Episode 43: 5 Things To Review Before The New Year
This time of year can feel overwhelming and chaotic. Things may have pilled up over the last few months or you've been meaning to organize that desk drawer.
But there is something nice about a fresh start on January 1st.
I'm sharing the 5 things to review to reset and refresh before the new year.
These are great things to do even if you aren't quite ready to set new goals.
Full Transcript:
Welcome back to the Upgraded Leader Podcast. I'm your host Nicole Case, and today I'm sharing the five things to review and reset before the new year. So I don't know about you, but I love the idea of a fresh start. I love the idea of a Monday of the beginning of a month, the start of the year, you know, your birthday, that kind of stuff, like just those
Milestones that naturally happen throughout the year, just kind of feel like a great time to do a bit of reflection, do that goal setting, all of those things. And if you're not quite ready to do some big old goal setting session, I. This can be a really fun exercise just to kind of dip your toe in. But regardless, there are just things I think in life, just things that don't seem like a big deal in the moment, but they pile up and can really weigh you down both physically and mentally, and just really contribute to you feeling [00:02:00] just generally overwhelmed.
They just really just add to the chaos in an already chaotic world. We don't need any more of that. So I know anytime I'm feeling just . A little overwhelmed, a little disorganized. There are these few things that I come back to time and time again to really ground myself. So again, if you're not really quite ready,
Or in that headspace to do a big old reflection session or a big old, you know, goal setting session. Um, that's okay. This might be like a nice little tiptoe into that if like you're like, I know I need to get reset and re-Grounded. These are some great places to start. So for me, reviewing these few things every year or sometimes quarterly, some of these things I do a little bit more regularly than just once a year.
But every time I do it, it just really makes a big difference in my headspace and my productivity. And again, just me just overall feeling grounded and reset. Now I. This is not an exhaustive list by any means, but these are definitely my go-to things. So I'd be curious [00:03:00] to hear about what yours are as we go along.
But again, where I'm gonna share just kind of the top five things that if I'm feeling kind of, um, a little bit, kind of overwhelmed or just know that these are things regularly, that if I keep up with them, I can feel really, uh, rested, relaxed, ready to rock and roll. So the first thing that I would look to, or I like to review and reset, particularly at the end of the year, is my workspace.
So our workspace is just so important to our productivity and just our day-to-Day comfort. Regardless if you are working at home, working in an office, some combination of . Both just your physical space really can make a dis a difference in just your, even just your day-to-day mindset. I mean, if you are not comfortable in your workspace, you know, it, it, it's gonna impact how you're able to show up and communicate and just really, truly be [00:04:00] productive.
Right. I was actually just doing a leadership training this week with a group of managers on leading through change, and I had asked the group, I said, you know, what are some of the big change initiatives or just big things that are going on in your organization that's requiring change? Which of course we went on for forever about all the various things that are changing in our organizations.
But one of the examples someone gave was that their organization was moving offices. They were moving buildings and . So now one of their employees are now sharing . An office space with another employee that they never needed to do that before. Everyone previously had their own private spaces, and now on this new building, they have to, they have to pair up, they have to double up in some, in some cases.
And her employee is kind of struggling bunking with, um, with this other employee. And that other employee is actually not on the team. So this manager, this leader, is trying to help her employee navigate this. New working arrangement, this [00:05:00] new work environment, this new workspace.
So, so again, for me, if my desk is messy, I. I'm gonna start to feel disorganized and my anxiety is gonna start to ramp up. And sometimes like, like kinda looking around at my physical space, if my physical space is me, is messy, or in my mind messy or just kind of disheveled, um, or they're just kind of things out of place, that is usually an external manifestation of how my brain is feeling in that moment.
So this is why I actually created this ritual. Years ago about, um, about cleaning up my desk space every Friday. That was kind of like one of the last things that I would do at the end of the day is, is clean my, is clean up my desk, so that Monday morning when I come back in, it's ready to go for me. Like again, that fresh start that I really enjoy.
So now at the end of the year, this might be a great time just to kinda look around your space again, whether it's at home, whether it's at, um, another office and just kind of . Just kinda look around and see like, what [00:06:00] do I need to go through? What does it need to be here anymore? And even if I'm just looking around my office space and my desk space right now, like it's clean.
Like if you, anybody would look at it and be like, yeah, Nicole, your desk is fine. It looks clean. But I can tell you that in, um, some of the file folder holder things, what are those words? I'm not sure. Where you put like just various files. I've just got a bunch of like, just random, loose pieces of paper and like some magazines and stuff like that that like, you know what, let me go through those.
I haven't gone through those in a little while just to kind of pull that out. I don't know, maybe you have like a coffee mug full of a bunch of pens that you don't use and you don't like because you know you got a pen from the bank. You got a pen from that conference that you went to. There's just a bunch of random pens.
Right? And if that's. Like maybe like, you know what? I don't like those pens. I'm not using them. Maybe you get rid of 'em and buy some like really cool, fun pens that you love to use and like have those stocked. I actually did this a couple years ago when my husband and [00:07:00] I moved. Um, I was packing up my office from the old, from the old house and I had to like a, like a shoebox full almost of.
Pens that are just like all mismatched and that like I didn't like that I didn't use and I was just like, I'm donating these . So I got rid of them and donated them and I bought like a bunch of pens that I absolutely love to use these. If you are watching on YouTube, you'll see I love these white pens.
And so I bought like a bunch of 'em, and that's what I have all around the house. So it's even just little things like that, just like cleaning up. Like I hate those pens. I'm not gonna use them, so get rid of them. I don't know, maybe you've got a drawer that is full of like 15 different lipsticks, pink lipsticks, and I've been known to have a drawer full of pink lipsticks that I don't use.
So things like that, like do you need to go through some things? Is your desk optimized for. The, you know, how you actually would like to use it. Maybe this could be a good time just to kind of look around your workspace. What needs to be tidied, what needs to be gotten [00:08:00] rid of, again, paperwork that needs to be gone through books that needs to be put back on the bookshelf.
Like that's kind of what I got going on right now. Like again, if. Anybody would look at my desk right now, they'd be like, Nicole, your desk is fine. Like it's, it's cleaned up. But I know that there's like a stack of books over here that they don't need to be here. I'm gonna, I need to put them back on my bookshelf.
And that's just, again, frees up space on my, my desk because I like having lots of empty space on my desk. That, to me, feels spacious. It feels, um, it doesn't feel like I'm bogged down or anything like that. Um, so that could be an exercise for you to do, even if, let's say you don't have, um, an off, like a dedicated workspace,
In your home is now the time to like get that set up. Do you want to like, create this little corner of your, of your home to be dedicated to a workspace? Maybe now's the time to get all of that set up or maybe revamp that in some ways. If that's, if, if you're just like, eh, I don't really like my [00:09:00] background.
You know what, maybe now's the time to, to tweak that a little bit. Um, the other kind of areas that you might . Take a look at here. You might take a look at your car, , you know, maybe your car needs, you know, maybe your car needs just a, a, a quick cleaning out or a quick, uh, a quick vacuum or kind of go through the, the center console.
You know, I don't know about you, but when I was commuting into an office regularly, every week, like my, my car could get. Quite messy. So maybe now's the time to do like a nice cleanup of the car or maybe your work bag. I actually just did this a couple weeks ago that I went through my work bag and just kind of like my laptop bag and just pulled out like again, a bunch of extra pens that I didn't wanna use.
You know, some um, you know, some Kleenexes that I needed to be clean out. Just different stuff like that. So there could be just spaces or . Areas of your home or your workplace that you're like, you know what? This would just be a nice time to just like give it a nice refresh, cleanup, wipe down, and then you can go into the new year [00:10:00] feeling just again, just ni nice and light and just ready to go.
Another area for you to look at and review is in the digital space. Why don't you take a look at your subscriptions, meaning your email newsletters, and your even, even people you're following on social media. I love a good email newsletter list. I sign up for lots of email lists. Um, I've actually lost count, like even in preparation for this, um, for this podcast.
I was like, oh, these are how many email newsletters I've signed up for. I, I can't even, I can't even figure out how many I've been, I've signed up for, um, because I just, I'm, I have so many of them because it's just, uh, a medium that I really enjoy. If you really like email newsletters, I've got one that I think is pretty good.
So if you're interested in getting signed up for that, you can go out to, um, the upgraded leader.com/newsletter and get signed up for free there. And I send out an email about every week, every other week or so. But I get so many of them [00:11:00] that sometimes things get lost , and I also can kind of feel behind or feel a little overwhelmed when some of them go unread.
Now there's a handful that I definitely, that are like daily, um, newsletters that I get. Like I love reading the Morning Brew. I love reading, um, Axios, Raleigh. I love reading things like that. So, um, so those, I try to make sure that I'm reading every single day, but there's others that come like once or twice a week and sometimes they just kind of pile up.
And again, I feel a little bit behind and a little bit overwhelmed when I'm seeing them in my email. So I. Maybe there are some email newsletters that you've signed up for that you know you're not reading that you know that you find yourself just deleting them every week, , or every day whenever they're coming in.
So just go ahead and unsubscribe, I promise you, as somebody who has an email list. We would much rather have you just unsubscribe and get the information you want from us another time, because it kinda is mucking up our metrics over there. But also, I don't want anyone to feel like, oh my gosh, [00:12:00] Nicole just sent me another email and it's just junking up my email box.
Right? If it's not providing value to you, just go ahead and unsubscribe. That's totally okay to do that. And then you'll find that your email box is not so stacked every morning when you wake up with a bunch of email newsletters that you're just gonna have to go through and delete. This is the same thing goes for, um, maybe podcasts that you follow.
This is something that I need to do. Um, here, this is kind of something that I'm gonna make sure that I take a look at here. Um, when I'm doing my, my year end review is just, there's a lot of podcasts and YouTube channels that I also subscribe to. And they automatically download and they get into my Spotify and I'm starting to get a little overwhelmed because I'm not keeping up with enough of them.
And there's just some that I'm just noticing that I've just kind of outgrown that I'm just not really into anymore, or I'm just prioritizing other ones right now. So just feel free to go in and just unfollow those or delete the, um, delete the episodes that have just kind of junked up. kind [00:13:00] of jumped up your, um, your
The platform that you use. Again, this goes for social media as well, and I, this is something that I do, um, pretty regularly, but I'm starting to feel like, ah, I got, I got, I need to go through and do another, and do another clean out round that if there's just people that you notice that I. You're not, um, especially, uh, I am not talking about your family or friends or, I mean, of course unfollow or hide your family and friends if, if, if that's healthy for you because boundaries, right?
But if there's people, again, just like influencers or companies or just products that you follow on social media and you're just like, you find that, like you're just scrolling past their content all the time, then just. Why don't you just go ahead and get rid of them? So, I'm, I'm already thinking that there's, um, a handful that I can think of off the top of my head right now on my Instagram that I'm, that I find that when I'm watching their stories, I'm constantly just advancing through their stories and not actually reading them.
So, you know what, I'm just gonna go ahead and unfollow them because I don't want them junking up my [00:14:00] feed and, you know, I don't wanna mess up their metrics either. I want them to feel like they are getting in front of. Their most ideal customer or their most ideal person, and I don't wanna mess up their, their metrics either.
Another thing that you can go and review, and this is a big one, and you might need a little bit of time, so you might need to like pour yourself a beverage and kind of think over these, and these are your meetings. I talked to so many clients about how many meetings they're in, why they're in them, who's in them, what they're covering in those, and if they're actually a value add and they're
Or if they're actually, um, pro they are themselves providing any value in these meetings. And so I encourage my, my clients to regularly go in and review this. And this is usually, um, one of the exercises that I have them do really early on when we're working together. But this is something that you can definitely do this time of year, and you can use the idea that, hey, it's the beginning of the year, [00:15:00] you know, or the end of the year.
And so I'm using this opportunity to take a look at all of the meetings that I've, that I've been in regularly this year, and moving forward and just. Reassessing where I need to be spending my time and what meetings I need to be in, and also just what meetings you need to be hosting too, right? So I encourage you to really sit down, take some this again, this might take you a little bit of time, so carve out a bit of time to really take
A, a discerning eye at the meetings that you have on your calendar, regular meetings that you're in. Sometimes we get pulled into a project and we get pulled into a regular meeting series that maybe was useful. Previously or whenever you were part of that project, and maybe that meeting has now morphed into something else, but people feel bad, you know, dropping off the meeting or deleting it or whatever.
Um, but again, use the excuse of being, you know, kind of year end, beginning of the year to say, Hey, I'm just kind of just doing a quick review of all of the meetings that, that I'm [00:16:00] in and, you know. You know, I'm gonna go ahead and decline this, this meeting series. Um, please feel free to send me meeting minutes or reach out to me if you have something specific for me.
Something like that. You could also take a look at the people who are on your team and say, is there somebody else that's on the team that reports into me that might be a better fit for this meeting? And that could be a really great development opportunity for them, right? Because you know, you used to be representing the organization at this particular meeting, and maybe they're ready to step in and be able to be that representative there again.
That can be a great. Um, development and visibility activity for someone else on your team. So again, take a look at those regular meetings that you're in, maybe those team meetings that you've set up that, that you've been hosting. Are you hosting regular team meetings? Are you hosting regular one-on-ones with your employees?
If you're not, this is a great time to say, Hey, it's the beginning of the year, or, I'd like to try [00:17:00] a new meeting Cadence to see if this works. And just, you don't have to commit to forever and always you can just say, Hey, for, for Q1, I'd like to try this new team meeting set up, or I'd like to try this new one-on-one meeting Cadence.
And this is, again, it's a great time to, um, to get that, to get that started. You can also just take a look at . Say the length of some of the meetings that you're in or the, some of the meetings that you're hosting. Does it need to be an hour? Can it be 20, can it be 25 minutes? Can it, um, can we, can you adjust the frequency?
Can it go from an every, every other week to maybe once a month? Maybe. That makes sense. Are there some tools that you can utilize that can, . Either capture some notes and set and, um, and get those sent out to, to folks so they don't all have to be at the meeting. Or again, can the, can this meeting just truly be a newsletter, right?
Can, can you just make this be, um, um, a regular newsletter or get this information out to people in a different way? And then the other thing just to kind of consider when you're looking [00:18:00] through your meetings is just exactly what I, what are we covering in here? Especially in these regular, in these regular meetings that you have on your, on your calendar, it can, it's really, really easy.
To, you know, set that regular meeting cadence and just kind of set it and forget it. And then you forget about, again, what was the real, what is the real purpose of this meeting? What is it that we're trying to achieve by meeting live in this, in this way? And so it, and maybe you wanna try out a different, say, agenda or a different flow of the meeting again, now is a really great time and it's, you can use this as an excuse to say, Hey, it's the beginning of the year.
I'd love to try out a new meeting agenda or a new me meeting cadence. Um, and just let the, let the participants know that. Kind of on the back of, um, taking a look at your meetings on your calendar, this could be a great time just to review your calendar in general, just to be like, do I have everything on here that needs to be here for me?
I have to make sure I've got all my family's birthdays on here, or I'm not remembering [00:19:00] them. I have a terrible memory when it comes to that. So like, do I have all the, all the birthdays on there that, that I want to make sure that I'm remembering if you have kids, like do you have all of . All of their, you know, school stuff on, on the calendar for this year, you know, first day of school, last day of school, that kind of stuff.
Big, just kind of big, um, events in their lives that we need to, you need to make sure that are on your calendar. And then this is also an important time. That I get kind of get excited about to like, do I have all my vacations? Do I have all my travel plans on my calendar? And so a lot of times, um, when I still worked in corporate and I had, um, and I, and I had accrued PTO.
I would like create this spreadsheet and I would go through and like optimize using a hundred percent of my PTO every, every year. And so this would be the time of year that I would go through and like make sure, like, okay, do I have all my days accounted for? You know, are there could, there are, is there anything left over?
You know, where can I use that? I [00:20:00] am. Someone who has been of the mind of, I'm going to use a hundred percent of my PTO every single year, and if you are not in that camp, if you've not done that recently or in the past, I encourage you to think how in 2024 can I use a hundred percent of my PTO, because I'm telling you, you are gonna be
More effective, more productive, a better leader for your team and just better for your customers if you're taking your time that, that you are owed, frankly. Right? Even if you do get un say quote unquote unlimited PTO, go ahead and put, like, what would be the ideal scenario for you in terms of taking time off throughout the year?
It doesn't always have to be a trip. It doesn't always have to be, you know, a big elaborate vacation. But like, I know I found that, um, . In the last couple of years, um, just being full-time in my business where I don't have PTO, I don't have a boss saying, you know, [00:21:00] you can or cannot take certain time off that.
It was, it's been hard for me to take the time off. So, but what I'm finding is that, okay, every couple of months I really need like a week stretch where I'm not taking phone calls and I can really just reset. And I'm also finding after coming, after traveling and coming back from trips, like I need, like I like having two days if I can get, if I can squeeze in two days where I'm not taking at least phone calls.
That's gonna, that's gonna be much better for me. What I also realized on this most recent trip, my husband and I celebrated our 15 year wedding anniversary and we traveled to Grenada to celebrate there over Thanksgiving. And what I found was I did not take calls. I. Like two days before the trip. Now, it's not that I didn't do work, I did, I did work behind the scenes, but I did not take customer calls or client calls or anything like that.
And that was just really great for me to build in the flexibility that I needed that, oh, you know what, I need to take a last minute [00:22:00] trip to Target because we all know that anytime we're taking vacation that there's gonna be a last minute trip to Target that needs to happen at some point. So that just created that flexibility for me and it also enabled me to kind of start to wind down my brain a little bit again.
I was still doing work, I was still working on some things, but it, I was just because I didn't have to be on a podcast or I didn't have to be, um, on with clients that I was able to kind of even just wind my brain down just a little bit. So I was able to just really dive into vacation mode quickly. Once we, once we got there.
So this would be a great time to go ahead and just schedule that in there. If you know that, hey, I don't wanna work the entire week of Thanksgiving next year, then block it all off. Go ahead and do that now, just so that you don't forget about it. You don't have to worry about, oh man, I didn't, you know, somebody scheduled a meeting, now I can't.
Now I can't take that day. Like it's already blocked off. And of course, none of that's set in stone. If something changes, you can always go back through and move it around or, or remove [00:23:00] it. But I like to kind of think at the beginning of the year what's kind of that ideal state where I'm gonna take some time off and just go ahead and block it off now.
So we don't, you don't forget about it and you don't have to worry about it. The final thing I recommend people do when they're doing a end of year review and reset is let's take a look at that resume and that LinkedIn profile. Shall we, you might have already just had your, um, performance review, or maybe you're getting ready to have your performance review in Q1.
Just really think back through like what are those major accomplishments that you've had this year that should be celebrated and highlighted on your resume. Right? You've done amazing work this year and I think, you know, a lot of people are like, yep, that was a tough. That was a tough situ situation, or that was, that was a hard one.
But you know what, that's a line on my resume and we say that over and over. I know, I joke with my, with my clients about this. I'm like, well, that was a line on your resume, but we forget to actually put it there and then whenever we need a refreshed resume for whatever reason, then we're kind of scrambling to get it [00:24:00] updated.
So, you know, I'm always talking to my clients about making sure that their resume and their LinkedIn profile is always up to date, and there's lots of reasons for that. Not just for job searching, right? You might be up for a promotion and maybe the executive committee wants to see an updated resume.
Maybe you are up for . An award of some kind and the, the award committee wants to see a resume, or perhaps you're going out for a volunteer position or like a volun, like a board position perhaps. You know, all of those reasons outside of job searching are reasons why you might wanna have a resume up to date.
Also for your LinkedIn profile as well. So this is a great time again to kind of look back on the year, what are those major accomplishments that you want to celebrate and highlight and add, and then may, maybe there's some things on there that's just a little bit dated now and you can go ahead and um, and remove it.
Or what are some metrics that you wanna update? Um, a lot of times whenever I'm talking with [00:25:00] clients and they, and they end up deciding that they wanna go external to get their promotion, they are like, oh, shoot, I don't have metrics on this. Or, I had, I had a client actually just a couple weeks ago, who, um, is putting, putting together their most recent.
Resume and they were talking about how their company was purchased earlier this year by another company and they lost all of the metrics that they had, all the dashboards that they were working off of previously. And so then they're like, I don't know how to get that information anymore and I don't know what it is.
I don't wanna make it up. So that's a great reason to make sure that you're updating those metrics. Um, and as you go it, . Or at least annually. And then if there's, if you're kind of looking at your resume, kinda looking at your LinkedIn and you're like, you know what, like I, I really could use some metrics here.
I'd real, I really want to pull out some, some data to really quantify the work that I'm doing. And I, I don't have that today. So now you can plan for, hey, these are the metrics [00:26:00] or this, these are the pieces of data that I need to make sure I'm tracking this year so that when I get to the, to this time next year, then you'll have them.
And you'll be able to plan for that more so in advance. So those are the five things to review in order to start off the new year refreshed and ready for that, for that, um, next start. So again, take a look at that workspace. It might not be your home office, maybe it's your office. In, um, in a physical building that you work in, maybe it's your car, maybe it's your work bag.
Something that has to do with your workspace just to make, um, make your day-to-day work environment more pleasant. Also, take a look at those subscriptions, those email newsletters, those social media personalities that you're following. Anything on there that's like, you know what? I'm really not reading this.
I'm not listening to this, or I'm not really engaging in this, in this content anymore. It's really just junking up space and really just taking up, taking up brain space [00:27:00] to be frank, to be frank with you, let's go ahead and unfollow or delete those things. Then I recommend sitting down, finding , getting a good beverage, and really taking a discerning eye to your calendar and really taking a look at the meetings that you're in, the meetings that you're hosting yourself, and just being open to what are the things that I can be taking off my, my regular list, or what are some things that can be adjusted in order to be more effective?
On the same vein, take a look at the rest of the things on your calendar. Do you have all the birthdays, all the holidays on there that, um, that are gonna be coming up? Do you have any of your PTO time on there that you wanna make sure that you're accounting for ahead of time? And again, this can always be changed, but I love at this time of year, um, especially just to be excited about something, um, in the next year, just really going out and planning, planning that time off.
And going ahead and getting it on your calendar. The final thing I recommend that you do is taking a look at your resume [00:28:00] and your LinkedIn and making sure that it's refreshed and it has all of your amazing accomplishments that you, that you accomplished this year to make sure that you don't have to feel like you're scrambling anytime you're asked for an updated, updated resume, and that your LinkedIn is always working for you and is always highlighting the most recent information.
So. Again, these are my top five things that I tend to look at and that I know that I'm gonna be looking at at the year. At the end of this year, I would love to hear about what you would add to this list or what are some things that you do every year at the end of the year. So send me a DM over over at LinkedIn or over on Instagram and let me know what you would add to this list, and if you are thinking about coaching.
Leadership coaching, executive coaching in 2024. I do still have some spots open for Q1, so send me a note and let me know and we can schedule a call to see about what your goals are for 2024 and if I'm the right coach to help support you in those.
So again, thank you so much for hanging out with me for an entire year on this podcast. We have [00:29:00] made it an entire year here, and I'm so excited to see you in 2024. But in the meantime, remember, your career deserves an upgrade.
