Plans fail because they are lists of aspirations with no order and no finish line. These have both. Each week has one deliverable and one number. If you cannot say what the number is, you have not started the week properly.
The 30-day plan: get operational
For: anyone who uses AI occasionally and wants it embedded in how they work.
Week 1 — Audit and instrument
List every repeating task in your week. Mark each red, amber or green using the method in the survival guide. Deliverable: a written task inventory. Number: hours spent on red tasks.
Week 2 — Ship one asset
Build one thing that exists without you afterwards. A ten-design print-on-demand test, a short film, a small tool, five articles. Deliverable: something published with a public URL. Number: units shipped.
Week 3 — Automate one workflow
Take your single most repetitive red task and build it in n8n or Make with a human approval step. Deliverable: a running automation. Number: hours saved per week.
Week 4 — Take a position
Read one primary source on capability and one on risk. Write 500 words on what you actually believe and what you are doing about it. Deliverable: the written position. Number: none — this one is judgement.
The 90-day plan: build the asset
For: anyone who has done the 30-day plan and wants revenue that is not hours.
- Weeks 1-3 — Choose and validate. One asset type only: products, books, software, video. Prove ten strangers want it before you build the full thing.
- Weeks 4-7 — Produce at volume. Twenty designs, three chapters, one working app, ten videos. Use the tool stacks on each page rather than shopping for new tools.
- Weeks 8-10 — Distribution. Pick one channel and go deep. One channel done properly beats five done badly, every time. See ads, marketing and social.
- Weeks 11-13 — Measure and cut. Kill what did not work without sentiment. Double the thing that showed any signal at all.
The 365-day plan: change your position
- Q1 — Operational. Complete the 30-day plan. AI in your daily work, one automation running.
- Q2 — Asset. Complete the 90-day plan. First revenue from something that is not your hours, however small.
- Q3 — Systems. Move from single automations to a connected pipeline with agents doing handoffs. Add a second asset type. Start teaching what you learned — teaching is the fastest way to become the person people call.
- Q4 — Ownership. Convert what works into something that compounds: equity, an audience you own the list for, a catalogue with a back list, or a business with a second person in it.
The weekly review that makes this work
Thirty minutes, same time every week. Three questions: what shipped, what number moved, what is blocking the next deliverable. Write the answers down. This single habit is the difference between people who finish these plans and people who bookmark them.