Focusing on Your 2024 Goals
Cathie Leimbach • January 2, 2024
2024 has just arrived! May it be a Happy New Year full of achievement and fulfillment!
The first step in having a great year is to decide what will make it a great year for you. If you don’t have a destination – where you wish your life and work activities will take you this year, they you can’t map out a path to get there. If you haven’t yet set goals for this new year, then this week is the best time to determine a few 2024 goals with deadline dates.
Once you have some important measurable goals, it is important to hold yourself accountable to consistently take actions towards achieving them. Here are a few steps that will help you stay focused on these priorities.
- Review your goals daily to keep them top of mind.
- Set milestones indicating how much progress you wish to make each week or month.
- Review your progress weekly or monthly to see if you are meeting your milestones.
- When you meet a milestone, celebrate. Go out for a specialty coffee or go see a movie. For major milestones, you might go out-of-town for the weekend or treat yourself to dinner at a high end restaurant.
- When you miss a milestone, review the actions you have taken, what helped you make progress, what were your bottlenecks. Develop plan B that will enable you to make more progress in the coming week.
- If you are stumbling, get an accountability partner to encourage your success and help you stay on track. This could be a business colleague, friend, family member, or a professional coach.
- Keep taking the actions that yield progress.
- And, when each goal is achieved, celebrate!
Wishing you a year full of achievement and joy!
As the New Year approaches, it’s a natural time to look forward and ask what you want the next chapter to bring. One simple way to reflect to ask yourself three questions to create a stronger year ahead, what should you: Stop?, Continue?, and Start? Stop focusing energy on habits, meetings, or expectations that no longer serve you or your team. This might mean letting go of outdated processes, unnecessary urgency, or ways of working that drain momentum without adding value. Continue the practices that helped you gain traction this year. Think about what worked—perhaps clear communication, strong collaboration, consistent follow-through, or time spent developing people. These are the behaviors worth protecting and reinforcing. Start being intentional about what will move you forward in 2026. This could include setting clearer priorities, investing in leadership development, building healthier team rhythms, or creating space for innovation and growth. Taking time to reflect now helps you enter the New Year with purpose rather than pressure. Small, thoughtful shifts can create meaningful impact over time. Ready to turn reflection into action? 👉 View our Stop • Continue • Start Worksheet for a simple, practical way to reset priorities, build on what’s working, and step into 2026 with clarity and momentum.
As the year comes to a close, it’s worth pausing to ask a simple question: What brought you joy this year at work and in life? Joy doesn’t always arrive in big, headline moments. Often, it shows up quietly—in meaningful conversations, shared laughter, progress made, lessons learned, or the steady presence of people who support us. Sometimes joy is found in growth, sometimes in rest, and sometimes in simply getting through a challenging season with resilience and grace. Take a few minutes to reflect. What moments made you smile? When did you feel most connected? For what are you grateful? This reflection isn’t about ignoring the hard parts of the year. It’s about honoring the bright spots that sustained you through them. Recognizing joy helps us close the year with perspective and open the next one with hope. As the holidays approach, give yourself permission to slow down, savor meaningful moments, and share joy with others—through kindness, gratitude, and presence. May this season be filled with moments that lift your spirit, and may you carry that joy with you into the year ahead. 👉 Take a moment to pause this season—view the Reflecting on Joy one-pager and reflect on what brought meaning to your work and life this year. Wishing you a truly joy-filled Christmas season .