12FocusQuarterly goals examples to copy
A quarterly goal is one result you can check on a set date about 13 weeks away: “10 paying customers by March 31”, not “grow the business”. Here are 30 for work, a business or side project, money and health, each with the weekly action behind it, and a template for yours.
A year leaves room to start “next month”. A quarter doesn’t: by week 4, almost a third of it is gone.
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What is a quarterly goal?
A result you will finish within one quarter of the year: 13 weeks, or about three months. It has a finish line someone else could check, and a date. “Grow the business” is a direction. “10 paying customers by March 31” is a quarterly goal.
Companies have long planned in quarters. Google’s re:Work guide says the company sets annual and quarterly OKRs (objectives and key results) and grades them at company-wide meetings every quarter. The same length works for one person: long enough to finish something real, short enough to see the end from the first week.
How do you write a quarterly goal?
Answer three questions, in order. Here they are for a side project someone runs after work.
The third question carries the most weight. In a meta-analysis of 94 independent tests, Gollwitzer and Sheeran (2006) found that plans that spell out when, where and how you will act had a medium-to-large effect on reaching goals. A goal with a date but no weekly action is still a wish with a deadline.
- What would make this quarter count? A result, not an activity.
- How will you know, and by when? A number or a plain yes or no, and the date.
- What happens every week? The action you control, with its day.
What are good quarterly goals for work?
Results your manager could check on the last day of the quarter. Ten examples, each with the weekly action behind it:
- Ship the onboarding redesign to every new user. One screen finished and reviewed each Friday.
- Close 12 new accounts. 15 personal outreach emails and two demos a week.
- Cut the support backlog from 300 open tickets to under 100. Two 90-minute blocks a week on the oldest ones.
- Talk to 12 customers and write up what they need. One 30-minute call a week, notes the same day.
- Pass the certification exam you keep postponing. Three study hours a week, a practice test every other Friday.
- Get the monthly report from two days down to half a day. Automate one manual export a week.
- Walk into the pay conversation with three shipped results. Log wins every Friday, ask for the meeting in week 10.
- Two mornings a week with no meetings and no feeds. Tuesday and Thursday 9 to 11: move the calls, limit the apps.
- Write the onboarding doc so the next hire starts with it. One section a week, read by a teammate.
- Lead your first project from kickoff to launch. A five-line status note every Friday.
What about a business or side project?
Pick the number that pays: customers, calls booked, signups. Eight examples:
- First 10 paying customers. Two demo calls and one post where your buyers read, every week.
- Launch the landing page and collect 200 signups. The page live by week 3, then one post a week that links to it.
- Publish 12 newsletter issues. Write on Tuesday, send on Thursday.
- Ship version 1 of the app. One feature finished and tested each week, submitted by week 11.
- Raise prices for new clients by 15%. The new rate on every proposal, wins and losses counted each Friday.
- Three referrals from past clients. Ask one happy client each week.
- Eight sales calls booked from cold outreach. 20 personal emails a week.
- Four hours a week back from admin. Hand off or automate one recurring chore a week.
What are good personal quarterly goals?
Money, health and learning work the same way: a number, a date and something that happens every week. Twelve examples:
- $3,000 in an emergency fund. $250 moved every Friday for 12 weeks.
- A $2,400 card balance paid off. $200 a week for 12 weeks.
- Know where every dollar went for 13 weeks. A 15-minute sort every Sunday.
- Save 10% of every paycheck. The transfer set up in week 1, one cost cut each month.
- Run a 10K in under an hour. Three runs a week, one of them long.
- 36 strength workouts. Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
- In bed by 11 on weeknights. The phone on its charger in another room at 10:30.
- Every check-up done: doctor, dentist, eyes. Book one a week until all three are in the calendar.
- Read six books. About 20 pages a day.
- Finish an A2 Spanish course. Three 30-minute lessons a week.
- A phone-free first hour after work, four days a week. Apps limited from 6 to 7 pm.
- Clear the garage and sell what you don’t use. One shelf every Saturday.
How many quarterly goals should you have?
For one person with a full-time job, one to three. Google’s re:Work guide suggests three to five objectives for a team, with around three key results each, and warns that more can lead to “a diffusion of effort”. A team splits the work. You don’t.
Each goal needs its own hours in the week. Three goals at five hours each is 15 hours a week, on top of work, family and sleep. If that doesn’t fit, cut a goal now rather than in week 7, and write down what waits for next quarter. Then give those hours fixed blocks in your days, before meetings fill them.
What goes in a quarterly goals template?
Six lines. Fill them in here, then copy them into your notes. What you type stays in your browser.
Want every week dated? The free 12-week planner drafts all twelve.
How do you track quarterly goals?
Count the weekly action, not the goal. On the last day of each week, write how many planned actions got done, one line on what got in the way, and next week’s actions. Writing it down helps: in a meta-analysis of 138 studies, Harkin and colleagues (2016) found that monitoring progress helped people reach their goals, and helped more when the progress was written down or reported to others. The ten-minute weekly review walks through it.
A quarter has 13 weeks. Plan 12 and keep the 13th for looking back and planning the next quarter, so one slipped week has somewhere to go.
Around week 7, check the goal’s number. Behind? Change the weekly action or the size of the goal, not the date. For a stretch goal, falling a little short is normal: Google grades OKRs from 0.0 to 1.0 and puts the sweet spot at 60 to 70%.
Is there an app for quarterly goals?
A quarterly goal doesn’t slip on its last day. It slips in an early week that gave it no hours. 12Focus starts there: it holds up to three goals for a 12-week cycle, shows how many hours a week each one gets and where they sit in your week, and turns each week into a few actions with days.
The week closes with a short review where you choose next week’s actions. On iPhone and Android, you can also give the apps you choose a daily allowance, and each planned action you finish adds minutes.
What people ask about quarterly goals
What is a good quarterly goal?
One result with a finish line someone else could check and a date about 13 weeks away, plus an action that happens every week: “10 paying customers by March 31, two demo calls a week”, not “grow the business”.
How many quarterly goals should I set?
One to three for one person. Each needs its own hours in the week. If three don’t fit, keep the one that matters most and give the others a smaller weekly action or the next quarter.
What is the difference between quarterly goals and OKRs?
OKRs pair an objective, the direction, with around three key results, the numbers that show it happened, and Google grades its OKRs every quarter. A personal quarterly goal is usually one result with one weekly action, which is closer to a single key result.
How do you track quarterly goals?
Once a week: count the planned actions you finished, write one line on what got in the way, and set next week’s actions. Check the goal’s number at the halfway point, around week 7, and change the weekly action if you’re behind.
What if I’m behind halfway through the quarter?
Change the weekly action or the size of the goal, not the date. Seven customers out of ten is still seven more than the quarter started with.
Should quarterly goals add up to a yearly goal?
They can: four quarters of 13 weeks make a year. A quarter also works on its own, and a new quarter is a clean place to start a goal you put off earlier in the year.
Give this quarter a place in your week
12Focus holds up to three goals for a 12-week cycle, turns each week into a few actions, and closes it with a short review.