As this episode is being originally released, it’s less than two weeks before Christmas 2023. In another four days, my husband, Arturo, will be off from work in his corporate job for the rest of the year. Yay for holiday vacations! And all over the world right now, people are making plans for the holidays and thinking about their New Year’s resolutions. Because being less than two weeks from Christmas means we’re also less than three weeks from the new year. What are you going to do in your creative work next year? What New Years resolutions do you have around your artistic business? What are you going to do to make your coming year one of creative joy and excitement? Let’s discuss.

--

Hello, thriving artists, and welcome to Episode 46 of the Starving Artist No More podcast! I am actor and creative entrepreneurship coach Jennifer Jill Araya, and I’m thrilled you’re here with me for today’s discussion about goals and year-end planning for artists. I know first-hand what an incredible difference supportive goals can make in the life of a creative, and I’m really excited about digging into this topic with you.

But before we get there, I have an exciting new program to let you know about. It’s my Thriving Artists Academy, which is launching this week. I work with artists all the time to help them craft workable business plans that will allow them to build creative businesses that actually work and that will meet their unique needs, but just having a plan isn’t enough: you have to actually put that plan into action. And so often, you need support to do that. You need friends and colleagues and mentors and collaborators surrounding you and encouraging you and holding you accountable so that you can actually take the steps outlined in your plan, in your strategy.

That’s where the Thriving Artists Academy comes in. This is a virtual community of creative entrepreneurs working together to help all of us build sustainable and joyfully creative businesses. Membership in the Academy includes monthly classes, topic-focused workshops, and coaching sessions; access to video recordings of past Academy Classes; book club gatherings for us to study and learn together; and a private online forum where you can share your struggles and your joys, both providing encouragement and receiving advice. But more than that, membership in the Academy gives you access to an incredible community of likeminded creatives who will give you the support you need to make your dreams for your creative business a reality.

The Thriving Artists Academy has been operating quietly with a group of charter members for about a year now, and I’m so excited to open it up for new artists to join. If you’d like more information about how you can be part of this, just visit my website, where you can get all of the information, www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com. And if you have any questions about the Academy, you can reach out to me via my website as well. I am so excited about this venture, and I can’t wait to see the growth and transformation that the Academy makes possible for all those involved. Again, all the information is available on my website, www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com.

Now let’s turn to the main topic of today’s podcast episode: year-end planning. It’s that time of year when people in the corporate world are reviewing what they’ve done over the past 12 months and making plans and strategizing for the coming 12 months.

And even though I am happy to ignore most aspects of the corporate world, formal goal-setting, planning, and strategizing are things that I think the corporate world got right. As the old saying goes, a goal without a plan is just a wish, and if wishes were horses, beggars would ride. The last thing you want is for your goals for your creative business to just be wishes, things that don’t ever have any hope of coming true.

I told you in last week’s podcast episode that my hope for each and every creative listening to this podcast, for each and every artist who comes to me for coaching or workshops or seminars, is that they, that you, will find fulfillment and joy from your creative work, that you will find success on your own terms. And finding that kind of success requires having a plan, a strategy, that will guide you there.

That’s really the purpose of year-end planning: taking your personal definition of success, which I talked about at length last week, and charting the map that will get you from here to there, from where you are today, as you’re listening to this podcast episode, to a state of being within your creative work that represents success and fulfillment for you.

And with that in mind, my year-end planning always starts with dreaming a little bit. I think about the particular details of my personal definition of success. I think about what my ideal workday looks like, what kind of projects I want to spend my time working on, how I want to learn and grow and where I want to experiment and stretch myself in my artistic work. I get specific about my personal definition of success.

Figuring out your personal definition of success is where you start your year-end planning, kind of like planning a road trip starts with picking a destination and deciding what you want to do during your time in that destination location. Let’s say you’re planning a holiday road trip to New York City. You know you’re going to NYC, so you’ve picked your destination. Next, you need to decide your activities while you’re there. For the purposes of this example, let’s imagine that you decide you want to visit the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree, walk through the winter village at Bryant Park, see the Radio City Rockettes, and walk along the Macy’s holiday window display. You’ve got your destination, and you’ve worked out the details of what you what to do while you’re there.

In your year-end business planning, follow that same process. Start by picking your destination – determining the broad strokes of what success means to you – and what you want to do while you’re there – the specific components of that definition of success, which includes things like details of how you want to spend your time, where you want to focus your energy, and the kinds of projects you want to be part of. Begin by having a clear idea of what success exactly means to you. I discussed all of that in detail in last week’s episode, so if this concept of your personal idea of success doesn’t make sense to you, pause this episode here and go listen to that one.

But if you’ve got your destination – the broad understanding of what success means to you – and if you’ve settled on your activities once you get there – the specifics of what success looks like for you in practical terms, now it’s time to figure out where you’re starting. Continuing the road trip analogy, when you’re plugging your road trip into your GPS, it’s not enough to just know your destination. You also have to know where you’re starting before you can figure out a route that will get you from here to there.

In terms of your business plan, that means that before we can start strategizing for the future, we have to take a look back. You have to figure out where you are so you can know how to get where you want to go. You have to look backward so you know how to move going forward.

There are three questions I ask myself that help me to do that kind of looking backward:

1. What went well in the past? What do I want to keep doing?
2. What didn’t go so well in the past? What do I want to stop doing, or change how I’m doing it?
3. What entirely new things do I want to start doing?

I ask these questions of myself every month at the beginning of the month, looking back at the past 30 days and planning for the next 30 days. But at the end of the year, I look back over 12 months, not just one month. I pull out my project management notes and review the entire calendar year. I look at my financial records for the entire year. And I review my personal schedule and notes from the past year. In all three of those areas – personal, creative, and financial – I take the time to answer those three questions in detail: what do I want to continue doing, what do I want to stop doing, and what do I want to start doing?

I find it really helpful to think about these three questions in light of the three big areas of fulfillment that I always talk about: personal, creative, and financial.

In terms of your personal fulfillment over the past 12 months, did you have the time you wanted with your family, friends, and other important relationships (including your relationship with yourself) in the past year? In terms of your personal life, what went well, what didn’t go so well, and what new things do you want to start doing? How can you make sure you get that vital personal time in the coming year? Go ahead and put that on your calendar!

When I recently did my own year-end planning, I went ahead and blocked off time in my work calendar. I put in the times when I’m going on vacation with my family. I set aside two weeks for my family’s annual trip to Chile to visit our family there, plus the time we’re going to spend with our close friends who live in Germany. Those trips are on my calendar now. They are my priority. I’m not going to let myself schedule projects over those times. By looking back at my past year and how I handled my personal time and my personal relationships, I was able to make decisions about how I would prioritize work and work projects in light of my non-work priorities for the coming year.

Because my work as an artist is a vital part of who I am as a human being, my work feels very personal … which means that, if I let it, my work has the potential to overwhelm my personal life and swallow up all of my time for my non-work commitments and for the people that matter to me. My personal wellbeing and my personal fulfillment are essential. They are a priority to me. And so making sure time is set aside for my personal commitments is priority #1 when it comes time to do my business year-end planning.

Creatively, what were your favorite projects of the past year? Pull out that project list of the work you’ve done over the past year, and review it. What went well in your creative life? What didn’t go so well? And what new things do you want to start doing? In terms of the projects that you particularly enjoyed, what characteristics tie those projects together? How did those stellar projects come to you, and how can you use that information to get more projects like them going forward? These creatively focused “looking back” questions are going to be vital to you as you plan your marketing strategy going forward!

And financially, take the time to get specific. Dig into the numbers. Don’t rely on your memory or your perception of your business finances. Use the actual figures, and ask yourself: “Financially, what went well over the past year? What didn’t go so well? And what do I want to start doing differently?”

Looking over all of the clients and customers you worked with over the past year, which clients or projects paid you the lowest rates, and which ones paid you your highest rates? How can you craft your marketing efforts for the coming year to focus on those higher paying projects or working with those higher paying clients?

Were you able to save during the past year, both in your personal finances and in your business finances? If not, how can you incorporate savings into your strategy for 2024? And if yes, if you were able to save, what can you do to make sure that savings habit continues?

Did you pay your estimated taxes last year? Did you save for those expenses? If not, do you need to find an accountant to work with for 2024 so you know that those estimated payments won’t take you by surprise?

Did you pay yourself a salary? If not, what steps can you take in 2024 to set that up for yourself so that you can remove financial stress from your personal life? Paying yourself a salary is part of what it means to have well-managed finances in your creative business, and it is a powerful thing. Knowing that you’re going to get a regular, dependable paycheck from your business, just as if you worked for someone else, can be a game-changer for how you feel about your artistic work! I discussed paying yourself a salary way back in Episode 6, so you can go back and listen to that episode if you want to know more. And, as it happens, I’m also teaching a class on paying yourself a salary tomorrow, December 13, 2023, within the Thriving Artists Academy, so all current Academy members will be able to attend that class live tomorrow afternoon, and all future Academy members will be able to access that class recording from the Academy resources.

But regardless of how you learn about it, paying yourself a salary is one really helpful strategy to bring you financial fulfillment from your creative work. As part of your review of your business finances over the past year, ask yourself: did I pay myself a salary last year? If so, how did that go, and do I need to make adjustments this next year? And if not, what do I need to do to make that happen for this year?

Take the time to really sink into these questions. Answer them in detail, not just in generalities. Get specific with yourself. It’s not always a particularly fun activity, but it’s always an enlightening one. And after all, nothing that’s truly worthwhile is easy. So do the hard thing and take the time to figure this out for yourself and your business, using the processing method that works best for you.

For me, I most enjoy journaling about these questions. I write pages and pages and clarify my thoughts in that writing. Writing has always helped me to process and understand my world more clearly, and so writing my answers to these questions as part of my year-end planning process works really well for me.

I would encourage you to work through these questions in the way that works best for you. Perhaps you process this kind of information best in conversations, in relationship. If that’s you, find an artist colleague you trust, and ask them to do year-end planning with you, using each other as sounding boards to work through this planning together. Perhaps you process best in quiet meditation. And if that’s you, schedule a few hours during this holiday season for you to do that kind of deep, meditative thought work. In whatever way works best for you and your unique style, answer for yourself what went well and what didn’t go well over the past year, and what you want to start doing differently as a result.

If you know what success looks like for you personally and you know the lessons you’ve learned over the past year, you are ready to start crafting a specific strategy that will guide you on the path to success for this coming year.

Getting back to that road trip analogy, after you’ve figured out your destination – which is your personal definition of success – and decided what you want to do at that destination – which are the specific components of that success definition – and figured out your starting location – which are all of your answers to these questions we just discussed – you’re ready to hit “directions” on the GPS app and plot your route to get there. You’re ready to figure out your strategy.

Before we dive into the details of figuring out this strategy, I want to take a quick detour into how to structure your business goals. Specifically, I really encourage you to use SMART goals as you are doing your year-end planning. I’m not going to go into SMART goals in detail right now because I explored them in detail back in Episode 19 of this podcast, so if you need more information about what SMART goals are and how to write them, you can listen back to that episode, or you can just search for “SMART goals,” because literally millions of articles have been written about them, what they are, and why they are helpful. But for today’s discussion right now, it’s enough to say that SMART goals are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound. As you think about what you want to do in 2024, and how you plan to do it, make sure your goals and strategies are SMART.

Remember, going back to our road trip analogy, figuring out your personal definition of success is equivalent to deciding on your destination city when planning a road trip. The individual components that make up your definition of success are like the specific things you want to do while you’re in that destination city. To figure out your route, your strategy, start by formulating a SMART goal from each component in your definition of success, and then craft a strategy to make that goal, that component, happen.

Now, let’s look at how to actually figure out what your strategy should be. My favorite way to figure out a strategy is what is often called the post-it method. I take a pad of 3 inch by 3 inch yellow post-it notes, which I use so much that I buy them in bulk, and on each post-it note, I write down an action step that will help me get from where I am to where I want to be. And I do this for each component that I’ve identified as being part of my personal definition of success for the next year.

Let’s say that one of my goals – one component of my personal definition of success for 2024 – is to narrate 20 mystery-thriller books for publishers in the next calendar year.

(And notice that I’ve phrased this goal, this component of my personal definition of success, so that it is a SMART goal. It is specific and measurable – I know exactly how many and what kind of books I want to narrate – 20 mystery-thrillers – and for what kind of clients – publishers. I know this is attainable because I narrated 12 mystery-thrillers in 2023, so this is a goal that will be difficult for me but won’t be impossible. It’s relevant to me because the mystery-thriller genre is one of my favorite genres to narrate and a genre of work that is definitely in my Creative & Financial Sweet Spot. And it’s time-bound because I know exactly when I want to narrate these 20 books – during the calendar year of 2024. Starting with a SMART goal is the best way to make sure you’re going to get a workable strategy out of the post-it method!)

So, with that goal in mind, the post-it method is to then write down every action step that you could possibly ever take that would contribute to making this goal a reality. And I do mean EVERY. SINGLE. ACTION. STEP. Everything you can think of. Each action step gets its own post-it note. Fill a post-it note pad with all the things you could do that would help you achieve that goal! For my example goal, that might include things like updating my mystery-thriller demo so that I know it’s reflective of my best mystery narration skills. Reaching out to the casting directors and publishing companies who have hired me to narrate mystery-thrillers in the past and thanking them for the opportunity to work in my favorite genre, letting them know I want to be considered for work like this in the future. Attending book cons devoted to the mystery-thriller genre so that I can meet both authors and listeners and learn firsthand what qualities they are looking for in mystery-thriller narrators. Talking on social media about the mystery-thrillers I narrated in 2023 and how much I enjoyed them. Getting coaching or taking performance workshops focused specifically on the mystery-thriller genre. Listening to award-winning thriller audiobooks with a critical ear so that I’m learning and evaluating the performance as I’m enjoying the story.

Etc etc etc.

These action steps are just barely scratching the surface of all of the things that I could do that would contribute toward my goal of narrating 20 mystery-thriller books for publishers in 2024. If I were doing this post-it note exercise for real instead of just as an example for this podcast, I’d fill that post-it pad full of all the possibilities, no judgment and no holding back. While you’re writing down possible action steps, don’t rule anything out.

Only after you’ve done a full and complete brain dump of all the action steps that could possibly contribute toward your goal do you start to narrow things down. I like to spread all of the post-it notes out on a big surface – sometimes I use our dining room table for this – so that I can see everything. And then I start grouping like with like. Post-it notes with action steps that are related to my marketing strategy get stacked with other post-it notes bearing marketing-related action steps. All the ongoing growth ideas get grouped together. If there are any action steps that have to be done in a specific order – for example, you have to research upcoming books from a specific publisher before you can reach out to that publisher about the book you want to narrate – I like to stack those post-its together and put big numbers on them, indicating that the action steps have to be done in a certain order.

Take all of the ideas you came up with, and put some order into the brain dump of ideas. You’re starting to figure out the different routes you could take to your end goal. Going back to the road trip idea, there are lots of different routes I could take that would get me from Cincinnati to New York City, and this part of the process is the equivalent of me mapping out all the different routes to see which one I want to take.

And then, take those piles of post-its and figure out which ones you’re actually going to do. Unlike with a road trip, where you’re only going to end up taking one of the routes you look at, with goal planning, you can actually use several different strategies at the same time. That way, if one strategy doesn’t work the way you thought, you still have other options for achieving that goal.

Going back to my example goal of narrating more mystery-thrillers, I might decide to focus in on the marketing effort of reaching out to casting directors who have hired me, plus updating my demos, plus engaging in ongoing growth around my skills in narrating mysteries, and not try to attend mystery book cons. In that case, from all the possible strategies I came up with during my post-it note brain dump, I decided to take action on three big strategies but am not going to worry about the fourth right now.

Repeat this process with each of the primary components that make up your personal definition of success. First, brain dump all possible action steps. Then organize those action steps into specific strategies, and then decide which strategies you’re going to use. Of course, my example of narrating more mystery-thriller audiobooks was just that – an example. This process will work regardless of your specific goal, and regardless of your creative industry. Brain dump action steps, organize the steps into strategies, and decide which strategies you’re going to put into action.

Once you’ve figure out strategies for each of the 2024 components of your personal definition of success, you have a plan for the next year. You’ve got goals, and you’ve got strategies with specific, achievable action steps that will make those goals happen. You’ve banished any wishy-washy wishes and have only concrete, actionable plans.

Take a moment to celebrate! This is amazing! You have a plan for the next year of your business! What an incredible thing! You are not going to go blindly into the coming year. You are going to pursue the kind of artistic work that lights you up and brings you joy with intention and purpose. You know what you want and you know how you are going to make what you want a reality. There is so much power and freedom in that. Congratulations!

But I don’t want you to stop there. If you don’t put your plan into action, that beautiful strategy will just sit in an unopened journal on a shelf in your studio, or sit in an unopened file on your computer. Having a plan is amazing and is absolutely something to be celebrated, but after you celebrate, take the next step: put that plan into action. Take one step, and then the next, and then the next. I’ve talked about the importance of small steps before, back in Episode 40, and putting your new 2024 business strategies into action is the perfect place to focus on those kinds of small steps. The way to move a mountain is one small pebble at a time, and the way to make your 2024 plan of action a reality is one small action at a time.

Taking action is where reaching out to your community can be incredibly helpful. Whether that looks like reaching out to one or two close colleagues and forming an accountability partnership, or whether that’s reaching out to your mentors and coaches in your creative industry, don’t try to walk this road alone.

In the corporate world, when my husband is putting his 2024 plan of growth into action, he’s not doing it alone. He came up with that plan with the guidance of his manager, and he’s working with his entire team of software engineers to make his plan a reality.

This is exactly the kind of work I do in my creative entrepreneurship coaching: I help people figure out what their dreams are, what their personal definition of success is. I help them craft supportive goals that will make those dreams a reality, and I give them encouragement and guidance as they figure out what exact strategies, tactics, and action steps will help them achieve those goals. And I give them support, accountability, and encouragement as they actually take action on those strategies.

I do this sort of work through one-on-one coaching. I do this through the Thriving Artists Academy, which I mentioned at the top of this episode, and which is brand new and which is open now. I do this through individual classes, workshops, and seminars that are focused on a specific topic. Some of those classes are recorded and available for purchase on my website, and Thriving Artists Academy members have access to those classes through their Academy membership.

I do this kind of supportive work through the Taming the Muse Group Workshop, and I’ll be hosting another group workshop cohort in 2024, although the dates aren’t yet set for it. And I’m even hosting a 3.5 day Thriving Narrators Retreat in Cincinnati next summer, August 22-25, 2024. I know what a difference support makes when it comes to putting your strategies into action, and the driving purpose behind my creative entrepreneurship coaching work is to give artists the support they need. If that kind of support is something you want, I would love to hear from you.

But I’m not your only possible source for support. There are other coaches out there who provide this kind of work, in different ways and in different frameworks than I do, but I know that not every artist is going to relate deeply to my frameworks and my exact message, so I’m glad that other coaches are out there who will speak to those artists who don’t relate to me. Yes, I have several different programs to give you the support and encouragement you need, but I know I’m not right for everyone, and you can get similar help from other coaches.

And even beyond coaching opportunities, there are other ways you can get supportive encouragement. As I already mentioned, you can form accountability partnerships. You can get assistance from mentors and friends. You don’t have to do this alone. You don’t know what you don’t know, and reaching out to others will help you see your blind spots, and you can help others see theirs. We are all better when we work together.

You may be working as a solo entrepreneur in your creative business, but you don’t have to do this by yourself. Find people who can fill the role of my husband’s manager and team members. Surround yourself with a supportive group of colleagues who are all committed to helping everyone realize their creative dreams. Together, we can each craft a plan for 2024, and then put that plan into action, so that we can live into our best creative selves and experience our own personal definitions of success in the year to come.

Thank you for spending this time with me today. I am so grateful for each and every artist who listens to this podcast! I hope today’s discussion helped you understand how to shape a plan for 2024 that will truly help you make your dreams for your creative business into your reality. I have found Goal Setting to be an incredibly powerful tool within both my business and in my personal life, and I hope they will be the same motivating force for you, too.

If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please rate, review, and subscribe. And as always, if you know a fellow creative who might be helped by today’s episode, or any episode, of this podcast, please pass it along to them. Sharing is caring! A huge thank you to my husband, Arturo, who makes sure this podcast sounds good as you’re listening to it. If you have questions or feedback for me, or if you’d like to learn more about how you can work with me, I’d love to hear from you. You can reach me through my website, www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com.

Once you determine what success means to you, take time to look back. Ask yourself what is going well, what isn’t going so well, and how you want to move forward. Use that information to craft goals and strategies to achieve those goals that will allow you take one small step at a time toward where you want to be. And most of all, surround yourself with a supportive community of creatives and artists who are all working together to help everyone be their best creative selves. We are all better together. I can’t wait to see what you create.