Summary : The 12 Week Year – Brian P. Moran and Michael Lennington

You can’t build a reputation on what you’re going to do.”
– Henry Ford

Every week, schedule a 15-minute session where you score your previous week, plan your coming week and account to your peers.
At least once a week, schedule a three-hour block of time where you work on your business, not in it. Call these your strategic blocks of time and schedule when your work activity is typically the lightest. Use that time to accomplish some key activities.
Every day, schedule one or two buffer blocks. These are 30 minutes or an hour long. Use them to get through your e-mails, phone calls and other interruptions as fast as possible.
Also schedule a 3-hour breakout block of time each week. Use that time to do something fun and creative. This block of time prevents burnout and gives you an opportunity to develop new passions.
Finally, fill the rest of your calendar with all the other important activities you need to be doing.

The only way you will ever have any realistic chance of meeting the ambitious stretch goals you set as 12-week targets will be to get into a weekly routine where you score your past week, plan the coming week and get a shot of enthusiasm from a small group of your peers.

Your 12-week plan needs to be very practical in order to be effective. Fill it with goals and tactics which are:
Specific and measurable
Descriptive of what success will look like
Stated positively
Realistic but big enough to make you stretch and grow
Assigned to someone specifically
Time-bound – which specify a due date for delivery

To create a motivational 12-week year vision, try this three-step exercise:
Articulate your long-term aspirations and big-picture vision. Think about what you want to achieve in the next 10 - 15 years
Clarify what you want to create over the next three years and describe what a great professional and personal life would look like three years from now
Develop your first 12-week plan. Set out your targets and the daily actions you will take to achieve those goals.
Share your vision with others – doing so will enhance your responsibility to act.
Write down your vision and keep it with you – review it every day and recommit to achieving it.
Take a few minutes each day to reflect on your progress – be very intentional about moving forward every day.
Make sure what you write down is meaningful – that it’s your vision and not one that someone else wishes on you. Connect with your vision emotionally.
Make sure your vision is big enough to inspire you – it must challenge you to do great things and to live your life with passion and commitment.

“If you think you can or think you can’t, you’re right.”
– Henry Ford

Loads of people talk about leading a balanced life but the reality is you don’t really want to spend equal amounts of time in every area of your life. The key to achieving leaps in productivity is to be purposeful about where and how you spend your time, energy and effort.

The key to being more productive is to be fully committed:
Have a clear and personally compelling reason why you want to produce results.
Understand the core actions which will generate the result you want and take them.
Count the costs – and be willing to make the requisite sacrifices.
Follow through and act on your commitments, not your feelings of the moment.

“There’s no such thing as work-life balance. There are work-life choices, and you make them, and they have consequences.”
– Jack Welch

“What I find profound is that the difference between greatness and mediocrity on a daily and weekly basis is slim, yet the difference in results down the road is tremendous. The difference between greatness and mediocrity for a salesperson is two or three extra appointments a week, five or ten more calls a day, three hours out of a 45-hour workweek spent working on their business. For a manager or leader, it’s recognizing the good work of one more person each day, delegating a task instead of doing it themselves, spending three hours of their week on strategic priorities, giving verbal praise and encouragement to someone who’s struggling. On a daily and weekly basis these differences seem minor, but in the long run they are significant.”
– Brian P. Moran and Michael Lennington