A Year of 12 Weeks

How to Get More Work Done in 12 Weeks Than Others Do in A Year?

Author

Noman Shaikh
March 08, 2023

Image by pch.vector on Freepik

Big claim. Isn’t it?

A while back there was research conducted to find out at what time of the year people are most productive. Guess what they found… We are most productive during November and December.

If you think about it, it should not surprise you.

Why so?

Deadline. It’s the yearly goal that supercharges our productivity. We fasten up.

Now, that’s what’s wrong with setting yearly goals.

When you’re setting up goals for a year and January comes by, you don’t have the urgency. You have a lot of time. And, another month passes by, and you still have time. And, another.

The goals seem practical even if you procrastinate a little more.

The Book “The 12 Week Year” by Brian and Michael suggests an approach that works a lot better and helps you achieve a lot more.

He suggests you set a 12 Week Goal. Not too many of them. One or two goals. Max three. One for each area of your life. You could define the areas for your life, for me it’s career, relationships, and health.

You got to understand that Less is more. 

When athletes train, they focus on one skill for a set number of weeks. They train hard on it. And, by their set deadline they master it. And, they now move on to the next one.

12 weeks is neither too long to make you procrastinate. Neither is too short, to scare you.

Your yearly goal is now a 12-week goal.

So now you’ve to treat every week as a month. And every day as a week.

Let’s break it down and keep it simple.

  1. Have one goal

  2. Make a 12-week plan to achieve that goal

  3. Make a separate plan for every single week

  4. Plan specific daily actions to accomplish weekly targets

As you start the week, you block your calendar to revisit your goal. And as the week comes to end, you revisit the activities and evaluate them.

If you think about it we’re just tightening up the deadlines. And this reminds me of Parkinson’s Law, the amount of work expands to fill the time available for its completion.

What do you think about this approach? Let me know your thoughts.

- Noman Shaikh