At the end of every quarter, I don’t jump straight into planning the next one.
I pause.
This is where I sit down and get curious about what actually happened before I ask anything new of my business.
It always starts the same way.
I make sure everything is up to date.
I block time on what I call my Financial Fridays. It’s where I get things off my plate and into the right place. Receipts, transactions, anything my bookkeeper needs so I’m not making decisions on half the picture.
Side note. QuickBooks decided not to connect to my Mastercard for most of March. Then today, all the transactions showed up at once. Not ideal timing. 🤪
And a good reminder that if things aren’t current, I’m not actually seeing what’s going on in my business.
Once everything is clean, I start asking better questions.
Did I bring in the revenue I thought I would?
Where did it actually come from?
What did I do that worked and what didn’t?
I look at how I showed up.
Did conversations turn into clients?
Did I keep the clients I already had?
What kind of clients am I attracting right now?
Because that tells me what will keep working.
Then I look at my spending.
Not to cut everything. To understand it.
What am I paying for that’s actually helping my business grow?
What just runs in the background every month?
What’s there that probably doesn’t need to be anymore?
And then I come back to the simplest question.
Do I have more money in the bank now than I did at the start of the year?
If yes, where did it come from?
If no, where did it go?
That question usually tells the truth.
From there, moving into Q2 feels a lot clearer.
I’m not guessing.
I’m not reacting.
I’m making decisions based on what my business is already showing me.
If you haven’t paused to look at your Q1 yet, I put together a simple worksheet you can walk through in about 10 minutes.
It will help you start to see what’s actually happening in your business right now and what might need your attention next.
Download your Q1 Review Worksheet here
When you go through it, I’d love to hear what stood out to you.
What felt clear
What felt off
You can just hit reply and tell me.
And if you’d rather talk it through together, I’m happy to do that too.
