Business success doesn’t happen by accident. It’s built step by step with clarity, reflection, and alignment. This quick start approach gives you a simple, powerful framework to build your best year yet.

📚Learn

Here are 5 key things you can apply from my planning method:

🤔Think

💪 Act

Pick one thing to work on this week:

Small steps. Big momentum. Let’s build forward.

The temptation in Q4 can be to take your foot off the gas, wrap up what you can, coast a little, and promise yourself (and your team) that you’ll start fresh and inspired in January. But, how you finish 2025 sets the tone for how you begin 2026. If you drift now, you risk dragging that with you into 2026. If you get intentional now, you’ll hit January with clarity, energy, and a plan your team is already moving on.

We strongly believe that the best don’t wait until January to figure it out - whatever “it” may be. They use the last stretch of the year to reflect, focus, and activate. Think of it as laying trail markers so that when you hit the first mile of 2026, everyone knows the path. So, we have provided a few ideas and suggestions you can use to start intentionally building for 2026. Pick what you think will work the best for you and your team. Use one or use them all.

Shift Reflection Into Action:

Don’t just ask “what worked this year?” Document it. Pull your team together and use these 2 prompts:

Action Item: Host a 30-minute reflection session. Capture the answers on a whiteboard (our favorite) or in a shared doc so that they don’t vanish into thin air and are forgotten.

Clarify the 2026 Driver

Growth, profit, impact all sound good, but vague goals won’t move your team. Get specific. If your 2026 driver is profit, what margin are you chasing? If it’s growth, by how much? If it’s impact, in what measurable way?

Action Item: Write down your primary driver for 2026 in one sentence. Share it with your leadership team to ensure alignment and then ask, “does this feel clear enough to guide us into 2026?”

Strengthen Core Functions

Every business has a backbone. Examples include build, install, service, sell. The breakdown usually isn’t strategy but ownership. Who owns what? What metric proves it’s working?

Action Item: Pick one function that feels fuzzy. Assign a clear owner. Agree on one success metric before the week is out.

Reframe Problems Into Possibilities

Teams are beyond tired of hearing “we need to fix X.” Try to reframe it. Instead of “our onboarding is broken,” try “It would be awesome if every new hire hit the ground running by day 30.” This small language shift sparks buy-in, creativity, and possibility.

Action Item: Ask your team to rewrite one nagging problem into a possibility statement. Then brainstorm together one step to make it real before year’s end.

Don’t wait until January. Use Q4 to set markers, assign owners, and build clarity. If you do, when 2026 arrives, you will already be moving forward with purpose.

We’re lacing up and heading out. Here’s where Catalyst will be in the coming weeks. Join us on the path and be part of the conversation.

Are you planning your 2026 SKO, RKO, or GKO? If you so and you are looking for someone who can connect with your team, using their language, Mike is your guy. He won’t just talk at your audience, he will interact and engage with them.

Fom communication and leadership to GTM, ICP and more, Mike brings real world experience and insight with practical and actionable takeaways that can be implemented immediately.

Book Mike for your next event now.

Or email us at [email protected]. We would love to hear more about your event and learn how Mike can partner with you to make it a success.

Please share with colleagues who could use some motivation and strategies for their next steps.

Keep putting one intentional step in front of the other - the view gets better and better as you climb.

The Find My Catalyst Team