⏱️ 12 minutes(ish)

For some it works. For others, it feels funny, strange, and weird (but not the kinda weird that works). So, knowing what we know now, we can choose today to be the day we stop forcing it to feel normal, natural, and familiar to instead play out another way we can work where we can (actually) feel the feels of working in a way across our days that’s normal, natural, and familiar.

Here we’re suggesting a subtle shift that by many standards could be seen as taking the business year (ahead) by the business horns. It could be considered bold to some while being boring to others.

For the few that just want a way of working that frees up 🧠 space without fuss or fanfare, we’re flippin’ lovin’ it in our Solo Business ways and days, so we share it with you.

In this article we utter the idea aloud of Solo Business moving from the focus and framework of the business year being designed and inline with a standard financialyear to, our most common container outside of business being, a (Georgian) standard calendar year (aka calendar year).

Our Respective Roles

Before we begin we say aloud the obvious which is often silently assumed — we each have a role to play here.

First, our role (our being us and us being me, Kathy Rast in Little Language Matters*). It’s up to us to look at Solo Business ways and days that are and aren’t working (yet).

And, it’s also up to us to share ideas in a way that’s kind to your mind to know (enough) of the thinking behind them and how they can inform, influence, and inspire your Solo Business ways and days.

And now, your role. Your role’s one that’s seemingly simple on the surface until you find the feels of what you feel when you take parts of an idea with you into your Solo Business 😃

We suggest you choose to catch any of your competing cognitions along the way. Maybe you can pen them on a Postit note, scribble them on a slip of scrap paper on the side as you scroll, or you could even print out this article and go to town on it (note: we’re working on making this easier for your 🧠 in a future iteration).

The Idea

To meet you where you are, for those who like the idea upfront, we’ve popped it just below.

And, for those who want to know (enough) of the thinking behind the idea so that you know the thinking has been thought, then we’ve popped that below the below below, below (not sure if we stuck the landing, but hey, let’s keep growing going 😅).

The idea that we’re suggesting to work better with all being done and doable by one in Solo Business:

To move the Solo Business design and delivery in a business year from a standard financial year to a standard calendar year.

Seems simple, right? It is. And, it isn’t…yet. You’re right, the idea’s not new, but maybe the thinking behind it can be.

What’s working. What’s not working. What’s coming with us from here.

As is, the business year being the same as a standard financial year is working. But maybe this is one area in Solo Business we can get the win to free up some unnecessary 🧠 resource allocation to instead work better in Solo Business.

And by better, we mean to work with what already feels normal, natural, and familiar (as a human).

So, as we can do in Solo Business, we can choose to keep going as is or we can work with as is to move it (enough) forward to work best with the way we work.

Below we’ve mapped our light look at what’s working and what’s not working as is in Solo Business being designed and delivered in a standard financial year.

Financial Year Quarters

Financial years are informed by financial obligations. Compliance is made manageable by being clear on what’s due in specific quarters.
Solo Business needs to keep up with financial obligations, while developing and delivering to all areas of the business. The financial year is not intuitive to many working outside the finance field.
Required actions to be assigned and performed in quarterly containers.

2. Financial Quarters Across Two Calendar Years

A year (365 days) is doable. There's something about a year that has enough room to look ahead, to navigate through, and to look back to move forward and to know you can do it all again.
For many (maybe most), when we think of a year we think of 1 January and 31 December. Solo Business (humans) thinks the same. Regardless of the financial year, the energy difference between January and December is more inline in the calendar year than the financial year (can you imagine the rush and running down the clock to Christmas and telling yourself you’re only half way there 🫣).
The Solo Business year being a calendar year divided into quarters (aka 4 x 90 day business work blocks).

3. Quarterly Financial Obligations

Finance obligations are complicated by nature and compliance can be unforgiving. Grouping the reoccurring required business tasks in fixed dates across a year is kind-AF-to-the-Solo-Business-🧠
There’s more than one standard financial year. It can be common for Solo Business to deliver the same delivery differently to cover different financial compliance requirements across different financial years in the same calendar year 🤯
All with all regular reoccurring tasks, including fixed financial compliance actions, to be assigned to quarters in the same calendar year.

(some of) The Thinking Behind The Idea

If something isn’t broken, don’t fix it, right? Well, we’re iterating this ol’ adage for what we need here (as we do 😉)...

If something’s taking more than it’s giving, tweak it.

Did you think we were going to say ‘change’ it?

Well, you’d be right. We (actually) tried ‘change’.

Change means many things to many people.

Change feels like the kinda chaos that can feel too much to even begin.

The thought of changing a change or even considering changing a change asks too much for the fixed and finite 🧠 footprint of a Solo Business.

So, instead, we encourage the idea of ‘tweaking’. As we go grow together here, we’re confident you’ll pick up the value in nuancing when a change is on the cards and when tweaking is the way to go grow.

To ensure we’re moving forward together from the same sense of knowing, we bring say the obvious aloud that by the standard calendar year, we mean the standard Georgian calendar year (which we’ll continue to consistently call it the calendar year from here).

And, by calendar year quarters we mean:

Q1: January - March
Q2: April - June
Q3: July - September
Q4: October - December

We’re thinking business quarters in the same calendar year make more (intuitive) sense in Solo Business because:

the calendar year as the closest we have to universally being in the same time at the same time
most of us already live our days and ways within the calendar year for the majority of the areas in our lives, and
our (weather) seasons are spaced out (by quarters) across the calendar year (we say this because our seasons have a significant say in how we business day to day).

And yes, we thought of that too, the (actual) seasons and how each season affects and effects Solo Business activity.

You may be wondering why we’re not suggesting tweaking towards lining up Solo Business days and ways with the (weather) seasons.

Well, we tried the seasons on and two small things didn’t quite make the type of sense we’re looking to make work better in Solo Business.

Same dates, different seasons.

Many Solo Businesses connect and crossover more than one geographical location, which means there’s a need to navigate and know who’s in what season to align with the feels and focus in the same space of time (aka while some are moving outdoors and actively connecting in the front of Solo Business, others are settling into working in areas behind behind the Solo Business doors).

December to January have (very) different feels.

The biggest momentum shift in the shortest time is from 31 December to 1 January. One day we hear the struggles and despair dragging out the last efforts to wish the year that was away and in the next breath welcome the newness of the new year that holds possibility and potential.

Literally, in one night, like clockwork, we (almost) all universally share the same shift in our collective focus.

That said, as summer (or winter, depending on your space and place in the world) crosses the critical cut off at the end of the year, it too meets the same fate as the financial year being outside of the cognitively kind container of the calendar year.

In saying this, the seasons do have a lot of say in what we do each quarter, as you’ll come to notice when we share the primary business focus for each Solo Business quarter. (Spoiler - Q1 readies the year already underway with ‘Solo Business Q1: The Setup’.

Your Choice to Choose

Now you know what you know, it’s up to you what happens next in your Solo Business.

It’s up to you to first choose if moving your Solo Business focus to a calendar year works with how you work.

It’s up to you to create your quarters.

It’s up to you as to whether you own parts of this idea by mapping your business year from where you are now.

Whether you watch the video (below) or go with the simple suggestion of grabbing A4 sheets of paper, labelling each with one of the four quarters and get to mapping, we bring front of mine the importance of where you map your first map, how you Solo Business is always your choice.

A Mapping suggestion that weirdly works wonders.

In your initial quarter mapping session, you’re strongly encouraged to be able to (physically) map your quarters on the floor or a large table.

Then, after you’ve completed your first map you can go ahead and pop one, or all four, quarter(s) on a wall where you can then step back and add as you grow in what you know.

We know the need to move from a face up flat surface to facing you at eye level sounds weird (and not a big thing). We also know it works wonders (and makes a big difference).

For now, just knowing your (physical) position to your thinking on a page is enough.

And, when you’re ready and you have capacity to be a little more curious (because being curious requires energy), you too can grow to feel the shift from a sense of seemingly doable as you stand above your initial thinking to then notice how planning plans can become more practical by focusing your focus to your containered thinking contained in each (mapped) quarter.

And if (or when) it feels too much, then (actually) step back and make it smaller to see where you can grow go from where you are now.

Disclaimer: It’s both sad to have to say (now) and yet we’re pretty proud to let you know aloud that no AI has been used in these thinking or words. Any word wrinkles, while unintentional, remain as is so that you know we as human as you are. Enjoy 😁

Maybe moving Solo Business to (calendar) quarters makes more sense.