I recently did a quarterly planning session with some of the MacSparky Labs members. I do that every quarter and find it really rewarding. It gives us a bit of a personal accountability circle. During the session, I started talking about the importance of quarterly review.

Now I know, reading this, you’re thinking that the new year is just around the corner. If you’re going to start thinking about planning and priorities, that seems like the ideal time to do it.

But think back to whatever you did this past January. Is it still on your mind? It likely isn’t, because January is a very poor boss of October.

I’m a big fan of quarterly planning. I think, as humans, we respond much better to a three-month plan than a year-long plan. It gives you a sense of renewal every three months, along with real, actionable feedback loops. Quarterly reviews give you a scheduled chance to make adjustments.

I’ve been working a lot lately on my health, but that isn’t a thing you can fix with one January resolution. In Q1, I was more focused on better eating habits and losing weight. In Q4, I’m thinking a lot more about how to gain more muscle and become more fit. Revisiting it quarterly lets me change the area of focus.

Annual planning gives your goals a lot of hiding places to disappear. Ninety days is much more concrete. You can pick a few things where you can actually move the needle and make progress.

I’ve got a lot more thoughts on this that I cover in the Productivity Field Guide, but here we are at the beginning of Q4. My advice to you is to start now. Don’t wait until January 1 to try to get serious about what’s important to you.

Figure out a few things today that you can do in the next 90 days and get to work.