Don't Worry About Those New Year's Goals–Do This Instead
It's the beginning of the year. Do you know what your goals are? I have thought through mine, mostly. But the thing I'm thinking more about is my system. Through my work on ReCulturing, I've discovered that sustainable change doesn't come from ambitious goal-setting. It comes from thoughtfully designed review systems. As James Clear puts it:
"The purpose of setting goals is to win the game. The purpose of building systems is to continue playing the game."
Here’s an example: I met my trainer this past Monday at the gym. It was twice as full but will return to normal by next week. Why? All these people sweating away on the treadmill set a goal to be healthy but didn't create the system to help them reach that goal.
The ReCulturing Approach to Personal Change
Just as a company's culture isn't merely its stated values, your personal culture isn't just your New Year's resolutions list. In ReCulturing, I emphasize that real change happens at the intersection of values, behaviors, practices, and processes.
Let me show you how this works with one of my core values: health.
Value: Health
Behaviors: Moving my body daily, prioritizing sleep, making time for reflection
Practices: Lifting weights 3x/week, tracking sleep with my Oura ring, meditating daily
Processes: Weekly check-ins with my trainer, monthly health metrics review, quarterly fitness assessment
Understanding Practices vs. Processes
While we often focus on daily practices, processes—your systematic methods and frameworks—create lasting change. Practices keep you moving daily, but processes provide the reflection and iteration that ensure you're moving in the right direction.
Let me make this concrete with an example from my own system:
Practice: Conducting a weekly review every Friday.
Process: The systematic approach that makes that review meaningful:
The metrics I track
How I assess calendar patterns
The tools I use
How I translate insights into next week's adjustments
The distinction is subtle but crucial. Practices are about doing; processes are about reviewing, learning, and iterating. Both are essential, but processes provide the foundation to make your practices more effective.
This video was from a few years ago. TJ, my trainer, emphasizes consistency. I won’t beat that deadlift record if I don’t consistently lift at least 3x/week.
Building Your System Through Ongoing Reviews
The E-Myth, written by Michael E. Gerber in 1986, introduced a remarkably relevant distinction: the difference between working "in your work" versus working "on your work." Despite being nearly 40 years old, this fundamental principle continues shaping my thinking about systems. We naturally spend time "in our work" (the daily grind of meetings, slacks, and responding to issues), but we need structured review systems to ensure we also spend time "on our work" (reviewing what we've done, measuring outcomes, and thinking strategically).
Designing Your Days vs. Reacting to Them
The key to a meaningful daily review isn't just checking off tasks – it's ensuring that you are designing your days aligned with your values and behaviors instead of merely reacting to your calendar. Here's my process:
Daily Reviews
Evening Planning (Intentional days start the night before) Using Sunsama helps me design days based on reality instead of wishful thinking. This means:
Reviewing tomorrow's commitments through the lens of my values and behaviors (like protecting morning time for working out and writing)
Being realistic about how long things actually take
Building in breaks between focused work
Setting up for success (yes, even packing that gym bag to make sure I'm not scrambling the next morning)
Capture and Organize The Things app serves as my trusted tool for:
Capturing random thoughts and actions throughout the day
Organizing projects around my core values and their associated behaviors
Keeping track of longer-term commitments that align with my values
End-of-Day Review I close each day by:
Checking what actually got done in Sunsama
Identifying where I might have overpromised (a behavior I'm working to change)
Adjusting tomorrow's plans based on today's reality
Protecting time blocks for breaks and transitions that support my values & behaviors
The power of this process isn't in the tools—it's in the intentionality. By planning the night before, I ensure that my days are designed around my values and behaviors rather than reactive to others' needs.
Weekly Reviews
Through Streaks, I monitor the consistency of my practices, usually on Friday afternoons. I also review my calendar from the week I just had and, more importantly, the week ahead. Did I hit my 3x/week strength training goal? Did I write daily? Did I reach out to a friend daily? Am I packing too much in next week? Are there less urgent things that could be pushed to the following week? What is more urgent for me to create time between those meetings? Am I giving enough time to my team?
Monthly Reviews
I spend about three hours reviewing my system and how well I'm ReCulturing my life. I review my values, behaviors, processes, practices, photos, calendar, and Streaks. When I do this, I'm more surprised by how much I've accomplished than the other way around.
Quarterly Reviews
These deeper dives are day-long retreats, preferably away from home or your office. If you have a partner, do the review with them. My partner, Eric, and I plan these quarterly reviews for the year. For Q1, we are slated to visit Vancouver to sneak in some skiing in Whistler and to see family in Seattle.
These quarterly reviews are conducted over the course of a weekend, giving each person time to share what they've accomplished, the challenges they've faced, and what they have learned. They also give each person a chance to share what they need from the other to maintain momentum with their system.
Creating Sustainable Change
Setting goals and building systems is like hoping and knowing. Goals point to a destination, but systems create the path. Like any healthy organizational culture, your personal culture requires regular attention and care—not through grand resolutions but through small, consistent actions aligned with clear values.
The power isn't in perfection but in persistence. As you begin this year, focus less on where you want to go and more on the system that will get you there, one review at a time.
I’d love to learn from you. What practices and processes are you using to design a powerful 2025?
