✅ Today’s Checklist:
🤔 Riddle me this: I’m something you can hold without hands, lose without notice, and find in the middle of doing something else. What am I? (Find the answer on the bottom).
🗓️ Wed 2/25 9AM PT: Meeting notes. Follow-ups. “Can you send that recap?” It adds up. This session shows you how to automate the busywork and get your hours back. Register here.
🧠 Give your hiring managers a 2026-ready brain upgrade—bias-proof, compliant, and sharp where it counts.
☁️ Feeling the midweek blahs? Try these 12 simple shifts to bring the joy back to your workdays.
🌺 Hormone health deserves better press. Here’s why anthocyanins may be worth a closer look.
🎤 If a promotion is on your 2026 vision board, these women in leadership conferences belong on it too.
End of February is when a lot of “Q1 priorities” turn into goal theater: pretty in the deck, ignored in real life.
Before March starts, run a 15 min portfolio review.
Because you can look at goal tracking like you’re managing a portfolio of bets:
If those three aren’t aligned, you’ll feel busy and behind at the same time.
1. Sort your portfolio (5 minutes)
Open wherever your goals live: your OKRs, performance doc, Notion/Asana board, or that dusty slide you built in January.
If you need a clean structure, borrow a simple goal-tracking template and adapt it.
Create three buckets:
Now label each goal:
Shrinking is underrated. “Redesign onboarding” becomes “Pilot one onboarding checklist with one client.”
If company-critical and manager-visible barely overlap, bring that into your next check-in.
2. Run a status reality check (5 minutes)
If your brain goes blank, copy/paste this into ChatGPT (or your AI tool of choice):
AI prompt:
“Act like my operations-minded chief of staff. I’m reviewing my Q1 goals and I need a one-line status update for each goal in this format: current state → biggest constraint → next concrete move (with a date). Ask me only the minimum questions needed. Here are my goals and what I’ve done so far:
Now produce the one-line status for each goal, plus one “shrink it” suggestion if the goal is too big.”
Tip: If you manage people, run the same prompt for your team’s goals so your 1:1 is based on reality, not vibes.
If a goal hasn’t moved in 6+ weeks, either shrink it or explicitly renegotiate it. Dead goals drain focus.
3. Turn intention into calendar reality (3 minutes)
For each “Keep” goal:
If your calendar doesn’t show proof of the goal, the goal doesn’t exist.
4. Use scripts to manage up (2 minutes)
Drop this into your 1:1 doc or Slack:
Status script:
“Here’s where I am on [goal]: [current result]. Biggest constraint is [Y], so in March I’m focusing on [Z] and de-prioritizing [A]. Anything you’d adjust?”
If you already run formal check-ins, you can plug that directly into a goal-setting meeting template instead of reinventing the structure.
Trade-off script:
“Given [new priority], I can keep A on track and slow B, or flip it. Which outcome matters more this quarter?”
That sentence alone prevents silent overload.
Check that your goals, calendar, and manager are aligned. If they aren’t, adjust before March starts.
If you’ve ever:
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Birthdays. Farewells. Work anniversaries. New babies.
Handled, as Olivia Pope says.
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TA reader, Malia B., wrote:
“My biggest struggle is a lack of purpose at work. I’m just going through the motions and my project quotes are small or die before really taking off.”
I’ve been in this spot before many times.
That specific kind of flat where you’re productive, but not invested.
Where projects move, but nothing really builds.
I’ve been thinking about this inside my own team lately.
A few weeks ago, I had my team take a self-discovery assessment from Pigment. I framed it as a collaboration exercise.
What I didn’t expect was how much it made me rethink how I structure work (especially my own).
What It Showed Me About Myself
My results labeled me an Accelerator with strong Integrative strengths.
Which makes sense. I like building systems, connecting dots, and designing how things flow across content, partnerships, and revenue.
What caught me off guard wasn’t the strengths, though.
It was how much independent thinking time I actually need to do my best work.
A lot of my strongest ideas come from quiet processing. Pattern recognition. Solo ideation.
And yet my calendar is packed with meetings because I can operate that way.
There’s a difference between being capable in a work style and being energized by it.
That realization alone changed how I structure my week.
Then I Looked at Cameron’s Results
Cameron’s report leaned more analytical and operational. Clear lanes. Structured thinking. Defined parameters.
And I immediately saw something.
I had been giving her a lot of high-ambiguity, cross-functional projects (the kind I personally enjoy).
But that’s not automatically where she operates best.
So we adjusted:
I’ve already seen fewer second-guessing Slack threads and more decisive updates.
It’s a small adjustment, but small adjustments compound.
Same role. Same person. Better positioning.
Back to You, Malia
When projects stall or stay small, it can wear on you.
Sometimes the issue isn’t effort, it’s fit.
Fit between:
Pigment breaks this down in a surprisingly practical way: how you process information, where you naturally create value, what kind of projects sustain your energy over time.
For teams, it’s useful language. Instead of assuming someone “isn’t pushing,” you can look at whether they’re being asked to operate outside their natural strengths.
That’s a different conversation entirely.
If Work Feels Flat Right Now
Try this before making any big decisions:
Those are not the same thing.
Purpose doesn’t always require a new job.
Sometimes it starts with understanding how you actually work, and adjusting the structure around that.
And that can change more than you think.
Joanna (TA Co-Founder)
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📆 TOMORROW: Steal this framework to measure AI progress within your org on Feb 25. RSVP for free.
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Work Wisdom of the Week: My first mentor used to say all the time, “It is what it is.” We deal with what we have, not what it was or what we wish it were. We deal with the now to generate the future outcome we want. We can learn lessons from mistakes, but finding culprits is a waste of time.
Joanna (TA Co-Founder)
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