The Leadership Season Most People Waste

December separates leaders from drifters. When the world coasts, you compound. Keep it simple, stay ruthlessly consistent, and you’ll start January already moving.

Core Idea

• Q1 is built now. Real estate runs on ~90-day cycles. What you do in Nov/Dec becomes your Feb/March checks.
• Don’t launch new projects. Double down on the few moves that already work.

Business — Market-Share Grab

Your December play:

• Daily (60–90 min): CRM follow-ups, speed-to-lead, appointment setting. No skipping.
• Weekly: Pipeline audit, listing prep checklists, offer/escrow negotiations, refresh ad copy and action plans (not platforms).
• Absolutely not: Changing CRMs, “going dark,” starting shiny new initiatives.

Micro-targets (per weekday):

• 30+ outbound conversations
• 2+ nurtures moved forward (appt set / LO intro / CMA delivered)
• 1 new face-to-face set (buyer consult or listing appt)

Scoreboard (track daily): Conversations | Appts Set | Appts Held | New Escrows | New Listings

Body — Discipline Through Holidays

Rules of engagement:

• Non-negotiables: Train, steps, protein, water, sleep.
• Indulgence window: Enjoy the holiday meal, not the weekend. Back on plan next meal.
• Party protocol: Eat a clean meal beforehand, pick 1–2 “treat” items, keep alcohol low, hydrate.

Weekly checklist: 4–6 training sessions | 8–10k+ steps/day | 7+ hrs sleep | log intake 5+ days

Balance — Presence Over Presents
Lead at home:

• Schedule weekly date night (do not cancel).
• Block two device-free family windows each week.
• Say no to low-value events so your people don’t get the leftovers version of you.
  
  

Simple wins: One family ritual (game, walk, cocoa & lights) | One 1:1 with each kid

Being — Anchor Your Spirit
Daily 10–15 minutes:

• Gratitude (3 specifics), short prayer/meditation, 3 lines of reflection.
• Keep your identity and standards intact while the calendar gets noisy.

14-Day December Sprint (repeat to New Year)

• Mon–Fri: 60–90 min power hour (CRM + dials), train, log food, family block.
• Sat: 30–45 min pipeline clean-up + active clients; light cardio; date night.
• Sun: 20-min weekly plan, meals/gym times set, gratitude stack.

Success criteria (per 14 days):

• 10+ set appts | 2+ signed (listing or buyer) | All actives touched twice weekly | Training hit 10–12 sessions | 2 date nights | 14 being blocks

Don’t Do List (non-negotiable)

• Don’t switch systems/platforms in Q4.
• Don’t “wait for January” to start habits.
• Don’t ghost your phone/clients.
• Don’t let one off-plan meal become a 4-day slide.
  
  

Lead now. Keep it simple. Stack small wins daily. You’ll roll into January fresh, funded, and already ahead.

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Transcript

Rachael Novak:

[0:34] All right, welcome back to another episode of the Growth Drivers podcast. We are going over

today the leadership season that most people waste. This will be coming out in December, first or

second week of December. And so we're going to kind of chat through each domain and how

December separates drifters from leaders every single year. It kind of blows my mind a little bit how

predictable this time of year is every year. Around Thanksgiving, the end of November, people start

checking out. They start tapping out. They soften standards. They coast in their business. They

stop tracking their habits. And then they act really shocked when January hits and they feel behind.

Mike Novak:

[1:18] Yeah. Meanwhile, obviously, the people that actually lead, they're doing the opposite, right?

They're putting points on the board while everyone else is busy waiting for the new year or thinking

about maybe what they're going to do when the new year comes.

Rachael Novak:

[1:28] Yeah, exactly. So let's just name this because this window right here, and we've talked about

this in years past, but this is like the highest leverage window of the entire year. Because when the

entire world slows down, other people in your industry, in your business, in business in general,

kind of slow down. The discipline that you maintain in this season is what's going to stand out.

Because everybody else is checking out. So if you're maintaining even micro commitments, your

momentum is going to compound.

Mike Novak:

[1:56] Right. And you don't really need to start a whole bunch of new projects or reinventing the

wheel on what you're doing. You just need to be ruthlessly consistent on a couple of things in each

domain.

Rachael Novak:

[2:06] Exactly. So we're going to kind of break this episode down a little bit. We're going to go

through business, body balance being all the domains and talk just a couple of points, two, three

max points in each area as to how you can continue that momentum and kind of like almost give a

stress test to some of the things that you do right now to lead yourself through this season and

kickstart January 2026 on the right foot.Mike Novak:

[2:33] So if you want to avoid being one of those people who wakes up in January full of regret, we'll

grab your coffee, sit down, and let's jump into it.

Rachael Novak:

[2:40] Oh, you're eggnog this time of year. All right, let's talk about business first. We like this time of

year because we're going to call this the market share grab, right? A lot of real estate agents, a lot

of mortgage pros, a lot of people in this industry kind of start checking out. I was telling a couple of

people on our team, actually, there is this group that I'm a part of, a real estate agent group.

There's dozens of them, but this one in particular. Somebody posted in there this meme about how

it's okay to not work. It's okay to take time. It's okay to ignore your phone. It's okay to do these

things. I was honestly kind of surprised. I know the sentiment of taking rest and taking time is

important strategically, but now is not the time to be ignoring your phone. Now is not the time to be

checking out of all your business stuff. People that check out early this time of year, they're not

going to have anything come January. Leaders in this industry, leaders who continue to build good

businesses year after year, they capitalize on this time of year. You gain ground and market share

because others don't, because others are checking out.

Mike Novak:

[3:50] Right. And for many agents and loan officers, 2025 has been a very, very tough year. And so I

think we all believe 2026 is going to be a much better year as far as sales activity goes, but it's not

going to change unless you start changing and implementing those adjustments right now. It's

important to remember that real estate runs in really a 90-day cycle. And so the actions and the

conversations you're having right now, That's going to be the paycheck in February and March for

you. So if you're not doing those things, you know, come February, March, if you don't have money

coming in, go look back what you're doing in November, December.

Rachael Novak:

[4:21] Yeah, that's exactly right. And to that point, Q1 is built right now, right? Like your pipeline, your

follow-up, your client care, like people that you're taking care of right now. Maybe you're nurturing

people for Q1. Like those January, February, March numbers are determined right now. So the

micro consistency that you need to continue and, you know, show in your business, those are

going to beat whatever New Year's goals or new business plan or vision board that you're going to

create, right? Even 60 to 90 minutes a day of follow ups, of connection, of rapport building, like 60,

90 minutes a day will compound over the next couple of months. So that that just doing that a

couple times a week or daily during the week, that execution is significantly more powerful than,

you know, waiting till January and hoping to drum up some stuff then.

Mike Novak:

[5:12] Consistency is so massively undervalued and underestimated.

Rachael Novak:

[5:16] So. In business and in all of them, I think there's going to be a common theme, which is cut

out the noise, right? There's a lot of stuff going on, parties and get togethers and all these things

taking us away from the day to day. But I would highly recommend like if you're spending maybe 30minutes checking into your CRM a day, double down, go 60 minutes, go 90 minutes. And like Mike

said before, like don't, this is not the time to start new projects. This is not the time to add in

distractions, right? Like keep it simple calls appointments continuing to negotiate for clients that are

currently under contract working on your marketing maybe reworking some of the action plans in

your crm if you're on a team and you're you create leverage for your agents work on these things

right now so that january they're humming they're running really well you're not thinking about oh i

gotta redo this at that point please.

Mike Novak:

[6:05] God don't change crms in q4.

Rachael Novak:

[6:07] Did we do that one year in q4 i don't think we Thank you for it. Okay.

Mike Novak:

[6:12] Like, it's such a distraction.

Rachael Novak:

[6:13] It totally is. Exactly. So simplify, simplify, simplify. Leaders in this market in this time of year

get ahead with these micro consistencies, keeping things very simple, keeping it on the forefront.

Okay. So that's business. Let's move on to body. Michael, you love this one, especially this time of

year. I think the ultimate year-round goal, right? I'm seeing a ton of content right now, reels and

memes of people saying, oh, I tried to eat healthy, but then boom, Halloween, boom, Thanksgiving,

boom, Christmas, boom, New Year's got in the way. And I think we talked in a podcast just a couple

of weeks ago that those are only a couple of actual days in three months.

Mike Novak:

[6:53] And Halloween, what are you, a child?

Rachael Novak:

[6:55] I mean, cake is good.

Mike Novak:

[6:56] I mean, grow up. Enjoy Thanksgiving dinner. Enjoy Christmas dinner. and that's it.

Rachael Novak:

[7:02] Well, let's let's think about this, because, again, like this is about leadership and this is about

what leaders do this time of year and that keeping that discipline through the holidays, like enjoy

Thanksgiving for sure. We're going to have have an extra meal or two, have some extra Hawaiian

rolls, whatever it is. Right. Enjoy that gravy and pumpkin pie. Do it. But then don't let that run into

the entire weekend. And now you're binging for four days. Right. Maintaining discipline during the

holidays is a leadership skill. It's a transferable skill that's going to transfer into every other domain.

It's not just a fitness strategy. So when you train, when you're fueling properly, everything else in

your life is going to continue to stay sharp. So it's really, really important. And as we all know, the

second point, the body, right, your fitness level, how you feel sets the tone for your energy and

execution. So if you're wanting to continue to maintain those micro commitments in your business,but you feel like crap because you're full of pie and turkey and gravy for the next week and a half,

you're going to be tired. You're going to be bloated. You're going to be inconsistent, which is a kind

of a poor leadership decision.

Mike Novak:

[8:09] They're going to have heavy brain fog.

Rachael Novak:

[8:11] Yes.

Mike Novak:

[8:11] Feel lethargic, things like that.

Rachael Novak:

[8:13] Exactly. So if you're, if you take a day, okay, great. Now we can recover. Now we can go back

to eating clean, eat on plan, maintain those.

Mike Novak:

[8:21] I don't even think it's a day. It's a meal, right? To me, it's, it's like a, at least at the level that we

do things, it's kind of like a two-hour window where, hey, eat whatever you want in those two hours.

And I can eat a lot in two hours.

Rachael Novak:

[8:32] Yes, yes, you can.

Mike Novak:

structured meal.

[8:33] Like 4,000 to 6,000 calories. But when the two hours is up, that's it. It's right back to the next

Rachael Novak:

[8:38] Right.

Mike Novak:

[8:38] You know what I mean?

Rachael Novak:

[8:39] I think what it comes down to in the body domain, people use these Christmas parties or

Thanksgiving parties or get-togethers as excuses to continue to eat like trash or to drink a ton of

alcohol. And then they wonder why they don't feel good for the week after that, right? You don't

have to be perfect through the holidays. We're not saying that. But you must have non-negotiables.

You must have kind of rules for yourself for when you're going to parties. Know ahead of time. Eat

beforehand so you don't gorge on crap when you're there, right? Eat a good meal beforehand. So

maybe you just have one piece of charcuterie or a couple of bites of a dessert or whatever. Again,

not about perfection just have these rules when you're going out.

Mike Novak:

[9:24] I think back to our bodybuilding shows this year and on the second show like we went out forburgers right and it sounded so good like i mean i was just like salivating at the thought for like

weeks about this burger i looked at the menu probably 20 times had it bookmarked my phone you

know everything i stacked on it excited about it right and then i ate it and i felt like garbage and not

for like a day or an hour but like for like four or five days, I had this grease burger hangover. And so

I think that that, to a less extreme degree, like we all build these meals up to be something so

grandiose. But I think if you go off the rails, you can really feel bad for days. Absolutely.

Rachael Novak:

[10:03] Then it affects your sleep.

Mike Novak:

[10:04] And yeah, you sleep crap, your digestion sucks. You just, you feel very bad.

Rachael Novak:

[10:08] Yep, exactly. And, you know, another part of this, again, with this leadership, like how you

steward your body, your physical body, being models strength for friends and family, right? There

may be crowds that you're going to get some flack or somebody's going to pitch you shit about not

drinking alcohol or not eating, you know, the crap that they're serving or whatever. But listen, at the

end of the day, people respect somebody who have those non-negotiables. People respect

somebody who like leads and sets a tone with how they steward their physical body. So just

remember that going into these situations this year. All right.

Rachael Novak:

[10:46] Next is balance. Now, this is the season of balance, right? We're hanging with family and our

kids and our marriage. But I think that it's really important that we look at this again as a leader,

right? Because a lot of people are going to be focusing on the gifts and the white elephant

exchange and the friends and the business meetings or the business parties and company events

and those kinds of things. But like you don't as a leader, you don't want your family getting the

leftovers of you this season, right? Like people put so much weight into the shopping and the

presents and all these material things. But your people, the people who care about you, even in

your business, in your world, in your immediate household, they want your presence. They don't

want a chaotic, distracted version of you. So really focusing on presence and quality of time when

you're with your people is absolutely the leadership strategy to walk into this season with. And

protecting your ecosystem, protecting your household, protecting your family's time by simplifying

things, simplifying what you're going to do, having fewer commitments, saying, you know, no thank

you this year to a couple of those parties, and yes to very select ones, having very clear

boundaries, and having intentional connection with your family, your kids, and your marriage are

going to feel the most important and feel the best during this season.

Rachael Novak:

[12:12] And as you and I have experienced often, we don't sacrifice our marriage during this season,

during busy seasons. Like date night is a still and unnegotiable, right? Your marriage shouldn't

suffer because business is active or that's the time of year that there's a lot of people pulling for

your time. And remember, as a leader, as a parent, as somebody who sets the tone for people in

your world, especially your children, kids watch how we handle pressure. They watch how wehandle this season of life every single year through the holidays. What do we prioritize? What do

we talk about? How do we talk about it? How do we say yes, no? How do we set our boundaries

and keep our non-negotiables? Are we continuing to stay in alignment and be the same person at

home as we are out when go out to parties and things right there kids like to they will

subconsciously mirror your emotional regulation they will watch how you react to things they will

watch how you handle things and if you're chaotic and distracted and you're not present they're not

going to learn how to do that either so yeah.

Mike Novak:

[13:20] I think just like overall like reducing expectations of yourself and maybe for your kids too and

shifting it from presence to presence like the gift presence.

Rachael Novak:

[13:30] To presence.

Mike Novak:

[13:30] Like physical presence.

Rachael Novak:

[13:32] Exactly.

Mike Novak:

[13:32] And building memories, I think, is very powerful.

Rachael Novak:

[13:34] Yeah, presence.

Mike Novak:

[13:35] Because that's what the holidays are ultimately about, right? It's not about what you give or

get. It's about that time you spend together.

Rachael Novak:

[13:40] That's exactly right. What did we do last night? We brought our kids into the warrior system,

right? We got them on their app, the app now, and taught them how to stack yesterday. And we all

stacked, spent 15 minutes stacking as a family, and then we all shared our stacks with each other.

And two of our three kids literally stacked about the holiday season about how it was their favorite

because of the family time and it was like that was literally the top of their mind what they chose to

stack on so again it's just kind of another witness to say like this time of year it's so easy to get

distracted so easy to put weight into the stuff and the material and the gifts and who to get what

and when and plans but remember to be present with your people during this season okay, And

being probably the most important, especially for you parents out there, and I want to say moms,

sorry, honey, but I want to say moms mostly who are trying to build this magical time for their family

and their kids, again, kind of based on material things or, you know, and fun experiences, of

course, which are positive as well. You still have to take care of you in this season right you still

have to anchor your spirit and your your mind and your your connection with the higher power ordivine self or whatever you want to call it because stillness in this season which is so distracted and

so busy is the leadership superpower that nobody thinks about that nobody remembers what.

Mike Novak:

[15:09] Do they say in bad mom's christmas If you haven't seen that, go watch it.

Rachael Novak:

[15:12] Yeah.

Mike Novak:

[15:12] The mom is like, moms don't get joy. They give joy during Christmas.

Rachael Novak:

[15:18] Exactly. Which is exactly what I'm talking about, right? Like we are, we are the givers of the

joy. Yeah. It's like, it's like you sacrifice yourself during this entire season when all the kids and the

husband people want is you to be happy. And yet we are sacrificing ourselves to try to make

everybody else happy. So, you know, I stacked on this yesterday and it's, it's about, remembering

to utilize and exercise gratitude, right? We're moving into tomorrow. We're recording this the day

before Thanksgiving. And tomorrow is the day of thanks, the day that everybody stops and

remembers what they're thankful for and grateful for, followed immediately by the biggest day of

consumption of material items in the entire year. I've always thought that was ironic and weird, and

I've never been a Black Friday person at all. But it's a good reminder that gratitude changes the

perspective of the season. And to continue to exercise gratitude daily on a daily basis for what you

have is going to really help you stay anchored in this season and remember what's really important.

Rachael Novak:

[16:24] When it comes to what practices that you do, I think personally that your spiritual practices,

these mindful moments, journaling, praying, connecting with your higher power, God, whatever you

believe, those are going to carry significantly more weight for you as a person than whatever

holiday obligations that you commit to. So reflection and journaling and prayer, these keep you

aligned with who you are, who you want to be, so you don't get lost in the chaos of this season.

Because we see a lot like there's always like trying to plan family Christmas days or, you know, that

extend family. It's like, OK, how do we coordinate with 27 people who all have jobs and kids and

schedules? It's chaotic. It's distracting. So take care of yourself. Anchor your own spirit in this

distracted season because you don't want to feel that exhaustion at the end of this season. After

Christmas is over and New Year's over, it's like we have this this spiritual hangover. That I'm

exhausted from all this. Now I need to get back to normal life. Maintain these things, maintain these

micro commitments in every domain and business and body and balance and being. And you won't

feel that massive disconnection and loss or exhaustion nearly as much. Right. That's kind of what

the whole point of this is.

Mike Novak:

[17:52] Yeah i think if you do this right and you follow a blueprint like this you round the corner into

the new year feeling whole feeling fresh like your business is in a good spot because you did the

work, family's in a good spot because you spent the time you know you're you're spiritually soundyou know and you don't feel like a fat ass because you didn't go off the rails exactly you're not a

resolutionist exactly.

Rachael Novak:

[18:14] Right well that's it guys these are again our kind of suggestions in each domain to make

sure that as a leader in your life, in your world, in your business, that you are not wasting this

season and you're exercising these leadership skills in every single domain. So we'll see you next

time.

Mike Novak:

[18:34] Yep. See you next week.