Feeling like the year’s flying by without the progress you hoped for? In this episode, Anna Lundberg shares how to use the summer slowdown as a powerful pause to reset your business focus and ensure you end the year feeling proud and accomplished. If you crave more intention, meaningful progress, and strategic action before December, this episode will give you practical prompts and inspiration to make it happen.

Key moments:

[00:00] Anna welcomes listeners and outlines the focus on resetting for the final months of the year.

[01:49] The power of taking a summer step back, using the “juggling balls” metaphor.

[03:54] Setting intentional, meaningful goals and reflecting on past annual achievements.

[06:25] Four reflection prompts to assess and reset your focus (what would make you proud, what’s missing, where to focus, support needed).

[11:48] Why you don’t need to overhaul everything; simple resets can create big shifts.

[13:51] Invitation to explore the Accelerator or one-to-one support for a strong year finish.

Resources mentioned:

• Chat with Anna: Book a call or message her on Instagram or LinkedIn to request access, including the workbook.
• Business Accelerator Programme: Next cohort opens in September for an October start. Learn more or register your interest at: onestepoutside.com/accelerate

Year-end business strategy

This one is for you if you’ve been rushing through this year ticking things off, but not necessarily moving the needle on anything that matters, it’s for you. If you’re craving a sense of focus and want to feel genuinely proud of where your business is by the end of the year. And if you know you work better when you take a step back, get clear and then go all in on what matters. Welcome to Reimagining Success, the podcast that helps you build a profitable business as an independent expert, one that works for you and your lifestyle. I’m your host, Anna Lundberg, former corporate insider turned business mentor, executive coach and mum of two. Whether you’re a solopreneur, a coach, speaker, consultant, I’m here to guide you in creating a business that gives you freedom, flexibility, and the fulfilment you’re looking for, ready to redefine success and build a business that you love. Let’s get started.

So this is the third episode in the August summer series on the podcast and we looked at tangible things you can do for this summer. Last week we looked at how could we redesign our business to work for term time work. And now, as things draw to a close and we get closer to September and things getting going again, I want to look at, okay, you know, four months, basically being generous left of this year. What would make you proud by the end of the year? Because summer is the perfect time to step back. We have that slower pace, we have clients on holiday. It’s a natural pause and hopefully you’ll recognise and experience that the world and your business is not going to spontaneously combust. It hasn’t exploded just because you’ve not been posting every day.

Yes, the algorithm won’t like it when you’ve been away and it’ll take a couple of days, blah, blah, blah, blah. It doesn’t matter. You’re living your best life and you know, coming back to the business to pick that ball up. You may have heard me talk about the metaphor of juggling balls. So glass balls, rubber balls and lead balls and your brand and your sort of social presence certainly is a rubber ball. So you can drop it, you can put it down intentionally and pick it back up and it will be perfectly fun. Fine, and fun maybe. So we don’t talk about hustling through August, but just reflecting, strategizing, ideating to have that clarity and focus for when you come.

So I want to look at some simple questions to help you reset your focus for the final four months of the year. And I don’t want to put pressure on you, it’s just that in my experience, the years when I’ve got to the end of the year, and there have been many when I’ve looked back and thought, huh, I’ve just kind of muddled through and I’ve done some things, but I just, you know, if you imagined, whether or not you share it on social media, that kind of the highlights of the year or, you know, the nine grid photos they do on Instagram or whatever that is, and in fact, most of them might be personal moments, but, you know, it just, it feels more satisfying when you set yourself an intentional goal and you’ve achieved it. And that applies whether it’s, you know, you’ve run a marathon or a 10k or a 5k, whatever your particular, you know, high ambition was ultra marathon, for goodness sake. I’ll try a man. I don’t know if it’s, you know, publishing your book, doing a TED talk, obviously those big and those are externally focused goals, so I’m not saying you need to have those, but something that, you know, oh, I’ve always wanted to write a book and now you’re writing a book, or I’ve always wanted to have a podcast and you’ve made that happen. Those are the really rewarding, meaningful things. It could also be making certain amount of money in your business, launching a particular programme, having a certain number of clients, whatever it is, but having been intentional and there’s no judgement of whether your goal is too big or too small. The point is just that if you set that intention and you achieve it, that is Happy days.

You may have set goals and intentions in the beginning of the year, you know, eight months ago or so, and if you’re now thinking, I’m not really on track for that, you can then either go, you know what, actually, that was the wrong goal. It’s not meaningful for me, or, no, I’m going to double down, knuckle down, whatever the expression is, and I’m going to make this happen. Even if we don’t make it happen by the end of the year, we’ll certainly make more progress than if we’d just given up. Right? And the example I always think of for me was, you know, a few years ago I wanted to do, in fact, it’s many years ago now, 2018, and I launched a group programme I wanted to do. I wanted to launch my podcast and my book. And it’s like, okay, that feels relatively manageable. It’s Three big things. But, you know, if you focus on those big rocks.

But obviously, in the meantime, I had client delivery and did I have kids then? No, I didn’t have kids yet, but I had all the other stuff. And so I was busy living life, working. And what I did was, in the end was I decided, okay, the most important priority is launching the programmes. That was February. I then set myself the arbitrary deadline of publishing the book by the 3rd of October, by my birthday. And then the podcast launched, I’m pretty sure, sort of December. So just in time for the end of the year. But otherwise that could have just been strung out forever and ever, right? So that’s my experience.

Now, if you don’t feel this way and you’re not motivated by that, then, you know, happy for you to skip this episode and go to next week’s interview. But for now, if you do agree, if you feel like, oh, yeah, it would be amazing if I could, da, da, da, then this could be for you. Now, a lot of us, I think, just keep doing things for the sake of doing. We stay busy, but we’re not moving the needle. And that’s why this kind of summer period of being away is such a valuable moment. Because, you know, if you think back to when you’re in a corporate job and you went on holiday, that’s when you suddenly go, oh, wow, I could do this and I could do that. And, you know, you get just a totally different perspective on things. I get that even if I just have a shower or go for a run.

And so, you know, having the number of weeks away from your usual routine is super creative and inspirational, whatever you’re doing. So it’s an opportunity to zoom out big picture and ask yourself, you know, what’s actually working, what’s draining you, what’s moving the needle? I don’t love that expression, but it is so important what’s actually moving the needle. And if we reflect now, then we can take sharper action in September. And for me, that’s when the accelerator enrollment opens for context. So, yeah, that’s on the horizon as well if you do want support. So, okay, a few reflection prompts for a strategic reset over the summer. Now, I asked this question for the summer for September, but I’m going to ask it again for December. So here it is.

What would make you proud and feel all those things I was describing there? Satisfied, Content? Ecstatic, however you express your emotions on the 31st of December? If you’re writing or celebrating or sharing something that you’ve done this year, what would make you feel really proud of how you showed up and what you achieved? And it could be getting out of your comfort zone. In fact, I find it more powerful to set an intention around the action you’re taking because you don’t have control over the end goal. Right. I can launch a programme. I can’t necessarily guarantee that I’ll get 50 people into it. I can apply to a TED Talk. I can’t necessarily guarantee that I’ll get the TED Talk. So it’s thinking about what’s the thing that you’re going to do to.

To actually make that thing more likely. Does that make sense? So what would make you proud by the end of the year? Secondly, let’s, okay, get a little bit dark and say what’s missing right now? So is it that you’re missing? You don’t even know how to do it. You know, the podcast example, we always get caught up in the tech and what if I don’t have enough things to say and how’s it going to work? You know, I worry I don’t have the equipment and so on. Is it lack of knowledge, skills? Is it lack of clarity on what exactly you’re going to do, how you’re going to do it? Is it confidence? Is it something more tangible like, you know, marketing, sales? The clients might be missing right now. So where are the biggest gaps between what would be success at the end of the year in December and where you are today? You know, think back. Why haven’t you been making progress on this? Or what’s caused you to be so slow so far this year? If you did set yourself this goal at the beginning of the year? For example, if I want to write a book, and I shared this in past years, I used to block Thursday mornings and I want to do that again now. It’s lovely in the cafe, no wifi, coffee and cake. And then I would work on the book.

And that’s how it happened. If I want to write a book, and I’ve looked at, oops, I haven’t spent the last eight months writing, then I need to block some time to write. It’s that simple. So what’s missing right now? And yes, the next one is where do you need to focus to close that gap? So obviously, again, think of my podcast group programme book example. Stop trying to do everything, especially when you’re starting out, but possibly even more so when you’re further along. I feel like, because we’ve sort of got so many plates spinning it and there’s Always new things being added. It can feel like, oh, I’ve got to keep going with everything. And again, this time over the summer is quite a good opportunity for a strategic reset to go, okay, what’s the high impact needle moving actions? If you’re like, I’ve got to do this, do you? Do you really? And I’m happy to have a call with you to help you sort through that because it’s hard to do it for yourself, but if you can coach yourself through that and go look when you go, ah, all these things on my list, if I look at my list here, actually, of things I want to do before the summer, you know, even recording podcast episodes, let’s say I could have made the choice to not do that for the summer and just have a break.

I then thought, oh, no, I’ll do a special micro mini episode series as I’ve instead ended up doing. I’m recording episodes that are longer than my usual ones. But hey ho, but they are tapping into the summer theme, so I hope they’ve been adding value to you. So where do you need to close that gap? What are the things that will actually move the needle, that will make a difference? And then finally, you know, I think we rarely ask ourselves this, and I’m not just saying this because I can provide some support to you, but what support would make this easier? We don’t have to struggle alone. If you need accountability, structure, fresh eyes, you know, you can work with a coach or mentor, you can find groups that support you, communities, you can go to events, you can listen to podcasts even, you know, you can pay if you’ve got the money. You can invest your own time if you’ve got more time than money. But it’s really asking yourself, how can you get the support that’s going to get you to this goal by the end of the year? So again, for me, the accelerator is my main container for this. It’s exactly the kind of reset we’re able to do inside the accelerator.

It’s experts who want to build this lifestyle business as a solopreneur, independent coach consultant, fractional experts who wants to do meaningful work, who wants to be writing books and doing TED talks and getting paid substantially for their expertise, being a recognised authority, not getting the VC or angel investor funding, not, you know, having the huge viral followings and becoming the next Brene Brown or Simon Sinek necessarily, but rather being respected in our field. If that’s you, then the accelerator is really a great programme, so you can read more and apply to the waitlist@onestepoutside.com accelerate one step outside.com accelerate. And you can also, once you’re on the website, you know, book a call with me. In fact, when you apply to the accelerator, you will have a call with me before we lock you in. So don’t worry that you’re not committing just by doing the application for the waitlist. We need to see if it’s a good fit for you and for me. Okay, so four reflection prompts. What would make you feel proud by December? What’s missing right now? Where do you need to focus to close that gap? And what support would make this easier? And I don’t need to give you permission, but I’m happy to do so, to say that you don’t need to overhaul everything in August.

This is not that you need to now go for a retreat for a week to do all these things. Literally, an hour with a notebook or whiteboard can shift your energy entirely. Why not book out kind of a CEO reset hour? Maybe there’s a time when your partner’s taking the kids to the playground or something, go sit in the sun with a pen and paper. Maybe you’re by the pool somewhere. You know, the kids are off playing tennis, who knows? And that’s time that you can have to yourself. And if you’re anything like me, you’ll enjoy it because it’s so fun. I love this kind of stuff. Summer, perfect time to take that step back.

And September, you know what? It’s not too late. To some extent, it’s the beginning of a new year, right when we’re talking term time working, it’s almost like the as important, if not more important than the start of the calendar year, which is a bit arbitrary. In fact, there’s so many starts of the year. I’ve got three if I count September as the start of the year for the school. January calendar year, and then April, start of the business year. So you know, you can restart whenever you want, which is pretty cool. But September is a great time to recalibrate. And again, if you want support to build that structure for the final four months and beyond, then applications for the next accelerator intake are opening.

We start in October, so that was a slightly shorter episode, so that’s good. But I wanted to talk about this bigger picture of, okay, what is the next four months or so going to look like for you? It’s not too late. You know, you might be feeling the pressure now because you’ve taken a month or so off all the more important to take the step back and be intentional about what you’re designing and what you’re focusing on so you don’t just get back to busy work and hustling away. And then again you get to December. Like hang on a second, what was I even working on? I haven’t done the things I want to do and it’s still not working, which would be a shame. Okay, see you next week. Bye for now.

If this episode has you thinking that something needs to shift, whether that’s streamlining how you work, redesigning your offers, or finally building the business that you actually wanted when you started, let’s talk about what’s next for you. We can look at where you are, what you want these next few months and years to feel like, and whether one one support or the business accelerator would be the best fit. Just book a call at onestepoutside.com/call. It’s a simple conversation to explore what would make the biggest difference for you right now. That’s onestepoutside.com/call.

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