The learning season
September always feels like a beginning to me, more than January does. In the US, summer has come to an end, kids are back in classrooms, and there's a sense that it's time to learn again.
Leaders mostly opt out of that. The last four months of the year become an execution sprint. Hit the number, close the gaps, get to December. Learning gets filed under "next year."
I don't think that holds up. The runway into year-end is one of the best learning windows you get, because it's the moment right before the goals you've set for next year become real. So here's my question for the month: what do you need to be more capable of by the end of this year to actually hit what you're planning for 2027? Not what do you need to do. What do you need to learn.
Learning the pieces, not the leap
I worked with a client a while back who had a dream they'd had for years: to own their own business. They had a job anyone would want, one they liked as well, but the pull toward building something of their own never went away.
Their hesitation wasn't about the excitement. They were excited! It was about the confidence of it. What would it actually be like to run a chocolate shop, or a food truck, or to buy a company that manufactures pipes? Not the idea of ownership, but the texture of the day to day.
Rather than trying to answer the giant, unanswerable question, "what is it like to be a business owner," they did something smaller. Break it into pieces they could learn and digest. What does it take to balance a P&L? What's it like to hire someone, and to fire someone? What does it mean to be responsible for all of it, in a way you never are as an employee inside a larger company? They went and learned the discrete parts before committing to the whole.
You may or may not be weighing whether to buy an ice cream shop. But there's almost certainly something between now and December that you don't yet know how to do. A skill your 2027 plan depends on, a part of the job that's about to get bigger than you, a decision you keep putting off. Don't try to swallow the whole unknown. Find the discrete pieces you can go learn, and start with one.
What I'm reading: Grit, by Angela Duckworth
I have a personal stake in this one. The book opens with grit research Duckworth ran on West Point cadets, and my class was part of that work. Sounds like I was gritty enough back then!
We tend to treat learning as a talent problem: some people just pick things up faster. Duckworth's argument is that the bigger factor is perseverance, whether you keep going long after the novelty wears off.
Trying something new feels great at first. But actually learning it, starting to gain any real mastery, takes the mundane work after the excitement fades. The book is full of examples, and you've seen them everywhere, of people who got good not because they were naturally gifted but because they kept showing up. Consistent practice, consistent focus, over a long time.
So as you think about what you want to learn heading into next year, the goal right now isn't to master it. It's not even to get proficient. It's to start the habit now, while you've got runway, so you can chip away at it consistently before you need it, instead of trying to cram it the moment it's required.
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What I'm learning
My own learning goal for the rest of this year has nothing to do with leadership. I'm learning Portuguese. I've got an app, I'm doing lessons every day, and the hope is to get proficient enough to take a trip out there next year.
It's slow. Some days it's fifteen minutes and I retain almost none of it. But that's the point. It doesn't have to be grand or strategic. Part of it is personal. My father’s side of the family lived in Portugal three generations ago.
Devagar se vai ao longe (Slowly, one goes far)
Before you go
Hit reply and tell me what you're planning to learn before the year ends. Doesn't have to be big. I read every response.
And if you're a revenue, GTM, or sales leader trying to figure out what capability your 2027 goals actually depend on, that's the work I do. Reply to this email or book a free 60 minute call.
Keep learning,
Garret