The Year Has Three Quarters

Planning season is starting, and most 2027 budgets will be built on four quarters. The year has three.

The first runs from around January 10 to early April. Most people don't come back from the holidays at full speed. The second runs from early April to early July. The third runs from early September to Thanksgiving. Between them sit two voids: early July to early September, and Thanksgiving to early January.

People still work in the voids, but things don't move. Team members take vacation at staggered times, buyers are away, boards don't meet, candidates delay decisions, and anything that needs three people to agree waits. A team can have nearly everyone working most of the summer and still go two months without everyone working at the same time.

Count the weeks and the working year comes to about 36, not 52. The third quarter is the shortest, at roughly eleven weeks.

That changes what the plan should promise, and when projects should start. A traditional Q3 target is really a target for the last three weeks of September. A deal that isn't close to signature by early November closes in late January. A senior search that opens in June produces a hire who starts in September. A raise that slips past early July doesn't slip a month. It slips to September. A major initiative launched in October has only a few weeks to gain momentum before the year winds down.

The cost isn't only the weeks. It's momentum. A project that stalls in July doesn't resume where it left off in September. Decisions get revisited, priorities get reset, and teams have to be brought back into sync. If the 2027 targets only work across 52 weeks, they don't work.

The better move is to plan around the three quarters instead of fighting them. Put major projects in the true quarters, especially the ones that depend on other teams, customers or partners. Save the summer for minor projects, the ones a small group can finish without waiting on anyone. Use the summer slowdown to step back from the business, so priorities are reset before the September-to-Thanksgiving push begins.

December is the natural time to think big: strategy, and relationships. Inside the company and outside it, people finally have time for conversations that aren't about this week's deadline.

Plan the 36 weeks for execution, and the other 16 for the work that makes those 36 count.