[00:00:00] I am back with another bonus episode. That means a listener asked a juicy question, and I'm here to share my answer.

[00:00:35] Today's question is personal. Someone said they'd love to hear more about how I personally prioritize my tasks and how I vision out the month ahead. Ooh, this one's personal, but I am an open book and if it's helpful to you, I am happy to share. So remember that my business is different than yours and my goals and my offers and my products, and the way I divide up my pie chart of ways that I make money is unique to me and different from yours.

[00:01:11] If there are things in hearing how I plan that can help apply to your business goals, I'm happy to share them, but it's not going to be a plug and play plan that directly applies to your goals because your business is so beautiful and individual and unique and it's not the same as mine. Okay, so with that disclaimer, I will share about my 2024 goals because 2024 was a huge year for me.

[00:01:42] 2024. My big goal was to tackle a problem that had been haunting me in my business, and it was a goal that I had been dragging with me year after year after year. Every time it was New Year goal setting, this same thing didn't get done, and I had to figure out why. And so I booked a coaching call, a clarity call with someone who I admired and trusted who I knew could help me figure out why someone who's really good at breaking tasks down and taking action

[00:02:20] can't achieve this one goal and can't seem to make progress on it. So I was vulnerable. I booked a strategy session with a coach, just a one-time call, not a big, fancy, long-term package. I had one question that I really wanted to deep dive in and get to the answer of. And it was a very impactful coaching session for me, and she helped me understand what it was about this task that I had big feelings about, that I needed to sort out first.

[00:02:47] And she helped me decide why this task is still coming with me year after year. What makes it so important that I really do want to solve it. And also understand whether I had the tools to solve that problem or I needed to invite someone else in. And to get that goal accomplished, I had to invite someone else, it ended up being to someone elses, behind the scenes in my business to help me.

[00:03:16] And it was very vulnerable to let someone into my digital mess and show them an area of my business that I didn't have altogether. And I worried about if words would spread about what they saw behind the scenes and if they would share that with others. And at the end of the day, I knew none of that was true.

[00:03:36] I knew as a service provider that we are in the business of helping and not in the business of judging, and we are just there to help. And if there's something in the behind the scenes of my business that needs to be solved for me to go forwards, and there's another unicorn out there that knows how to solve it because they've solved a similar problem before then us holding hands and crossing that bridge together is often the best path forward.

[00:04:06] So this coach helped me work through those feelings that I didn't even really know were bubbling and blocking me, and helped me identify what the next step was. And she worked with me to help identify what the perfect unicorn would look like that I would be able to trust to come with me behind the scenes, see the mess, sit in the mess with me, and help me cross the bridge to the other side.

[00:04:30] And so this personal goal for me in my business was having to do with a big email marketing backend mess that had been created from moving one platform to another, but also pivoting to serve one audience and then serving another. I had a number of freebies and lead magnets that were out there that were no longer serving me, and they were great, and they were solving problems for people, but they weren't

[00:04:55] people that I really, truly wanted to add to my list to serve in the future. They were problems I had solved in the past, and I had come to peace with the fact that I can't solve every problem for every person on this earth. And I was ready to officially close up shop in certain pillars of my brand and focus my audience growth

[00:05:18] going forwards, and there was just a lot of backend tech,. And I could hold the feelings and the clarity of where I wanted that brand to go, or I could be removed from the feelings and handle a tech problem like that in someone else's business. But I couldn't live in the emotions of that pivot in my own business and do all the tech steps with a clear mind

[00:05:44] to know that I was doing it well. I really needed to step out of that problem and invite someone in. And so I found an amazing human to come behind my brand with me and help me identify what are the steps, I would actually need to take to solve this problem. And we kind of divvied things up. These were things that I felt I could do.

[00:06:06] These were things I needed her to do. And then she was honest that she thought we needed to bring in one additional person to really do the problem and solve it well, and I honored that suggestion and we ended up inviting two other people into the team to solve this problem. And the problem was completely solved that year by May.

[00:06:28] So we took January, February, March, and April, three of us humans together holding hands, solving the problem fully together, crossing the bridge, and then I felt like I had a brand new business on my desk in May that I got to run with and really enjoy. And so that was my story about prioritizing tasks in 2024.

[00:06:53] If we bring it back to this question, how did I prioritize tasks? I drew a line in the sand in 2024 and I said, we're solving this problem and we're solving it first. I am not dragging this problem into another calendar year ever again. This is the year it gets solved. And so every day I started looking at my calendar saying, what's the next step for this task to move forward? For this goal to move forward?

[00:07:22] And is that task on my desk? So, if that task was on service provider a's desk and there was nothing else I could do but be available to answer their questions quickly, then I was free to move on to the next task that was on my desk. But if a question came in from one of those two unicorn humans about that task,

[00:07:45] I would pause what I was doing, answer them as quickly as I could so that I wasn't the bottleneck in my own business, and then I would return to what I was doing because I had the clarity that the most important needle that needed to be moved in my business was that stuck project. And so every morning, that was the first question I asked myself, is there a step that I could take to move that specific goal forwards?

[00:08:11] And if it was a yes, I set a timer and I took a step. And if it was a no, then I knew that I was free to go into a different task and that someone else was working on that problem for me. And so as I visioned out the month ahead in January and February and March and April, there were a lot of tasks on my calendar that were related to that goal.

[00:08:37] But the closer we got to the problem being solved in May, the fewer tasks there were, or they were shorter tasks, they were quick approval tasks, or quick this or that decisions. It was learning the new system as it got handed back to me by these amazing service providing humans. And then in May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December, there were no tasks on my desk related to that goal because I had already achieved it.

[00:09:09] So prioritizing that task at the beginning and not waiting to do it in the summer and not waiting to do it in Q4, doing it first helped me honor and show up for those goals, and it helped bring me clarity when I was putting other tasks on my desk. I was like, do I really have time to take on this other project?

[00:09:30] Or do I have a lot of tasks on my desk related to this really important goal that I said I was really serious about this particular year? So for that particular goal, I love front loading goals. I went all in on that icky, sticky problem in January and February and March, and then the work got lighter in April, and in May I was stepping into a whole new business

[00:09:54] that I didn't even recognize and it was so exciting. And I was having a new year, new me moment, at a time of year where other people were not. And I felt like I was getting to move on to 2025 goals seven months early. It just felt like such a gift. But that's just how my brain works, and that was the most important goal in my business.

[00:10:17] And there were certainly other important things that I achieved in 2024, but they all felt like the bonus round, they all felt like gravy because that big one goal that I allowed to be my focus was the most important thing on my heart because it was just such an important stuck moment in my business.

[00:10:37] And if we go back and listen to that story, I didn't do it all by myself, right? I used a strategy call with a coach to get me unstuck. I chose a unicorn who had a unique skillset who I thought could help me unstick that problem. And then I trusted that human when they said we needed to bring one more person into the fold.

[00:10:56] And it got me to my destination, and it was one of the hardest problems that I've ever solved in my business. It was one of the most emotional decisions I've ever made. And it's also one of the ones that was the most impactful, and I was so grateful for stepping into the bravery and going through the sticky feelings to get to the beautiful place at the other side.

[00:11:19] And then to make sure I answer this question fully, the second part of this question was about visioning the month ahead. So I'm gonna give a shout out to Alexis. I will link her calendar down below. I talk a lot about digital project management systems. I also promise you that there is a place in your life for paper planning tools.

[00:11:39] Alexis has a paper calendar that is created by a service provider for other service providers, and it's genius. It's editable, it's in Canva, it's a monthly calendar layout. I print it out on card stock and I hang it above my computer on a clipboard, and it helps me make sure that I'm on track for my month.

[00:12:04] So I know there are some other freelancers in my space. So on the left side of Alexis's amazing calendar is where she has you list the offers that you offer to people and how many spaces you have for each one. So for example, if I offer Asana builds as a service and I have capacity this month to do two of them, then that offer is on the left hand side and it has two

[00:12:30] spots for Asana builds, and so then I know if there's a name in that spot then I only have one spot left, and if there's two names in the spot, then I don't have any spots to offer this month. So it helps me make a really quick decision when someone slides into my dms or the contact form on my website.

[00:12:48] And they say, Hey, I think I would like you to build me an Asana workspace. Is that something you can do this month? I can look really clearly above my computer and I can see, no, I do not have any openings for that service right now, but my next available opening, is. And that seems like something silly to have on paper, but there's just something that we can't argue is really helpful about pen and paper, and I love to use a highlighter and cross things off.

[00:13:16] So on that calendar is all of the client tasks that I've agreed to do inside other businesses this month, and I only get to see that calendar. That calendar allows me to plot out how long I think each of those projects are going to take and what specific day in the month I plan to focus on that person's business.

[00:13:36] And then once that client's project is fully solved, I highlight it on the left side to make sure that they're paid, they're happy, I delivered everything they need, and then I cross it off on my calendar as well. So my goal by the end of the month is that that entire calendar is crossed off and highlighted and empty.

[00:13:55] And I keep some spaces open on that calendar for things like popup meetings so that if someone needs to hop on a Zoom with me, I can see really quickly what days I have capacity for that type of energetic conversation and what days I really need to be heads down on a project for someone else's business because that's a promise I've already made to them.

[00:14:15] And so that paper calendar is something built by a service provider for service providers, and it works really well for me. It's a tool that's supplementary to my digital project management system. It's not instead of, but one of the unique challenges we have as service providers is that I spend my day bebopping in and out of many other people's businesses.

[00:14:39] And so seeing my entire business capacity in one place is sometimes just something I like to double check on a paper calendar to make sure that if I've promised to do something in your business, it has like a black and white time slot saved and dedicated in my calendar. So in terms of my monthly vision, this person knows that I do plan monthly in my business. Clients

[00:15:06] mostly put work on my desk on the first of the month, and they know that they will get their deliverables by a certain day. But I have most of the work for the month ready to go on my desk on the first of the month, and then I have a game plan to make sure I can get everyone their work by the deadline that they need it.

[00:15:24] And that it is a process that's unique to the type of business I have. And Alexis's Paper Calendar has been a tool I've used in my business for multiple years. I was probably the first sale of that product. I was one of the people who begged her to make it, and it's still a tool that I use in my business each and every day.

[00:15:45] It helps me project revenue, it helps me double check my capacity, and it helps me make decisions in my business quickly, and time is money as a business owner, so any tool that helps me make a decision quickly so that I can move on to a needle moving task, that's a win-win for me.

[00:16:07] So prioritizing tasks in my business involves being laser focused on what my current clear goal is. Making sure I do something every single day that's related to the goal that I said was most important this year, and then visioning out the month ahead is a capacity check for me, and that means that I need a visual tool that can show me

[00:16:30] all the things I've already said yes to and what openings I have. So if I have an opening for a podcast management client, or an email marketing client, or one VIP week that I could do for an Asana build, or a TPT data or coaching client, or a strategy call, any of those openings that I have that I feel I could add to my plate in a particular month are clearly demonstrated on my calendar, above my desk at all times.

[00:17:00] And that's a promise that I make to myself, that when all of those tasks are done, I am free to make a choice to do anything that I wish to grow my business and spend my time the way I want. But when I sit down at my desk with a fresh cup of coffee, I have a game plan for the day on that calendar and my job is to choose the client of focus, who's next, and honor their big dreams and their business to the best of my ability on that day.

[00:17:29] Your business looks different from mine, so you need to find the tool that works for you, but I hope that little peek behind the curtain about how I think about my own business priorities and plan for the month is helpful in some way. Do you have a teacher business question that you're hoping to hear answered on the podcast?

[00:17:49] I'll leave a link for you in the show notes.