The EntreMD Podcast

How I Upgrade My Business Every 90 Days as a Physician Entrepreneur

• Dr. Una • Episode 414

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Back in December 2015, I did what any responsible entrepreneur would do: I wrote down my goals for 2016. 

After writing them down, I felt accomplished and ready to take on the New Year!

But then I stumbled upon the goals I had written down last year, and to my shock, they were the same as the ones I had just written down…

So, I realized I was doing something wrong. I had taken the time to write down my goals, which granted is more than most people do, but I had not taken the time to establish a proper relationship with my goals. 

That's when I decided to take a different approach to goal setting and started living quarter to quarter, and it has changed everything!

Today, I will share this new approach with you and explain exactly how you can set and fulfill quarterly goals instead of writing down yearly goals and forgetting about them as I did. 

Tune in! 

Key Takeaways: 

  • 00:00:00 Intro
  • 00:01:10 Why I switched from years to quarters 
  • 00:06:36 How to effectively set quarterly goals 
  • 00:10:06 Creating a roadmap to hit your goals
  • 00:11:05 Why you need to review the previous quarter 
  • 00:16:28 Outro 

—

Additional Resources:


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To get on a call with my team to determine your next best step, go here ...

Speaker 1:

The thing with the annual goal, like I alluded to before, it's just hard to hang on to. It's hard to hold your annual goal the entire year and you know, like, but if you break it down like okay, over the next 90 days, this is what I want to do, then it makes it so much easier.

Speaker 2:

Hi docs, Welcome to the EntreMD podcast, where it's all about helping amazing physicians just like you embrace entrepreneurship so you can have the freedom to live life and practice medicine on your terms. I'm your host, Dr Una.

Speaker 1:

You have probably met people who, month to month, quarter to quarter, year to year, it seems like their businesses just keep getting better and better and better.

Speaker 1:

They stay in momentum and you wonder how they pull it off. Well, today, I'm going to show you how to upgrade your business every 90 days, how to put yourself in a position where you stay in momentum, you're moving forward, even when you have some of those times that are challenging. You still get to move forward because you understand these three things that you need to be doing every single quarter. Okay, now, the starting point of all of this is I had a year it was 2015 and it was December and I was doing what any responsible entrepreneur, any responsible person, would do I was setting goals for the next year, which was going to be 2016. Responsible person would do I was setting goals for the next year, which was going to be 2016. And so I had spent some time writing out my goals and all the nine areas of life and all of that, and I finished and I felt very accomplished, right, like I am ready for this new year that is coming and it's going to be my best year yet, and all of those things. And when I was done, for some reason, I stumbled, stumbled on my goals for that year. So my 2015 goals and, to my shock when I read through them, they were the same goals as the goals I had just set for 2016. Right, why did that happen? Because while I had taken the time to set goals which put me above most of the world's population, I had not taken the time to build a relationship with my goals which put me above most of the world's population. I had not taken the time to build a relationship with my goals, to hold them tighter to. You know, like to stay acting on them all through the year. And so I went on to develop this new habit of living a quarter at a time. So, yes, I have the annual goals, but I have my goals for the quarter and you know I can go granular and drop into a month, into a week, into the days and all of that, but every quarter I have the annual goals. But I have my goals for the quarter. And you know, I can go granular and drop into a month, into a week, into the days and all of that, but every quarter I would sit the same way people would sit in December to set goals. I will sit to set my quarterly goals and do all the adjustments that I need to do, because 90 days I can kind of hang on to, that I can hold, that, I can stay consistent with something for 90 days, as opposed to a year where you're like, yeah, like you know, in January you're like, yeah, it's January, we have time. And then April you're like, yeah, it's just April, we have time, and before you know, it's happening the entire year, the entire year is gone, right, I'm very acutely aware of the fact that I'm not going to be here forever. I'm not going to live forever, I'm burning daylight and I do really want to leave this planet going like I did what I was here to do Goodbye, right, and so.

Speaker 1:

So that's how this whole thing came about. And so when we started the Entree MD Business School, well, a year in, we started this whole concept of okay, now you know we've set annual goals, we've done all of that, we've stayed in momentum, but now I'm going to introduce you to the real deal and we're going to start living 90 days at a time. And so at the time of this recording is the very beginning of April, and so April is another new year in the on-trending business school because, you know, january 1st to March 31st is that first year, is the first quarter, and April 1st we're like, okay, we get another 90 day block, we get another 90 day year, if you will, and because of that the doctors in the school are able to see radical results quarter to quarter because they're just hanging on to these smaller goals in this smaller timeframe and it's easier to be accountable and all of that. So I'm celebrating wins. You know, like Dr Maisha Claiborne, I will celebrate, you know, hers openly.

Speaker 1:

I can, because she talked about this at an open event that we had and she is the founder of, you know, mind Remapping Co and it. You know she's a she's a veteran speaker, she does trainings for institutions and all of those things. And you know she came into the Entree MD Business School and kind of started this whole thing and I watched her execute and execute. She had her 90 day goals and at the end of 90 days, at the end of the 90 days, she had had five paid speaking gigs booked. She had had, you know, raised her prices from five to eight to 10,000, you know, for her, for her speaker fee, and got so much clarity and is so much momentum. And when she looks at the next quarters, I mean she's just like, oh my goodness, we're just going to snowball on from here. And that's what happened in a quarter.

Speaker 1:

We've had people I had one of one of the students in the in the business school say I surpassed my Q1 revenue goal by $110,000. Just think about that. Unbelievable, so amazing, and so things like that. And they have really massive wins. And they're smaller wins because in EBS we celebrate them all, big, small, tangible, intangible, like all of them. A win is a win is a win, and I could go on and on.

Speaker 1:

And when I look at, you know, like, an entree as a company, what did we do? Right, the number of new doctors we welcomed into the school, the number of you know like we had, the number of workshops we did. So we were able to serve thousands of people like over the course of the quarter. And so and we don't, you know like, when we do our workshops, we're very aware like there's some people who will never, you know like, maybe come into the Entree MD business school to work with us or anything like that. However, you know, we are still bringing massive changes in their, in their businesses. You know what I mean Because you know there is a part of you know, entree MD like, of course, the highest way we serve people is in the business school. The highest way we serve people is in the business school, the different tiers of it.

Speaker 1:

But at the same time, we are trying to change the narrative of a whole community. It's a million physicians, right. And so we did that. We released a brand new book, we set the stage for brand new podcasts that are going to come out in Q2. And we had records that we broke, milestones that we crushed. We hit the Inc regional list of fastest growing companies in the Southeast, and last year we were number 29. This year we were number 17. And we had all these things. And it's just 90 days, it's not a year, it's 90 days.

Speaker 1:

So I'm going to tell you what you can do, starting today, to kind of set yourself up that this is the way you live your life. Okay, and if you decide, oh, my goodness, I want to do this and I want to do that at a much higher level, I want to do it with the accountability and I want to do it in community, then, of course, come join us in the Outrendy Business School, right? But I'm going to give you, I'm going to give you three things to do, so number one. Number one is you do want to take the time to set your quarterly goals, okay, so you have your annual goals. This is what I want to accomplish for my business. This is what I want to accomplish for the entire year, right, and you know, like, so maybe there's revenue goals, there's team goals, there's you know how you want to improve your service delivery. You have goals around that. You know, like all of that your position in the marketplace, maybe the size of your email list. You have all of all of these things, right, so you have the annual goal, right, but the thing with the annual goal, like I alluded to before, it's just hard to hang on to. It's hard to hold your annual goal the entire year. But if you break it down, like, okay, over the next 90 days, this is what I want to do, then it makes it so much easier. And when we talk about this, we're not talking about because sometimes people set 90 day goals and they have 72 goals, and I'm like okay, because sometimes people set 90 day goals and they have 72 goals and I'm like, okay, we are not going to do this in 72.

Speaker 1:

So when I teach at Armstrong Business School, I literally go like, okay, if you could only only accomplish three things in your business over the next 90 days, what will those things be? And the reason why it's so important to narrow it down is that it helps you prioritize. It lets you know what is actually really important to you, right, and it helps you. It helps you not set goals that don't matter. So, for instance, when I teach, I'm like and one of them has to be a revenue goal, right, like one of them has to be a revenue goal. And sometimes people are like well, I'm pre-revenue, my clinic doesn't start, you know, for the next two months. I'm like well, then it's the size of your email list. And why did we do that? Because those are the goals people are most likely to procrastinate on, but then, on the other hand, complain that they didn't hit it. It's hard to hit a target you don't set, right.

Speaker 1:

So what are your top three goals for your business? It may look like, ok, so for this quarter, over the next 90 days, you know, we want to have our first, we want to have our first three hundred thousand dollar quarter, meaning, first, we want to have our first $300,000 quarter, meaning that we hit, you know, $100,000 a month on average, right? So maybe that's what your revenue goal is. And you're like, okay, what else? Well, you know, in order for me to pull this off, I am going to need a critical hire. Like there's a team member I need and you're not going to hire 17 people in 90 days, but maybe there are one or two people and these are the people who have the capacity to make the biggest difference in the business for the stage that it's in.

Speaker 1:

Right, so, okay. So you know, I put it on, I'm going to hire this person. You have a private practice. It may be a practice administrator, you have a coaching business, maybe a marketing strategist, or it may be an executive assistant, or maybe a VA, depending on the phase of your business and you're like, okay, so this is the person I'm going to hire and those may be your two goals. You may say, yeah, I want my email list to grow by 10%, and so maybe you have a new lead magnet that you're going to put out, or you're launching a newsletter, or whatever. That is right and so when you look at that, you're like, okay, this is a revenue goal, this is a team person I need to bring on, this is the email list growth right, like that kind of represents my audience growth and you can hang on to that. Now am I saying it's these three? I'm not saying it's these three, I'm just saying you know you want to pick your top three. Okay, now, I'm not going to go into, like you know, of course, after you do that, they have to ask yourself what do I need to do to pull that off and all of that.

Speaker 1:

But you want to set your goals. You want to set your goals. That's one thing. You want to do every quarter. The second thing that you want to do and maybe I just put that in the second thing, the second thing you want to do is you want to create the roadmap.

Speaker 1:

So, for these three goals that I set, how am I going to get there? What do I need to do? Because it is possible for you to have your goals walk around. Do your affirmation say that I'm going to hit it, but you have to define the yellow brick road. Going to hit it, but you have to define the yellow brick road? Okay. And if you never watched Wizard of Oz, you need to define the path. Okay, you need to define the path. How am I going to get there? If I want to create this amount of revenue? What do I need to do If I want to grow my email list by X, y, z? What do I need to do If I want to hire this kind of team member? What do I need to do? Right, because you can't really act on the goal. You reverse engineer it. You set the goal, the goal determines the path, then you act on the path, right. So the second thing is what is the roadmap? Create the roadmap right, so that you can hit the ground running. So you can run. So at the end of the day, you can know did I do anything to take me closer to my goals or not? So that's the second thing.

Speaker 1:

The third thing is you want to take time to then review the quarter. I find this is a place where many, many people miss it, and I think the reason for it is it's so uncomfortable. It is so, first of all, our brains are not wired to see where we want, so to us, we're like we didn't win, and then our brains are. You know like it is uncomfortable for you to sit and say, okay, the things that didn't go well, how come? What is the lesson to learn here? Right, where? Where did I struggle? Why did I struggle? What is a goal that had no chance of, you know, really coming to pass because of the way I showed up?

Speaker 1:

And I always say, like you want to look at this from a standpoint of observation, not judgment. It's not about saying, oh, I suck, I didn't do it. It's not about that, right. It's about saying, huh, well, looky here, I didn't do this, no wonder this didn't happen, right, and so what am I going to do differently? So you want to stop to review, and if we could look at broad categories, you're really looking at where did I win, celebrate the win, what was the thing that I did that created that win? What are the results that we didn't create yet? Is there something I did to contribute it? Or is it just passage of time? It's a goal that, like gestation period, it needs more time, right? What are the lessons I learned? Where are the places that I procrastinate? Why did I? Where are the places I struggled? Why did I Right?

Speaker 1:

But doing that what that does. This is a deal. What that does is it makes you smarter every quarter. It makes you wiser, it helps you make better decisions. Because guess what, now, most people don't set goals at all. I cannot tell you how many people are like, wow, before EDS, I was just not, I just did not set goals, this was not something I did. Okay. So most people don't set at all. But for the people who do, most of them actually never come back to review. So guess what? If they start making a mistake in January, chances are they make it all the way through to December. And if they don't stop to review the year, guess what happens? They make that mistake all of the following year.

Speaker 1:

But if you embrace this habit, what will happen is you've taken the time to reflect every quarter, so every quarter, you can make these adjustments, you can learn these lessons, you can show up differently and because of that, you create different results in your business. It is beyond mind blowing, okay. And then, after you're done with these three things, guess what you do you rinse and repeat, and rinse and repeat and rinse and repeat. And then, after you're done with these three things, guess what you do you rinse and repeat, and rinse and repeat, and rinse and repeat. But I'll tell you this If you will make this a habit, you will become a person who has at least four years in one. Because now, instead of setting goals once, you're setting them four times Now. Instead of evaluating your behavior once, you're evaluating it four times Now, instead of sitting with this thing of oh yeah, I have all the time in the world, you've held yourself accountable to a narrow window and so you're like, yeah, no, I don't have all the time in the world.

Speaker 1:

This needs to be happening now. So I want to challenge you. I want to challenge you to embrace this. Now you may be tempted to say, oh, this is so simple, right, like, yeah, okay, I know it, right, I know it. But this is the thing Knowing things does not create results.

Speaker 1:

Doing things after you know them, that's what creates the results. So, you know, I used to tell my. I started telling myself, like, saying, I know that, like it's a dangerous statement, but what the ultra successful say is they say, wow, that's interesting, I'm going to go do that. Right, like that's very different. So we don't just learn to know and we don't get so puffed up and excited by our knowledge, especially when we're not doing anything about it. Right?

Speaker 1:

So I want to invite you to just you know this exercise. You can probably take an hour, sit down, get it done. You know it will be uncomfortable. I can promise you that it will be uncomfortable, but it's good discomfort. The return on investment of your discomfort is so high, like so unbelievably high. So take an hour, do it. And I want you to send me a DM and just say Dr Una, I did the exercise to upgrade my business in 90 days. I did the exercise to upgrade my business in 90 days. Right, and I want to shout you out, right, I want you to. I want, I want to shout you out tell you oh, my goodness, this is so amazing.

Speaker 1:

Okay, now on a serious note, if you are also a person who is, you're like, you're a gung ho, you're all in, you're like I want to take this business to multiple, six figure, seven figure. I want to be in a community where I can do this 90 day exercise and I can do it with people Like I wish I could take people on a drive by of the Entremet Business School Facebook group, especially this time of the year, to say come and see what people are doing in a quarter. It is so inspiring, like I run multiple seven figure businesses and one multiple seven figure business and still I am so inspired by the doctors in the school, like in all stages of business, just to watch them, you know, come in and get down and do the work and hold themselves accountable and see how much they can change in 90 days. It's not unusual to say, oh, my goodness, I did more. Especially when people are newer in the school, they're like I have done more in 90 days than I have done in the last three years in my business. Right, and to really be in a community like that. If you're thinking about it ontrendycom forward slash call, you can get on a call with my team to see is this the next best next step for me? And we would love to have you, love to have you in the school, that these are the kinds of results you're looking at.

Speaker 1:

But this is what I want to leave you with. I want you to think about, man, if you did this 90 days from now, imagine if, 90 days from now, you ended up doing more in your business than you've done in the last year. Imagine if, 90 days from now, you sat down and owned three goals and you crushed them. At the end, you're like okay, this done, that, done, that done. Imagine what that would feel like that can be your reality. Okay, I know they say doctors, you know we're not good entrepreneurs or whatever, but of course, you know we're rewriting that narrative completely. So I want to invite you, I want to invite you to say yeah, that's exactly what I'm going to do, and I want to celebrate you and all the wins that you go on to create 90 days from now. Okay, so go, do this, do the exercise, share this episode with the doctors in your life, tell them oh, my goodness, you need to listen to this. Let's even do this together, and I'll see you on the next episode of Beyond Friendly Podcast.