What's your hybrid plan for 2023?

An annual reflection to improve your work—and your life

Hybrid work has catapulted us into a new era—one in which we have more opportunity to shape our day-to-day working lives, as well as the trajectory of our work and careers. But many of us are still finding our way to that opportunity, thanks to the hustle of our daily tasks, as well as the problems of overload and burnout that arise when incessant meetings crowd out time for focused work.

The rollover to a new calendar year is a great moment to step back and think about how your experience of work is unfolding, and what you want that to look like in the year ahead. Since the bliss and peril of remote work lie in the way it blurs the line between work and home, you can’t figure out your professional vision in isolation: You need to take an integrated look at how your personal and professional lives have intertwined over the past year, and what you want them to look like in the year ahead.

YearCompass is a free tool that can help you get that big-picture look at your work and your life, and set you on a clear path for the year ahead. This will be the eighth consecutive year that I’ve used this digital workbook to reflect on my past year and to clarify my vision for the next twelve months. YearCompass has become a deeply meaningful and effective part of my work, with a footprint that goes far beyond the time I dedicate to the reflection and goal-setting process.

Whether you’re already using YearCompass or another annual reflection process, or just considering this kind of ritual, here are some suggestions for how you can make it an effective component of your professional practice—and a way of refining your approach to hybrid work. I’ve even created a hybrid work supplement (PDF) that will help you think specifically about the way you’re balancing work and home.

Pair reflection with intention setting

What I love about YearCompass is that it’s not only about setting a bunch of goals or resolutions for the year ahead; it’s also a structured process for reflecting on the past year. That process begins by reviewing your calendar so that you’re not just thinking abstractly about what you think the year was about: You’re looking at where your time went, and at least in my case, remembering a lot of forgotten projects and experiences.