I’ve always been fascinated with time and fruitfulness—from daily time boxing to annual planning. I don’t remember where I first read about it, but, at one point, I read an article about dividing the year into three one hundred day segments with a few weeks for review, refreshing, and planning in between. The idea is interesting for two reasons:

1. Quarter Planning Weaknesses - Because of fiscal quarters, many leaders plan in three-month increments. In my work with leaders, I’ve found four-month increments to be far desireable to three. For planning purposes, you’re looking for the maximum amount of time to retain focus and facilitate goal setting.

2. Semester Planning - For any leaders who plan around the school year (hint: all of them), the one-hundred day planning cycle allows natural synchronicity with the people you serve. Most people think of the year as fall and spring with a summer break (sorry winter).

So the one hundred day planning cycle is patterned around these principles:

1. Break the year up into three one hundred day increments beginning on January 1, May 1, and September 1. There is still time to hop into the first cycle of 2022. Today is day five.

2. In between these three one hundred day “sprints” create three buffer weeks: one for review, one for refreshing, and one for planning the next one hundred days. If you think in weeks, this means that you’re planning for three fourteen week pushes with three weeks in between each push. Each complete cycle is seventeen weeks.

3. Creat goals for the next one hundred days. You’re trying to find a goal big enough to accomplish over fourteen weeks but small enough to not extend into the next one hundred day cycle.

4. Get after it.

Along with me, a few of my intrepid coaching clients are beginning this year of coaching by organizing their goals this way. I’ll relay successes and failures later this year. I’m thinking of using this method for all my coaching, signing up clients for renewable one hundred-day sprints.

Grimké Work

The spring semester is upon us. Students are signing up for classes, including our inaugural STM (Masters in Sacred Theology) class. Did I mention that we are launching a theological journal soon? Stay tuned.

Coaching Work

I’m almost full with coaching clients for the beginning of 2022, a great milestone for me. Honestly, my side-gig and my main work feed one another—writing for leaders as I’m learning more about them and their challenges through coaching.

Parting Quote

“To lead is to live dangerously because when leadership counts, when you lead people through difficult change, you challenge what people hold dear—their daily habits, tools, loyalties, and ways of thinking—with nothing more to offer perhaps than a possibility.” —Heifetz and Linsky, Leadership on the Line

Up Next

In addition to the great feedback about interest in reading more about some of the things I added at the end of my last newsletter, I recently did a deep dive into social media scheduling platforms and the algorithms they use. I’m hoping on writing soon about how I think they’re changing social media, leadership, and those who use them.