Promote Yourself to CEO | Small Business Strategy for Women Entrepreneurs

The Mid-Year Review That Resets Your Second Half of 2026

• Racheal Cook MBA: Small Business Owner, Entrepreneur, Business Growth Strategist

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If the plan you wrote down in January no longer matches the year you're actually living, you're not behind. You're just due for a review.

This is the time of year where I see most women entrepreneurs do one of two things. They abandon the plan entirely and start running on default, or they white-knuckle a plan that stopped fitting their reality months ago. Both end the same way: a Q3 where nothing feels like it's working and you can't tell why.

So in this episode I'm walking you through the exact mid-year review I'm running on my own business right now, messy parts included. Facebook disabled my ads account for six weeks and pushed a one-month project into three and a half. Travel patterns shifted enough that we had to restructure how we delivered the March retreat. And I'm being honest about the weeks recently where I haven't had it in me to record at all, and what that's been teaching me about adjusting capacity instead of grinding through it.

By the end of this conversation, you'll have a clearer picture of what's still working in your business and what you need to change before the second half of the year gets away from you.


What You'll Learn in This Episode

  • Why most entrepreneurs abandon their plan in June instead of doing the harder work of adjusting it
  • How to separate the goals that still serve you from the ones that no longer match the year you're actually in
  • Why 80% is the only achievement standard worth holding yourself to right now, and why 100% is silently breaking your business
  • The leading metric Racheal tracks every week to predict revenue before it shows up
  • What to do when last year's capacity isn't available this year, and how to set goals around the version of you that exists today
  • How to "think like a store" when you're deciding what to sell each month for the rest of the year
  • What Racheal is changing in her own business right now after running this exact review on herself


Key Concepts from the Episode

Maycember. The collision of end-of-school chaos, exam stress, classroom parties, and final projects that turns May into a second December for working parents. If your operating system doesn't have built-in checkpoints, you'll lose the back half of your year to whatever shows up.

Adapt vs Abandon. When the plan stops matching reality, most entrepreneurs don't update it. They quietly let it go and start running on default instead. A plan you stopped using six months ago isn't a plan. It's a relic.

The 80% Standard. Hitting 80% of what you set out to do is success, not failure. Holding yourself to 100% in a year like this one is how you burn out trying to prove a point that doesn't matter. Perfection is not a business strategy. Capacity is.

Lagging Goals vs Leading Metrics. Revenue is a lagging metric. It tells you what already happened. Leading metrics, like the number of consults booked this month, tell you what's about to happen. If revenue is the only thing you're tracking, you're managing your business through the rearview mirror.

Think Like a Store. Even retailers with a full catalog highlight specific offers each month tied to what's seasonally relevant. The same applies to your business. Selling the same thing every month is not consistency. It's invisibility.


Resources Mentioned

Plan Your Best Year Ever. Racheal's free annual planning challenge to map out your goals, your offers, and your marketing calendar for the year. 

Fired Up and Focused. Free five-day challenge to build the habits and systems that keep you focused on what actually moves your business forward. 

The June CEO Retreats. Three formats are currently open: the Virtual CEO Retreat, the in-person Richmond CEO Retreat, and the On-Demand CEO Retreat. Pick the format that fits where you are right now. 

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🎤 Thanks for listening! I'll see you next week!

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Racheal Cook

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