250. How to Plan 2026 Like a Business Owner (Not as a Consultant)

There’s a planning trap consultants fall into every year, and it has nothing to do with effort, motivation, or follow-through. You put hours into planning. You set goals, map out your year, and feel clear when you close your notebook.  Yet despite your best efforts, months later your business looks the same. Revenue hasn’t grown the way you expected, you struggle to create pipeline control, and the plan feels like it never really mattered. In Episode 250, Melisa explains why this happens. She breaks down the planning trap that turns well-intentioned plans into little more than busywork.  She walks through the four most common planning mistakes consultants make—not as personal failures, but as predictable outcomes of thinking like the doer instead of the business owner responsible for driving work into the business. This episode isn’t about working harder or creating better task lists. It’s about understanding why your planning hasn’t changed results and how to build a plan that actually drives your business forward, to hit (and even exceed) your goals this year. If you’ve ever:Put serious time into planning but seen little change in your businessSet goals that didn’t move the needle on revenue, pipeline, or workloadFinished the year wondering why things felt busy but not meaningfully different This episode will reset how you approach planning and what a plan should actually do. In this episode, you’ll learn:[03:12] The four planning mistakes that make plans ineffective[08:44] Why underperformance and feast-or-famine cycles are usually planning problems, not execution problems[18:55] A five-step framework for planning like a business owner, including building revenue and lead strategies that actually work[28:42] How to implement, evaluate, and adjust your plan so it continues to drive results Episode 250 is a milestone and a reset. If you want planning time to create recognizable changes in your business, this episode shows you how to make it happen. Mentioned ResourcesCompanion Resource: Download the Independent Consultant"s 12-Month Plan Template, www.icyearlyplan.com Full Show Notes: https://shownotes.melisaliberman.com/episode-250Melisa’s Books, Planners & Journals: https://linktr.ee/melisalibermanRelated Podcast Episode: Episode 176 - Set a Compound Goal for Sustainable Consulting Business Growth, https://shownotes.melisaliberman.com/episode-176/#more-2463   Mentioned in this Episode: Join the 2026 Lead Gen Sprint http://www.consultantsprint.com/  Want help achieving your consulting business goals? Melisa can help. Click here for more on coaching tailored to you as an independent consulting business owner.