Why I Quit Annual Goal-Setting and Switched to 90-Day Sprints

So here's the thing — I've set New Year's resolutions every year since I was 16.

And I've failed them every year since I was 16.

The pattern is embarrassingly consistent: January 1st, I'm caffeinated and ambitious, writing down 15 goals in a fresh notebook. "This is the year," I tell myself. By March, I've forgotten what 12 of them were. By June, the notebook is under my bed collecting dust. By September, I'm already planning the next January's redemption arc.

Four years into my career, I realized something: annual goals don't work for me. Not because I'm undisciplined, but because 365 days is just too far away to feel real. There's no urgency. No feedback loop. By the time you realize you're off track, you've lost half a year.

Two years ago, I tried something different. I stole a concept from the startup world — the 90-day sprint — and applied it to my own career development. I've been running this system for 8 quarters now, and I need to give you the full report: what works, what broke, and why I can't imagine going back to annual planning.

The Problem with Annual Goals

Before I explain the solution, let's diagnose why annual goals fail for so many people:

1. The horizon is too distant. When your deadline is 12 months away, your brain treats it like "someday." Psychologists call this "temporal discounting" — we dramatically undervalue rewards that feel far away.

2. No course correction. With annual goals, you're flying blind for months. You set the goal, then what? Check back in December? By then, you're either way off course or the goal itself is irrelevant.

3. The "fresh start" trap. January 1st feels like magic. It's not. It's just a Tuesday. And the expectation that you need a new year to start something creates procrastination in every other month.

4. Too many goals, not enough focus. Annual planning encourages breadth over depth. "I'll learn Spanish, get promoted, start a side hustle, run a marathon, and read 50 books." Spoiler: you'll do maybe one of those.

Enter: The 90-Day Sprint

I first encountered 90-day planning in a book about scaling startups. The concept was simple — set ambitious targets for the next quarter, execute ruthlessly, review, adjust, repeat. Companies like Google and Intel have used variants of this for decades.

But I wasn't scaling a startup. I was a 26-year-old marketing coordinator trying to figure out my career. So I adapted it.

Here's the framework I landed on:

Step 1: The Wildly Important Goal (WIG)

I set exactly ONE career goal per quarter. Not three. Not five. One. This is stolen from the 4 Disciplines of Execution framework — the idea that if you have more than one priority, you don't have any.

Examples of my past WIGs: - Q1 2024: Get promoted to Senior Marketing Coordinator - Q2 2024: Ship my first product marketing campaign (pivot skill) - Q3 2024: Launch Career Goals blog and publish 12 posts - Q4 2024: Hit 5,000 monthly visitors on the blog

Notice these aren't vague. They're specific, measurable, and time-bound. But the key is the time constraint: 90 days. Close enough to feel real. Far enough to achieve something meaningful.

Step 2: The Lead Measures (Your Process)

For every WIG, I define 2-3 "lead measures" — the things I can control that predict success. These are my weekly actions.

For the promotion goal: - Complete 3 stretch projects outside my normal scope - Document results in a "wins tracker" (visible to my manager) - Have biweekly growth conversations with my manager

I track these lead measures every week. They're my actual scoreboard, not just the final result.

Step 3: The Accountability Cadence

Every Friday at 4 PM, I do a 15-minute review: - What lead measures did I hit this week? - What blocked me? - What do I need to change for next week?

Every quarter, I do a deeper retrospective: - Did I hit the WIG? Why or why not? - What did I learn about my work style? - What will I change for next quarter?

This is the secret sauce. Most people don't fail because they're lazy. They fail because they don't check in often enough to course-correct.

The Honest Results (8 Quarters In)

Here's where I tell you the truth — wins and losses included:

Quarters where I hit the WIG: 6 out of 8.
That's a 75% hit rate. My annual resolution success rate was probably 10%.

Quarters where I failed:

Q3 2023: I set the goal to "build a consistent writing habit" but didn't define it clearly enough. Was it daily? Weekly? How much? The ambiguity killed me. I learned: specificity is non-negotiable.

Q1 2025: I got overconfident and set two goals instead of one. Classic mistake. I split focus and accomplished neither. I learned: the "one WIG" rule exists for a reason.

The biggest surprise: The quarters where I "failed" weren't actually failures. In Q3 2023, I wrote 15,000 words of blog notes even though I didn't hit the "habit" metric. In Q1 2025, the skills I built for both goals set me up for an even bigger Q2.

The system creates progress even when you miss the target. Annual goals don't do that. Miss an annual goal and you've lost a year.

Why This Works (The Psychology)

I'm not a psychologist, but I've read enough Cal Newport and James Clear to understand the mechanics:

Time horizon: 90 days is right at the edge of what your brain can treat as "soon." It creates urgency without panic.

Feedback loops: Quarterly reviews mean you get 4 learning cycles per year instead of 1. You learn faster, iterate faster, improve faster.

Identity shift: Each completed sprint reinforces the identity of "someone who follows through." James Clear would call this "habit stacking" on an identity level.

Loss aversion: 90 days feels like a real investment to waste. Abandoning a quarterly goal feels more costly than abandoning a vague annual intention.

What I'd Do Differently (Updated Framework)

After 8 quarters, here's my refined system:

Start with a skill audit. Before setting any goal, spend 30 minutes mapping: What do I currently do well? What's in demand? What's the gap? This prevents vanity goals.

Make the WIG visible. Write it on a sticky note. Put it on your monitor. Say it out loud to a friend. Goals you don't see daily aren't real.

Build in a "off week." I used to sprint into the next sprint immediately. Bad idea. Take 3-5 days between quarters to rest, reflect, and plan. It's a mini vacation and it prevents burnout.

Track lead measures obsessively. I used to just track whether I hit the WIG. Now I track lead measures weekly in a simple spreadsheet. This is where the real work happens.

Share your goal with one person. Not a public announcement. Just one friend or colleague who will ask about it. Social accountability works, but public pressure often backfires.

Try This: Your First 90-Day Sprint

If you're reading this and thinking "okay, I want to try this," here's your week one action plan:

This Monday: Choose your first WIG. Make it career-related, specific, and achievable in 90 days. Write it down.

This Week: Define 2-3 lead measures. What weekly actions will predict success?

Next Friday: Do your first 15-minute review. What worked? What didn't? What changes for next week?

90 Days From Now: Do a full retrospective. Win or learn — both are valuable.

The Bottom Line

I got promoted in Q1 2024 using this system. I pivoted from content marketing to product marketing in Q2 2024. I launched this blog in Q3 2024. I grew it to meaningful traffic in Q4 2024.

None of that happened because I'm special or because I "hustled harder." It happened because I stopped pretending 365 days was a useful planning horizon and started treating 90 days like the unit of real progress.

Annual goals are wishes. 90-day sprints are systems.

And systems beat wishes every time.

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What goal would you set for your first 90-day sprint? Drop it in the comments — I'm genuinely curious what you're working toward.