Steph Winger on Vision, the 12 Week Year, and Making Goals Fun
Mindset · From Student of the Game
Steph Winger on Vision, the 12 Week Year, and Making Goals Fun
Steph Winger has been a realtor in Ontario, Canada, for almost two decades. She runs her own brokerage and coaches women on blending a thriving business with family and self-care. Brad Noll met her at real estate conferences years ago, and he admits he is already putting some of her ideas to work in his own life.
They recorded this conversation near the end of the year, when many people are writing New Year's resolutions. Steph's message is that resolutions often become wishes. A clear vision, a shorter timeline, and a plan you can enjoy are what turn those wishes into results.
A Wake-Up Call and a Better System
Steph started in real estate when her kids were very young. Like many new agents, she was promised training that never came, so she figured things out on her own. Working by relationship and referral changed her business, because it fit who she is. "I love people," she says, and some of the other marketing tactics never felt right to her.
About 12 years ago she was diagnosed with MS. She calls it a wake-up call. She had been so focused on family and business that she had neglected herself. After about a week of what she calls a pity party, she decided not to accept the diagnosis as a label. She took control of what she could: the food she ate, her environment, and her stress. More than a decade later, she feels good, travels, and has run races.
When the pandemic made life and business chaotic, Steph leaned on the 12 Week Year and short cycle execution. She and a few fellow realtors met on Zoom every Thursday at 7 a.m. to talk about what was working and how they were executing. By the end of 2020 she had hit the big goal she set in January, her business had doubled, and she felt like she was taking care of herself along the way. Last year she opened her own brokerage.
“We're not meant to be martyrs. We're meant to be in community and support each other and uplift each other.”
Steph Winger
Vision First, Then Time
Brad points out that people see time differently. Some only see today. Some can look a little behind and a little ahead. Others are always looking far down the road. For the people just trying to get through the day, Steph suggests looking backward instead: where were you five years ago, and has anything changed in your health, relationships, or business?
From there, she builds vision in layers:
- Long-term: picture yourself in your 80s or 90s and ask what you want to have done and who you want to have been.
- Three years: narrow the picture and add more clarity.
- One year: set a theme, such as focusing on health, getting finances in order, or a business number.
- Twelve weeks: park the annual goal and build an actual plan for the next 12 weeks, treating that stretch as the whole year.
She uses a hockey analogy. If a coach told the team it was only playing one period today, the players would go all out instead of easing in. Brad connects it to his college basketball days, when coaches treated each stretch between media timeouts as its own four-minute battle. As Brad sums it up, the fundamentals are vision and time.
Mind Mapping the Tactics
Brad volunteers himself as an example: say he wants to lose 20 pounds this year. Spreading it out at five pounds a quarter, Steph says, is not how it works. Instead, mind map every small action that could help in the first 12 weeks. Buy running shoes. Get headphones. Put workout clothes beside the bed. Fill a water bottle. Clear the holiday junk food out of the cupboard. Some actions happen only once, like hiring a personal trainer in week seven.
The emotion matters as much as the plan. People quit when they are not attached to the reason. Wanting to be healthy enough at 80 to run after your great-grandkids is the kind of reason that sticks. And a 12 week year does not have to start on January 1, a Monday, or the first of the month. It can start whenever you are ready, even after the holidays.
Why She Coaches Women
Steph feels called to help women because she lived the battle between being a great mom and building a business, then spent years neglecting herself until her body put up red flags. She does not want other women to spend eight or ten years figuring it out, or to wait until they are sitting in a doctor's office to put their own oxygen mask on first.
Overwhelm is the most common challenge she sees. Her advice is to stop staying surface level with friends. "We're not meant to be martyrs. We're meant to be in community and support each other and uplift each other," she says. If a friend has not reached out, she is probably thinking the same thing, so be the one to send the text. Steph even keeps reminders on her phone to check on friends. Brad shares a practice he borrowed from author Bob Beaudine's book The Power of Who: friendship Fridays, when he sets time aside to call friends and see how they are really doing.
Not Balance, but a Blend
Steph calls herself anti-balance. On a balance beam in gym class, you are never fully balanced. You keep adjusting to stay straight. Family, business, and self overlap like a Venn diagram, so she aims for the right blend instead.
She also gamifies her goals with boards, colors, and shapes. As a free spirit who also loves structure, she likes to know that if she hits her number of client calls, she can enjoy her weekend. The finish line is not where the motivation lives, she explains. The daily wins, like lacing up for a run, are what keep you going.
Brad adds two examples. His team planned and threw its 20th anniversary party in 90 days, proof that you can get more done in 12 weeks than in a year. And a travel agent once told him that roughly 30 percent of a vacation's enjoyment comes from planning it, 40 percent from the trip, and 30 percent from the memories. His team now thinks about client events the same way. He also shares a mutual friend's family game: win the week and the family has steak on Friday, miss and it is soup.
What Does Winning at the Game of Life Look Like?
For Steph, money matters because it pays for trips and client events, but winning is a sense of ease. She ran her life without ease for years, and it did not work. Now she wants what she does to align with who she is, so she can say yes to a spontaneous comedy show or hockey game, give back to her community, and watch the agents in her office and her own kids succeed.
Brad recaps the episode in one line: the fundamentals are vision and time, and everything in the middle comes down to short cycle execution. When it is time to send virtual flowers, Steph thanks the coach who has worked with her for several years. Brad reminds listeners that relationships win, and the first step toward the right blend might simply be reaching out to a friend.
▶ Listen to the full episode
Gamifying Your Goals: Making Success Fun and Enjoyable with Steph Winger, on Student of the Game.
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