow and our planning so everything has a board and quarter one and quarter 2 2026 have boards and they have lots of projects on them, but we're spacing them out. Really what that meant was I've now dubbed November, No Vember, the month of no. That feels so good.
[00:06:35] It feels so good to just be saying no. So anything that comes across our desk that we're invited to, that we're asked to do, projects that we're excited about, ideas we have, we're saying no in November, but yes to quarter one and quarter two. So that's the first thing. And. What that has led to is a process that I've really enjoyed diving into where I'm embracing a season of simplification and elimination and I'm spending time in quarter four looking at our internal processes and systems and seeing what needs to be simplified and what we no longer need, in which case we're eliminating it. That simplification in itself results often in upleveling some of our systems and processes. There's lots of little tweaking. It feels so lovely to have the time and space to do that because ordinarily I'd find myself saying, I'll get to that later.
[00:07:31] I'll get to that later and later never comes. Now's the season. Because we have No november, there is space to think about things and look at things and to look high level at the business operations, our client experience, our onboarding, our delivery, our offboarding, our nurturing, to have a look at all of that to make sure I'm happy with it, and there've been lots of little tweaks and elevations there, and to then have the time and space to deep [00:08:00] dive into those processes and systems on the micro level. How's this working on the day-to-day? What does this look like? What's that process? We are simplifying our processes to make them smoother, both at our end and from a client perspective, and we're eliminating what we no longer have need for and I'm not feeling nervous anymore about eliminating things.
[00:08:21] I would've earlier on in this business, so about six years ago, I would've felt nervous about that. I didn't know enough then to know what was gonna work really well and what wasn't. But now I've got the confidence to say, no, we don't need that. Let's just park that or remove it completely because we're going to up level here and this is what we're going to do instead.
[00:08:40] My end of year process has very much embraced the season of simplification and elimination, and it has felt really good and it feels so lovely to be setting us up for success to start 2026 on the front foot with those things. No longer will I be entering January going, my gosh, I've got this great big long list of things I need to look at.
[00:09:00] Oh, that just feels so low vibing because we're doing it now. That feels pretty awesome. To be honest. I've had a real long, hard look around the way I show up in business, the way I show up in my personal life and who I want to be showing up in 2026. So what that has meant is my end of year roadmap has very much involved identifying the version of me that I want to be showing up in business and in my personal life in 2026 and I've started implementing it now. I actually started in October. This feels really novel for me. What I've done is I've done away with New Year's resolutions. I was never really a New Year's resolution person anyway.
[00:09:46] But I do love a clean slate and I do love the start of anything new. I love Mondays. I love the start of the month. I love the start of the calendar year, the financial year, whatever it might be. I love the start of anything new but I'm not really a New [00:10:00] Year's resolution person. What I've done though, is I've identified the changes I wanna make within myself and the way I show up in business and in personal life and started implementing it in October.
[00:10:11] My fitness goals, my health journey, tweaks I've been making to my nutrition, the way I'm blocking out time in my calendar for my CEO days, for my podcast and content days, for my client delivery, my drafting, all of the things that I need to allocate into my calendar each week.
[00:10:32] I've made those tweaks now. I haven't waited until January. That feels amazing. So what it means is by the time January arrives, I've got almost three months of momentum under my belt. In terms of my personal goals, my personal objectives and my lifestyle choices, but also in terms of the way I'm showing up in business, how I'm treating my time.
[00:10:53] I've tried to implement Whitespace in my calendar in the past and I have not been successful. I now am pleased to say that I started implementing that again in October.
[00:11:02] There have been a few tweaks and I'm feeling really good about it now, so by the time January gets here, I'm good to go. It's locked and loaded. It's working really well. So I'm already building momentum. So much momentum, and there's a freshness to this because I've given myself the space in quarter four by saying no to the new projects, and I'm allocating them into quarter one and quarter two, i've got space to think about these things and it feels really fresh. It feels really liberating to be honest i'm building momentum and I can feel it already. I can see it and feel it already. It feels so good and I'm excited. I'm really excited for the December period for taking time off to go to Sydney with my family and do our annual Christmas traditional Sydney things that we always love to do and I'm excited to take two weeks off over the Christmas New Year break to just be with my family and to allow myself to rest and nurture and recharge and I'm not [00:12:00] collapsing at the finish line, and I'm full of excitement and optimism because January's already planned. My structures are already planned. My list of things that I need to tweak is already done.
[00:12:10] So what I'm enabling myself to do by taking this approach of putting into action in quarter four, all the things I need to build momentum, I'm enabling myself to step into January in 2026 with momentum, enthusiasm, refreshed excitement, a renewed vision and a schedule of projects that we are so excited to dive into that we've allocated time to, to know that we're going to have the space we need to focus on each project one at a time.
[00:12:41] So I am Oh so ready for 2026 already. And I know that there are so many people that are going to find that really annoying, and I get it.
[00:12:47] We haven't put up the Christmas tree. I'm gonna say that I I really am hard and fast on 1 December with that much to the dissatisfaction of my 10-year-old daughter. No, I'm not that person who talks about how many weeks till Christmas and how many sleeps till Christmas and all of that, but I am the annoying person, I hope you don't find it too annoying, that talks about how long until January, rest, spaciousness, momentum, and setting ourselves up for success in January.
[00:13:12] So I hope you have taken some little nuggets of gold from this episode. With all my episodes, take what resonates, leave what doesn't. But for me, quarter 1 2026 started in quarter 4 2025. The planning, the spaciousness, the No November, the process of simplification and elimination, and the building momentum.
[00:13:34] Visibility is there. We can see the projects. I'm so excited and I'm still coming off a real high from launching the brand evolution in October, so that's been a really great wave to ride, which I think is going to see us through until the end of December.
[00:13:50] As a part of your end of year planning and your strategic thinking, if you are wondering what to focus on next with your legal requirements or even where to start at all with your [00:14:00] legals, i'm sure you'll find my essential legal checklist really valuable for you right now.
[00:14:05] The link to download your free copy is in the show notes. This is something I encourage my clients to review at least annually and usually the end of a year or the end of a financial year is a really great time to do it because you can then identify what projects you need to allocate time and energy to to set your business up for success in the next season. so you can grab a copy for free via the link in the show notes and if you have questions on that or you'd like to arrange a time to chat, please reach out because I always love to hear from you. Thank you for listening. I'll catch you next time.
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