Pretty much everything will take longer than you think - FROM THE ARCHIVES.

Business lesson 6 - optimistic and realistic business planning.

Oct 29, 2025

The topic of this post from the archives has been a noticeable theme this year. I’ve seen it in all of the businesses I’ve been working with. I’m sharing it again in case you’ve noticed the same, so you 1) let yourself off the hook; and 2) get some strategies to better estimate the time an activity/task/initiative will actually take in your business.

Let’s dive in.

Continuing with the deep dive into each of the “10 business lessons to learn sooner rather than later,” we’re on to…

Lesson number 6 - Everything will take longer than you think.

TL:DR - summary from the roundup article

And I mean everything. You want to find the right bookkeeper or creative agency. You want to create a rocking online course. You’re ready to sign your first client. An example from my own business… I planned (and worked the plan) to launch this newsletter on Substack at the end of June; I launched it at the end of July (2024).

Too often, you think you can get more done in less time than it truly takes. And most efforts are 1) contingent on other people and their timing and 2) contingent on life.

Knowledge is power. When you know this you can plan for it. And you can give yourself some grace when the timing doesn’t go according to plan.

Everyone experiences this.

When I shared the complete list of business lessons in a LinkedIn post, one of the women business owners I know said this:

“#6 made me laugh out loud because if this isn't the truth I don't know what is. You can build in more time and yet still....something is going to take longer than you anticipated.”

Suffice it to say, everyone I know has experienced this in one form or another. As I mentioned in the roundup post, I really did think that launching on Substack by June 30th was doable. I’d purchased an online course, so I knew what needed to be done, and I started the work with what I thought was plenty of time. But it turns out it wasn’t. I needed another month to get it launched in the way I wanted to. More on why that was below.

This is true for the short term.

The short term — projects or initiatives you’re pursuing in your business that you hope to execute in the next 3-6 months.

Some examples:

Making your first (or any) hire for your team
The time it will take the person to meaningfully contribute to your business once you do
Setting up a new CRM or project management tool
Launching on Substack and making the move from another email platform
Creating and launching your first (or a new) course or program
Getting a guest spot on a coveted podcast or getting media mentions

And for your long-term goals.

Your big, juicy long-term goals will also take longer than you think.

Things like:

Hitting a revenue target
Getting to a specific number of email subscribers (free and/or paid)
Or to a specific number of clients, program participants, or members
Landing your first paid speaking gig
Buying your first home (or second spot in your dream location)

Why you don’t accurately estimate the time things will take.

There are a number of reasons that come into play when planning the expected timing of projects, initiatives, and goals.

Here are a few:

You set overly ambitious goals and timelines at the start without thinking through what’s actually involved.
You don’t accurately assess the amount of time you truly have available to work on the project when all of your other business and personal commitments are taken into account.
You don’t take into account the availability and timing of others involved in your initiative — your timeline may not be their timeline.
You’re a perfectionist — note, this is part of what was in play for me when it came to my Substack launch (I refused to forgo functionality and offerings that could have waited until after launch).
You don’t build in “buffer time” for unforeseen circumstances (a storm and resulting power outage, getting sick or having a team member get sick, a client emergency that pulls you away from your plan) — this also played a part in my delay.

A suggestion — go through a recent project or two where you didn’t hit your anticipated timeline and, with the list above as a guide, see what caused the delay.

What you can do to meet your goals.

Once you have a sense of where you’ve run into problems in the past, you can take action to do things differently the next time around.

Here are some tactics that I’ve found helpful:

Knowing that “things happen,” you can build in “buffer time” — that could be one or two weeks (or longer, depending on the goal) to allow for unexpected delays.
You can involve team members in the creation or review of the timeline to get their perspective and buy-in.
If being a perfectionist is causing you to severely delay “shipping” new initiatives, you can address this with a trusted advisor or mentor.
You can adopt calendar blocking in your business — I wrote about the power of time blocking in detail in a prior article that you can find here. If you’re new to the concept, it’s worth a read because it works. And it does so in a few important ways:
1. You get real with yourself regarding the time you have available to work on XYZ Project;
2. It keeps you accountable to do the activities assigned to the calendar blocks;
3. It forces you to create a realistic timeline once you see the time you have available to do the work.

This is especially important when there’s revenue involved. If you’re counting on launching a course in 4 months with 10 paid participants, and 4 months becomes 6 or 7 months, that has the potential to cause financial pain.

And for your sanity, don’t believe what you see on social media.

I came across this genius Reel last week when I started writing this article. Great minds were clearly thinking alike:). I'm sharing it here because there are so many people out there on social selling the quick-wins and the 7-figure businesses. Frankly, it’s bu$$shit. And it can make you feel like you’re a failure when you’re just on your own path with your own timing.

If you’re a fan of the Fleetwood Mac album “Rumors,” click through to see what Malcolm Gladwell shares about that multi-platinum classic. I for one am a fan and had no idea…

malcolmgladwell