It is not how you start, it is how you finish that defines you. Finishing strong is a habit. The winners of life know how to finish strong, which creates momentum for your future, forms the habit of not quitting, and gives you an advantage over the competition.

So, how do you finish strong?

#1 – Work harder

Legendary coach Pat Summitt said, “Here’s how I’m going to beat you. I’m going to outwork you.” If you decide to gear up one notch, even if it’s just an extra hour a week, you can be more efficient, more effective. It is amazing how sheer determination and a strong work ethic can create results and increase momentum and cause the “finish strong effect” to happen by deciding to work harder at the end of the year.

#2 – Work smarter

The smartest way to get your job done efficiently and effectively is by asking for help and maximizing the team around you. If you are on the operations side of the business and you have a project to get done by the end of the year, think about what you and your team are doing and how you can work together more efficiently and effectively.

Or if you are in sales, maybe you want to increase referrals and have more meetings, so you make sure at the end of every meeting that you ask for five referrals and create a referrals hit list. Just by making an action plan, you are loading up your pipeline and will have ten appointments on the books before going into next year—that is working smarter.

#3 – Set short-term goals

This season is the best time of the year to commit or recommit to your goals. The key is putting your focus on activity and not results. Sometimes results are uncontrollable, but you have direct control of your actions. Setting short-term goal-based activities with a daily, weekly, or monthly frequency will create momentum that will bring you closer to your goals.

Think about your vision, the future, and what you want. If you want the future to be bright with next year as one of the best years you have ever had, decide to start right now. Make this your mantra: “I’m going to have so much momentum going into next year, it’s going to be ridiculous. It’ll be impossible to stop me from having my best year ever.”

Our goal as a family of companies is to finish strong in everything we do so that we positively impact, inspire, and invest in those around us. It is the decisions we make right now to finish strong that sets it all into motion. So, let’s go out and finish strong.