The Quarterly Questions You're Probably Not Asking

Do you have a plan for what you’re building?

Having a big-picture vision of what you’re building and breaking it down into more manageable chunks - like breaking down to a yearly goal and then into quarterly goals - can help break down the overwhelm to something much more manageable.

Let’s say you want to increase your revenue by $48,000 over the course of a year.

Which of these is more approachable?
“I need to increase my revenue by $48,000 in one go.”
“I need two lump sums of $24,000 coming in.”
“I need to create another $12,000 in revenue each quarter.”
“I need to create another $4,000 each month.”

While there’s more than one way to reach the revenue target, breaking the goal down into something more manageable doesn’t make the work disappear. But it gives you a more tangible place to start - and makes it easier to figure out how you're actually going to get there.

But there’s one step that often gets skipped:
Stopping to look at what actually happened before deciding what happens next.

At the time of writing this, it’s the final part of Q3 - and about to head into the last few months of the year.

Maybe you’re looking at your revenue goal for this year and wondering whether you’ll hit it.

Maybe there are projects, programs, fundraising goals, or launches you still want to get across the finish line.

Maybe you’re already thinking about what you want next year to look like.

And Q4 can be a busy one - and a lot can happen in those 3 months.

For a creative business, it might mean wrapping up client projects, launching or promoting an offer, trying to close a revenue gap, preparing for next year, or taking advantage of increased demand during the final months of the year.

For a nonprofit, it might mean a Giving Tuesday campaign, a year-end fundraising campaign or year end asks, closing out programs, preparing for next year, or finishing the work you already committed to.

What I see happen over and over again with creative founders, entrepreneurs, and nonprofit leaders:
They spend the last few months of the year doing much of the same things they did in the first few part of the  - just faster, busier, and more stressed.

Then January comes.

New goals are set. New plans are made. There’s renewed motivation and a promise that this year will be different.

But eventually, the same patterns start showing up again.

You start of managing your time well, but you eventually you end up answering emails, working on marketing copy, putting out a team fire, and realizing at 5PM that the one thing you actually needed to work on that day never happened.

You plan on increasing revenue and have a few ways you want to do so, but you find yourself drowning in the day-to-day operations of your org, scrambling to keep up with what’s already on your plate, leaving very little capacity to think about what's next - let alone how to increase revenue.

After working with creative founders and teams, I see this cycle constantly.

Because being busy and having a profitable business are not the same thing.

Neither is being completely consumed by the day-to-day work of running your business or organization the same as actually building something sustainable that can grow.

One of the things I've learned from working with creative businesses and organizations is that the problem isn't always a lack of ideas, effort, or ambition.

Often, there's simply no space to step back far enough to see what's actually happening - and use that information to build a business that’s more sustainable.

Without that information…
A revenue problem might actually be a messaging problem.
A capacity problem might actually be a systems problem.
A “time management” problem might actually be a role, delegation, or process problem.
And sometimes what looks like a need to do more is actually a need to decide what should stop.

So before you plan Q4, take a step back.

Take a look and ask: what worked in Q3?

Not just what you accomplished or what you didn’t.

Take the time and look at what the last 90 days are actually telling you - and consider these question to start:

1. How dependent is the business on you?

Most of us aren't doing three to five things at 100%.

We find ourselves doing ten things at 60%.

Some of those things might genuinely need to happen. Others are there because we've always done them - and stopping doing it ourselves, changing how it gets done or delegating them feels harder than continuing to do them ourselves.

And when you're a creative, there's often another layer to this.  Your work may be deeply connected to your identity, your ideas, your mission, or your creative interests. 

That can make it difficult to distinguish between what you love doing, what you're good at, what your business needs, and what only you can do.

Add in the fact that many creative, from CEO’s to nonprofit leaders are wearing multiple hats, and it's easy to end up doing the work of the founder and CEO alongside the creative director, project manager, operations manager, marketer, salesperson, administrator, and sometimes the person making the coffee.

What happens when you're not available?

You get sick. Take a vacation. Have a family obligation. Need to step away. Or simply reach the point where you can't keep running at the same pace.

Could your team continue working? Could clients get what they need? Would someone know what happens next on active projects? Would routine decisions still get made without you?

If the answer is no, that doesn't necessarily mean something is wrong. But it does tell you where the work and decision-making currently live.

When every decision, task, and approval comes back to you, you become the bottleneck.

And the more your business grows, the more expensive that bottleneck becomes.

So look at your last 90 days and ask:
What would I cut?
What would I delegate?
What would I automate or document?
And what genuinely requires my expertise?

Your role will naturally evolve as your business grows, and it’s stepping into the role what your building needs.

The goal isn't to become unnecessary, it’s to stop being the bottleneck.

Your business should depend on your vision - not your constant availability.

2. Where did your actual revenue come from?

This is one of the simplest - and most useful - questions you can ask.

Go back through your last 20-30 sales or donations.

Trace every single one.

Where did each person come from?

Instagram? LinkedIn? Your email list? A referral? A podcast? A networking event? A previous client? Direct outreach? Someone who has been following your work for two years?

This doesn’t need to be complicated - you're looking for the patterns.

Because creatives led businesses can often spend enormous amounts of time creating content for the platforms they're most familiar with rather than looking at where their actual buyers or supporters are coming from.

If 80% of your sales are coming from your email list, how are you strengthening getting people onto your email list?

If most of your clients come through referrals, maybe your Q4 strategy needs to include nurturing those relationships rather than creating and putting out more content.

If your nonprofits strongest donors are coming from personal relationships, repeat event attendees, and previous supporters, that tells you something about where your fundraising energy may be most useful.

And look beyond the immediate source too.

If your email list is primarily growing through LinkedIn and TikTok, but you're spending most of your time but you're spending hours every week trying to make Instagram Reels or Carousels over-perform, ask yourself: Why?

Maybe Instagram is still worth investing in.

Maybe it isn't.

The point isn't to automatically abandon one platform for another.

It's to understand the ecosystem you're actually building - and make decisions based on what the data is telling you - is to stop assuming and pull the data.

The answer might already be sitting inside your sales, donor, website, email, or project information.

And the insight can be gold.

3. How much of next quarter's revenue is actually locked in?

There's a big difference between "We have several exciting conversations happening” and "We have $X in signed contracts, retainers, recurring revenue, or committed project milestones" when it comes to having money coming in.

This isn't about being pessimistic.

It's about knowing what you're actually working with.

Look at what's actually guaranteed for the coming quarter or even two.

Include recurring monthly revenue, signed retainers, projects continuing into the next quarter, contracted milestones, confirmed programs, and other commitments you can reasonably count on.

Then separate those from:

• proposals that haven't been accepted
• potential clients
• speculative pitches
• verbal or "handshake" agreements
• revenue you hope will come in

For nonprofits, the same principle applies to fundraising.

What’s been committed? 
What's recurring? 
How much are you relying on last-minute or erratic donations to close the gap?

For earned revenue, look at ticket sales, workshop fees, merchandise, or other paid experiences.  

Are your prices and margins actually covering production and delivery costs?

Or are you unintentionally subsidizing those activities from somewhere else in the budget?

You can't make useful decisions about the next quarter if you don't know what resources you're actually taking into it.

4. What changed this quarter - and is it actually working?

Every quarter, we add or remove things, whether it’s a new platform, software subscription, team member, workflow, automation, approval process, to a new offer.

Regardless of whether you’re adding or removing something, both are worth reviewing.

What did you add, modify, or remove in your work this quarter?

How did doing so impact how things are being run?

Not "Did we successfully implement it?" or ”Did everyone learn how to use it?"

Did it actually improve the way the work gets done?
Did it save time? 
Reduce errors? 
Make responsibilities clearer?
Improve communication? 
Make the customer or donor experience better?

If it did, great!  If there are still frustrations with how things are being run, if there are things that are taking longer to complete than it should, or if you are  repeatedly having the same conversation, fixing the same problem, or reinventing the same process - that’s useful information too. 

A system isn't successful because it exists.  It's successful because it supports the work.

It’s a chance to look back at what got better and what’s still sticky.

5. Are you still building the thing you actually want to build?

A new creative direction can be exciting. A new program or offer can be compelling. A new partnership can open doors.

But does that mean you automatically pursue it?

In the nonprofit space, it might sound like:
Are we still using our time and resources toward work that directly supports our mission?
 

For a business, the question might be:
Are the projects, clients, offers, and opportunities we're pursuing actually moving us toward the business we want to build?

Or are you saying yes because the opportunity is exciting? Because you need the revenue? Are you afraid there may not be another opportunity?

If this is something you’re struggling with, take some time to reconnect with what you’re trying to build.

Taking the time to have clarity around what you’re building and why, taking the time to look back and see what’s working (or not), and using that information to help build the structure to help you build the business and life you want will take you far.

Why This Matters Now

You have about 25% of the year left.

That’s enough time for a lot to happen.

You could change what you're prioritizing.

Clean up a process that's been slowing you down.

Shift where you're putting your marketing energy.

Tighten an offer.

Address a revenue gap.

Delegate something you've been holding onto.

Strengthen a relationship that could lead to future work.

But only if you know what actually needs to change.

The temptation is to look at the remaining quarter and think:
"Okay. We just need to do more."

Whether it’s creating more content, doing more asks, more outreach, offering more programs or offers. 

But if the last 90 days already showed you that something in your current approach isn't working, doing more of the same may not be the right strategy for you anymore.

It's accelerating what isn’t working.

And accelerating without changing direction doesn't get you where you want to go.

Without the debrief or audit, it's easy to carry the same bottlenecks, underperforming offers, unnecessary systems, unclear roles, and revenue assumptions into Q4 - and then into next year.

You can spend another three months working harder without actually getting closer to the business or organization you're trying to build.

That's why taking the time to do debriefs and audits matters.

An audit looks at the broader picture of your work and business.

A debrief looks at what happened within a specific event or offering and extracts the information you need to make better decisions about what's next.

They help you see the patterns you may be missing - and what’s working well - in different ways.

You identify what's working so you can do more of it.

You identify what's not working so you can stop, change, or test something different.

You see which systems are supporting you and which ones are creating more work.

And then you build the next quarter - and beyond - around what you've learned.

That's how you create structure to support what you're doing instead of just doing more.

And you don't have to wait until December 31 or January 1 to do it.

You have a quarter left of this year - but you don't need to spend it repeating what you did in the last three.

Take the time to do an audit or debrief now.

Then use what you learn to make Q4 more intentional - and to give yourself better information to work from when you start planning next year.

Because how you wrap up your year isn't just about what you accomplish between now and December.

It's also about the decisions you make about what comes with you into the next year - and what doesn't.

Want some help looking back?

If these questions are already giving you a few things to investigate, don't let the answers live in your head for another quarter.

Turn them into decisions.

If you have a project, offer, event, or campaign that just wrapped up - or is wrapping up soon - I’m opening early access to a Debrief Toolkit that walks you through this process step by step.

It's designed to help you move beyond “What happened?” and actually extract the insights you can use to make better decisions about what's next.

Access the Debrief Toolkit →

And if you know there's a bigger-picture issue you need help seeing, a Digital Audit can give you another set of eyes on the ecosystem you're building.

Rather than a formal, agency-style audit, I'll review the links and platforms you provide and look at how your work is being presented, how the pieces fit together, your messaging, opportunities for improvement, and where things could work together more effectively.

I'll pull the findings and recommendations together into a written audit you can use as a roadmap.

Learn more about the Digital Audit →

You don't need another quarter of doing everything.

You need to know what deserves your attention.