EP 169 - Why New Year’s Goals Fail by February - Even for Disciplined People

Most goals don’t fail because of laziness or lack of ambition.

They fail quietly — buried under daily noise, competing priorities, and forgotten intentions.

By March, even the most meaningful goals have slipped down the list… replaced by urgency, meetings, and excuses.

In the last years, whenever I work with companies or people in my executive coaching a pattern showed up frequently.

In private life: marathons abandoned, educations postponed, mountains left unclimbed. 

In business: bold visions diluted, priorities scattered, companies losing momentum — not because the goal was wrong, but because it was never protected.

This Year in Review 2025 episode is my answer to that problem.

After working with founders, executives, and teams throughout the year, one truth became unavoidable:

Big goals don’t fail because people stop caring. They fail because they lose daily contact.

So I stripped goal-setting down to what actually works.

To make it memorable, I revisited the conversations of 2025 and selected six voices — from politics, investing, entrepreneurship, and professional sport — each illustrating one essential principle for achieving meaningful goals.

No hype. No motivational slogans.
 Just a clear, calm framework you can apply immediately to your most important goal for 2026.

🧭 What You’ll Learn in This Episode

1️⃣ Why discipline and motivation are overrated — and what replaces them
2️⃣ How goals quietly disappear without friction or resistance
3️⃣ Why choosing one goal is the highest-leverage decision you can make
4️⃣ How to keep goals present without pressure or obsession
5️⃣ Why process builds identity — and outcomes don’t
6️⃣ What real commitment looks like when nobody is watching

⏱️ Timestamps

(00:00) Why New Year’s Resolutions Collapse — and What Actually Works
(02:57) Karl Nehammer — “Sometimes there is no guidebook”
(04:19) How Goals Quietly Disappear
(07:56) Alex Dang — Focus, Selection, and Knowing When to Fold
(11:45) Hack Away the Unessential — Choosing One Goal
(14:05) Fabrizio Conicella — Skills Entrepreneurs Need in 2026
(17:54) Why You Must Review Goals Daily
(19:43) Jason Foster — Setting Big Goals and Chipping Away
(20:48) Process Over Outcome
(22:48) Alasdair Milton — Doing the Work When Nobody Is Watching
(26:05) Start Now — Before It Feels Comfortable
(27:50) Vadim Fedotov — What Commitment Really Means
 (30:54) Before You Leave — Ed Sheeran’s Approach to Progress

🎙️ About This Episode

This episode isn’t about setting more goals.
It’s about protecting one goal that actually matters — whether you’re building the next NVIDIA, scaling a company, or working toward a personal milestone.

If 2025 taught us anything, it’s this:
Clarity beats intensity. Direction beats urgency. Process beats motivation.

May 2026 be the year your most important goal doesn’t get lost.

I’m glad you’re here.

Transcript

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:33:00

Christian Soschner

Let me ask you something. Do you remember the party on December 31st? Maybe it was similar, like mine. I remember that the room was warm and loud, empty, and four glasses were everywhere. And someone suddenly opened a window. Even though it was freezing outside and from the outside came a slight smell of firework into the room

00:00:33:00 - 00:00:36:11

Christian Soschner

and it hang in the air.

00:00:36:13 - 00:00:46:15

Christian Soschner

And December 31st I was talking to someone that night at the party. It was almost casually and asked to so

00:00:46:15 - 00:01:06:17

Christian Soschner

what is your New Year's resolution for 2026? And she didn't hesitate. She looked at me and smiled and said, that came January 1st. Every single day. 7 p.m. she pulled out her phone and opened Instagram and showed me

00:01:06:17 - 00:01:11:06

Christian Soschner

a profile of a fitness influencer, a perfect lighting, perfect body.

00:01:11:06 - 00:01:30:12

Christian Soschner

And she said, that's me next year. This time. And she meant it. A few days later. Yesterday, I ran into her at a meeting and asked, hey, how's the gym going? She looked at me, puzzled and paused.

00:01:30:12 - 00:01:32:11

Christian Soschner

That gym?

00:01:32:17 - 00:01:41:14

Christian Soschner

I look was obviously confused, as if she had forgotten it. Why? It was January 9th.

00:01:41:14 - 00:02:08:15

Christian Soschner

And if you are smiling right now, it's probably because you have been there too. And here is the promise of this episode. By the end, you will have one goal. You can actually live with and a simple way to make it stick. And it's relevant for private life and business builders because when motivation fades

00:02:08:15 - 00:02:10:03

Christian Soschner

and life gets loud,

00:02:10:03 - 00:02:11:10

Christian Soschner

you need a method.

00:02:11:10 - 00:02:29:16

Christian Soschner

The point is, when goals fall apart, many people usually blame themselves and they tell themselves they lacked discipline or motivation or willpower. But sometimes the truth is simpler and kinder.

00:02:29:16 - 00:02:42:16

Christian Soschner

Sometimes there are simply, genuinely is no guidebook. And I heard that articulated perfectly last year in a conversation with Carl Niemeyer.

00:02:42:16 - 00:02:49:19

Christian Soschner

the former chancellor of Austria and today vice president of the European Investment Bank,

00:02:49:19 - 00:02:53:14

Christian Soschner

and someone who had to make decisions under pressure.

00:02:53:16 - 00:02:56:11

Christian Soschner

Most of us will never experience.

00:02:56:24 - 00:03:36:03

Karl Nehammer

Every crisis is a chance as well, you know. When I became a federal chancellor, the ceremony was was Musk's unbelievable today. And you mentioned it then, was the end of the pandemic. We we saw the chance that we can overcome it. And in February, the Russian aggression against Ukraine started to this time we had an energy dependance on Russian gas of 80%.

00:03:36:05 - 00:04:11:13

Karl Nehammer

The storages were not filled anymore. The Russian storages hadn't been filled because of strategic reasons. So I was a really a lot of pressure. But. What do I mean? That every crisis is also maybe a chance you'll learn a lot. You'll have to decide quick, and you'll have always to think. Sometimes really in totally new ways. Because for all these crises, there were no guidebook.

00:04:11:15 - 00:04:19:15

Karl Nehammer

And so you have to try to find new solutions. Think out of the box. And I think this kind of experience on the whole bring also in the IAB.

00:04:19:15 - 00:04:37:23

Christian Soschner

And that's true for leadership and it's true for personal change. Most goals don't fail because people are weak. They fail because they expect a guidebook that someone should deliver and simply forget that

00:04:37:23 - 00:04:41:00

Christian Soschner

they have to develop it themselves.

00:04:41:00 - 00:04:45:02

Christian Soschner

Most goals don't fail because people are weak.

00:04:45:04 - 00:05:01:08

Christian Soschner

They fail because they expect a guidebook that someone should deliver and forget that they have to develop it themselves. And that's why the first step is not optimization.

00:05:01:08 - 00:05:04:19

Christian Soschner

It's selection. And writing your own guidebook.

00:05:04:19 - 00:05:20:17

Christian Soschner

Here is what really happened to that gym goal. It did not collapse with drama. It did not fail with resistance. It failed it. Raw friction and noise.

00:05:20:17 - 00:05:41:10

Christian Soschner

There was no slack in the day. No trigger. No system that bring it back into awareness. So the brain quietly archived it. And that's how most resolutions die before February. Not with conflict, simply with forgetting.

00:05:41:10 - 00:05:50:03

Christian Soschner

And once a goal disappears from daily contact, it stops being real. Does that sound familiar?

00:05:50:03 - 00:06:11:04

Christian Soschner

Usually at the turn of the year, the party feels like a reset, doesn't it? It's a new calendar. A clean slate. A quiet hope that this time it will be different. But actually, nothing else really resets.

00:06:11:04 - 00:06:13:15

Christian Soschner

People are still in the same environment.

00:06:13:15 - 00:06:15:14

Christian Soschner

They have the same routines

00:06:15:14 - 00:06:20:04

Christian Soschner

and the same pressures awaiting. On January 2nd.

00:06:20:04 - 00:06:27:09

Christian Soschner

So if the year is going to feel different, something inside the drift has to change.

00:06:27:09 - 00:06:31:23

Christian Soschner

And that's what this episode today is really about.

00:06:31:23 - 00:06:36:14

Christian Soschner

Again, most resolutions don't collapse because they are unrealistic.

00:06:36:14 - 00:06:45:14

Christian Soschner

They simply collapse because there are too many. There is too much noise and too many wishes and dreams.

00:06:45:14 - 00:06:58:05

Christian Soschner

Run more. Eat better. Make more money. Sleep earlier. Build something meaningful. Be present. Be calm. Speak better. And I think you can make up hundreds more.

00:06:58:05 - 00:07:04:20

Christian Soschner

And each one of these wishes makes sense on its own.

00:07:04:22 - 00:07:10:17

Christian Soschner

But together, when they all come at the same time, they cancel each other out and.

00:07:10:17 - 00:07:15:17

Christian Soschner

The mind doesn't want more options and simply shuts it down.

00:07:15:17 - 00:07:20:06

Christian Soschner

The mind wants clarity, and clarity doesn't come from a myriad of codes.

00:07:20:06 - 00:07:32:08

Christian Soschner

So the point is, most people don't struggle because they lack ambition. They struggle because they try to keep every option alive every single day.

00:07:32:08 - 00:07:35:18

Christian Soschner

Focus is not about doing more.

00:07:35:18 - 00:07:38:17

Christian Soschner

It's about knowing when to stay in

00:07:38:17 - 00:07:41:08

Christian Soschner

and when to fold.

00:07:41:10 - 00:07:48:10

Christian Soschner

One conversation from 20 to 25 explained this better than anything else I've ever heard.

00:07:48:10 - 00:07:52:08

Christian Soschner

Here is Alex Tang, using a poker analogy

00:07:52:08 - 00:07:56:17

Christian Soschner

that completely reframes what focus actually means.

00:07:56:17 - 00:08:28:18

Karl Nehammer

Christian, I would use this, as an analogy again, to some extent. Because what poker tells you is that you should not make a decision right away if you just always say yes and never quit. And that's the path to a disaster. You have to fold in poker, folding meaning means that you exit the game, you lose whatever you invested already, but you exit the game because you feel that the chances to succeed are lower or lower than you expected, or that you should expect.

00:08:28:20 - 00:08:53:10

Karl Nehammer

So poker game in a nutshell, is when you have a few cards available to you, but then you open more and more cards on the table and then you make a call. Then you either stay in the game or you double down. You even increase the bet, or you exit the game. And if you think about that stage model, that's the one that we liked to explore more with.

00:08:53:14 - 00:09:18:02

Karl Nehammer

Yeah, because this is the one that VCs would. Follow. They would do this. Their investment in series. They would start with a seed stage, then series A and series B, C, B, C. So for your audience means that the first check that will be written to a startup founder will not be in tens and hundreds of millions of dollars could be just a few hundreds of thousands.

00:09:18:04 - 00:09:48:13

Karl Nehammer

To test the idea, to build a prototype, to, get the first market feedback. And then if the market feedback is positive, then you go to the series A, and you can raise more capital from the same VCs or movie seeds. Maybe new VCs will join. And definitely when you reach series C, series D, you may need more cash and more capital to say, scale the business across the world to bring Airbnb or Uber to other countries to give you a specific example.

00:09:48:15 - 00:10:13:02

Karl Nehammer

So VCs would do this and step by step process learning along the way. And I would say that successful corporations should do exactly the same way. When we launched right now, which is the 1 hour to 2 hour deliver at Amazon, we start with a very small sized experiment, at in a single zip code in New York City.

00:10:13:02 - 00:10:37:03

Karl Nehammer

So that's where Prime Now was first launched, to collect information to learn more about the user feedback. And only after the first feedback was positive. Then it started to scale to other cities and then to other countries. If you think about any but other technology corporation, that would be a typical process. You start small and then you scale fast as you learn on the way.

00:10:37:05 - 00:11:07:14

Karl Nehammer

But I don't want to miss one critical point that in case the feedback is not positive, then you should close the business. Then you should cut your losses. You cannot just simply keep all of them. All of your ideas stay here in the lab. Unfortunately, with, Ilya and as a consultant, I had a chance to see so many labs and, incubators where you can come and see so many ideas, all prosper, that senior leadership simply forget about their existence.

00:11:07:14 - 00:11:44:05

Karl Nehammer

And, all of these zombies, are still there. You have to cut your losses in order to keep the capital and your resources and your effort and your attention focused on the ones which are potentially unicorns or big ideas, which will become these ten x 100 x that's in your portfolio. That's why we use the analogy of a double down or quit, which is a combination of doubling down on winners and quitting and or killing your darlings, even though it's one of the hardest jobs, to do.

00:11:44:05 - 00:11:45:07

Christian Soschner

So

00:11:45:07 - 00:11:50:23

Christian Soschner

And that's focus. And it also reminds me of a quote from Bruce Lee where he said,

00:11:50:23 - 00:11:53:04

Christian Soschner

it's not about the daily increase.

00:11:53:04 - 00:11:54:05

Christian Soschner

It's

00:11:54:05 - 00:11:59:16

Christian Soschner

the daily decrease that matters. So hack away the unessential.

00:11:59:16 - 00:12:05:10

Christian Soschner

It's not intensity. It's not effort. It's selection and elimination.

00:12:05:10 - 00:12:22:18

Christian Soschner

So here, pause with me for a moment. Just one question. If you could only move one thing in 2026, what would it be?

00:12:22:20 - 00:12:33:14

Christian Soschner

That's like the most impressive goal. Not the one that sounds best in conversations like the one that actually matters to you.

00:12:33:14 - 00:12:42:11

Christian Soschner

Your personal 100 x winner. The one you want to double down on in 2026.

00:12:42:11 - 00:12:50:00

Christian Soschner

And if you had to choose only this one goal. Which one is it?

00:12:50:00 - 00:13:00:00

Christian Soschner

And here is the point. When you choose one thing, something subtle happens. The noise drops. Decisions get simpler.

00:13:00:02 - 00:13:12:06

Christian Soschner

Energy stops leaking into it doesn't. Different directions. Now to one small but important thing. With this one goal.

00:13:12:10 - 00:13:34:12

Christian Soschner

Take a piece of paper. Take a pencil and write it down on paper. One clear sentence and written. Writing is not about remembering. It's about committing.

00:13:34:12 - 00:13:49:09

Christian Soschner

And choosing one goal is a rational decision. Staying with it over years is a different kind of skill. And this is where the difference between managing life and shaping it becomes visible.

00:13:49:09 - 00:14:05:11

Christian Soschner

One conversation in 2025 articulated that distinction beautifully. Here is Fabrizio Conseiller on why vision and not short term execution is what carries a company through long arcs.

00:14:05:11 - 00:14:42:15

Fabrizio Conicella

you need to understand the how to pass through different phases of, development, able to reach that goal. It's, a big casting activity, but you start from the future. This is normal for startups and the that the market the common it's really not common. Sometimes we we we see companies that are simply saying our product is better of everything today is available on the market, forgetting that to bring their product on the market that they have to invest for 15 years.

00:14:43:13 - 00:14:45:07

Fabrizio Conicella

And the that capability,

00:14:45:07 - 00:15:10:00

Fabrizio Conicella

the capability to read the the future from a certain point of view or to have a so strong vision able to change in the future. It's what my from my point of view distinguish a really visionary, a good entrepreneur from a manager. The manager. I have a more short term perspective. They are able to manage what they have to do.

00:15:10:02 - 00:15:39:16

Fabrizio Conicella

They are not so much able to define what they have to do. And the the market, the command, the strategic acumen. It's became key if you are willing to develop a long term relation, because when you arrive to buy that company, you buy also the vision you buy also the capability to change the role of the game. And you need to have someone able to see the change and explain you the change.

00:15:39:18 - 00:16:06:10

Fabrizio Conicella

Communication capabilities are key for a startup and more and more because what they are doing particular in the first two years of life is the selling. Their idea is the only way to raise money and more. The idea is crazy different from the standard way to solve problem. To solve things more is important to sell the idea in a really, really, really wonderful way.

00:16:06:12 - 00:16:37:04

Fabrizio Conicella

Otherwise you are not able to raise money. Or if you raise money, you are not raising enough money. That is another issue for a startup. So communication capability, strategic acumen, are key. The capability, the operational capability, the capability to understand and plan how the company will develop are key. The scientific capability are key for the first year of life of the company, because without them we cannot start.

00:16:37:06 - 00:17:03:24

Fabrizio Conicella

They will be, let's say, adapted to the operational need at a certain point. Who is falling in love for science, is probably to increase the flexibility. You know that sometimes scientists are saying I'm not a scientist. So every all the scientist that are assisting to the log will say, no, it's not true. Every scientist is saying, I have the truth.

00:17:04:01 - 00:17:30:20

Fabrizio Conicella

This is the solution. I can demonstrate that this is the best way to solve the problem. And they continue to think in that perspective. It's good because this is a commitment. But from a company point of view, this is dangerous. You need to understand at a certain point that you have to transform your idea in a product. And for a company perspective, it's became key and you need to have it internal know how to do that.

00:17:30:22 - 00:17:55:10

Fabrizio Conicella

Last but not least, that is transversal to the three moment is the capability to understand how to create value, the value creation. It's what to justify an investment in a startup you invest or not because it's nice, because it's giving you back some finger. The value creation is another thing that has to be present in a startup.

00:17:55:12 - 00:18:14:03

Christian Soschner

And that's exactly what makes a gold draper another agency direction and without direction. Even the best intentions get traded away. The first time the week gets heavy, the noise gets loud, and many people want many different things.

00:18:14:10 - 00:18:16:09

Christian Soschner

And now let me ask you something else.

00:18:16:09 - 00:18:22:24

Christian Soschner

How often do you actually revisit your goals after you have written them down?

00:18:22:24 - 00:18:38:12

Christian Soschner

Here is the truth. Most people write them down once, if at all, and then hope motivation will to their rest in the future. But the truth is, it won't.

00:18:38:12 - 00:18:45:06

Christian Soschner

What really works is contact with your one goal

00:18:45:06 - 00:18:46:14

Christian Soschner

brief.

00:18:46:16 - 00:18:48:24

Christian Soschner

Regular. Familiar.

00:18:48:24 - 00:18:50:02

Christian Soschner

So

00:18:50:02 - 00:18:58:12

Christian Soschner

what you should do is every single day in the morning. Take your goal and describe it a little bit better.

00:18:58:12 - 00:19:00:04

Christian Soschner

Not as a fantasy.

00:19:00:04 - 00:19:01:01

Christian Soschner

Do it

00:19:01:01 - 00:19:03:12

Christian Soschner

like you. Rehearse for something.

00:19:03:12 - 00:19:05:11

Christian Soschner

Read it once a day.

00:19:05:11 - 00:19:15:24

Christian Soschner

20s is enough. And when the future feels familiar, the actions stop. Feeling foreign.

00:19:16:05 - 00:19:28:02

Christian Soschner

Now let me offer you a different frame. Not discipline. Not pressure. Identity. Becoming the kind of person who builds things. One small step at a time.

00:19:28:02 - 00:19:43:11

Christian Soschner

I had a conversation last year that captured that feeling perfectly. Here is Chase and foster reflecting on why chipping away at something heart is so deeply satisfying is necessary for success.

00:19:43:11 - 00:19:54:09

Christian Soschner

you said training is terrible for a marathon. What? What keeps you going? Why do you endure this? Why do you do that to you?

00:19:54:11 - 00:19:55:00

Jason Foster

I think it is.

00:19:55:00 - 00:20:12:09

Jason Foster

I was doing, a workshop with my leadership team. My, in my last role, which you can talk about, and the facilitator, after about a day and a half of working together, she said, you know what? You're going to build stuff. You're a builder. And I said, I hadn't really thought of myself in that way.

00:20:12:11 - 00:20:48:01

Jason Foster

But setting a goal that seems difficult or even impossible to reach, and chipping away at it every day and having the feeling of being successful. At the end of that marathon, whether it's a real marathon or, or a fictional, marathon, it's a fantastic feeling. And what a feeling of accomplishment. It's something I think I forgot to do, but percentages are, you know, you know, 0.1% or 0.1%, you know, of people ever run, that distance and it's just something to it's in my control that I can set a big goal and, and go out an accomplishment.

00:20:48:01 - 00:20:53:14

Jason Foster

So that feeling of accomplishment, I guess, is what what I seek through, through marathon running.

00:20:53:14 - 00:20:55:16

Christian Soschner

And that's the shift.

00:20:55:18 - 00:21:08:01

Christian Soschner

Not chasing a result. Becoming someone who builds it every single day. And here is something most people don't wants to hear.

00:21:08:12 - 00:21:25:22

Christian Soschner

Outcomes don't change behavior. Hard truth. Processes and habits do. And when progress slows, outcome goals often feel a little bit personal and imperfect and hard to achieve.

00:21:25:22 - 00:21:37:06

Christian Soschner

And then people start accusing, take over accusing their coaches, and they start pressuring harder towards the goal, adding more work to it.

00:21:37:06 - 00:21:39:06

Christian Soschner

But that's not the point.

00:21:39:06 - 00:21:45:16

Christian Soschner

The point is change your habits and your processes every single day by just 1%.

00:21:45:21 - 00:22:04:16

Christian Soschner

And what makes it work is asking a single neutral question. What happens today? Small actions repeated consistently. And that's where momentum lifts. And this is the part most people underestimate.

00:22:04:16 - 00:22:08:01

Christian Soschner

Knowing what to do. That's the easy part.

00:22:08:01 - 00:22:10:13

Christian Soschner

Actually doing it every day,

00:22:10:13 - 00:22:19:12

Christian Soschner

especially when it's early and comfortable and glamorous. When you hit plateaus and it feels like nothing is moving towards your outcome goal.

00:22:19:15 - 00:22:23:07

Christian Soschner

But that's where identity is actually built.

00:22:23:07 - 00:22:32:23

Christian Soschner

So it's really one action every single day. One small improvements to the process, even when it feels that the outcome

00:22:32:23 - 00:22:35:10

Christian Soschner

is uncertain and somewhere in the future.

00:22:35:10 - 00:22:49:10

Christian Soschner

And here is one conversation from the last year that captured that reality perfectly. Here is Alyssa Hamilton on what discipline looks like before anyone is watching and before results show up.

00:22:49:10 - 00:23:09:21

Alasdair Milton

think, there's a level of consciousness in me in particular and a kind of discipline like I said, and, and resilience. I did a lot of swimming when I was a kid. So when I was about 8 or 9, I started swimming competitively. So I would have to be in the pool.

00:23:09:23 - 00:23:28:16

Alasdair Milton

You know, 6 or 7 in the morning, four days a week to train and then on the weekends of would swim competitively in Scotland. I mean, you're that young. It takes a lot of takes a lot of resilience and dedication. It's not easy to get up at that time in the morning, especially in the west coast of Scotland, where it rains a lot and in the winter, and it's very dark in the mornings.

00:23:28:16 - 00:23:49:11

Alasdair Milton

But, you know, I'd have to do that. And then I would go to school afterwards. And so that, that definitely has a lot of discipline. And, and you know, I'm just somebody who, who has that very levelheaded approach to life and, believes that, you know, you work hard, you keep your head down and, and, you know, you like I say, you achieve your goals.

00:23:49:13 - 00:24:17:19

Alasdair Milton

But definitely that, that discipline, that resilience, that tenacity, which actually really helped me a lot when I went to university and I did my PhD because, again, those qualities are required when you're in the lab and you're in there, you know, eight hours a week, sometimes you're not earning much money. Usually you're working weekends. And so a lot of that, that grit and determination that I took from my childhood actually translated very nicely into, you know what?

00:24:17:19 - 00:24:19:15

Alasdair Milton

I did a university.

00:24:20:12 - 00:24:49:23

Christian Soschner

That totally reminds me of my own life. The generation 70s, 80s said the excellent work ethic get up in the morning. Yeah. Job done. Don't think much about it. Come back the next day. Regardless of, sunrise is 5 a.m. or 9 p.m.. 9 a.m.. Yeah. Just gets the job done. In your opinion, when we look at today's world, I mean, there was always this discussion between work ethic and discipline is the most important part in building a successful biotech company.

00:24:50:00 - 00:25:15:14

Christian Soschner

When we look at it with outside biotech, Nvidia, for example, is currently the prime example of, Jensen Huang with his, excellent work ethic in hustle, hustle, hustle. And then on the other side here where we all from, hustling is not everything. When you look at your own life, how important is discipline, in your opinion, for success and having a solid work ethic?

00:25:15:16 - 00:25:16:13

Alasdair Milton

Critical, I

00:25:16:13 - 00:25:31:23

Alasdair Milton

would say, especially as a consultant. You know, you have to be so well organized. You have to be disciplined in your life as a consultant. You have to be organized. You have to have a good work ethic. I mean, this is not this is not a 9 to 5 job. You have to be willing to make sacrifices.

00:25:31:23 - 00:25:54:23

Alasdair Milton

You're on the road a lot. You work weekends, you know, you're you're in client services. And I think at the end of the day, that that discipline, that work ethic, the organizational, the organizational skills that are required are absolutely critical. Yeah. You got it. You got to be willing to, to really grind. I mean, you're a partner in a big for your, your your contributing to the partnership.

00:25:55:00 - 00:26:06:18

Alasdair Milton

And so you want to you want to be you want to be a good partner. And so, you know, everyone has to roll up their sleeves so that that hard work ethic is absolutely required in your, in your, in your career. No doubt. Absolutely no doubt.

00:26:06:21 - 00:26:21:11

Christian Soschner

But that's just the beginning. Not motivation. Not clarity. Showing up again. Every single day before anyone is watching.

00:26:22:00 - 00:26:44:21

Christian Soschner

And that's exactly why, in achieving goals, the next step is not about more planning, more scenarios. It's movement. Execution before anyone is cheering you on. And that's why many influencers about building companies these days say execute, execute, execute, execute, get their reps in.

00:26:45:05 - 00:26:55:09

Christian Soschner

But let me be very honest with you. Most people do not need a better plan. They need to start before it feels comfortable.

00:26:55:09 - 00:26:57:24

Christian Soschner

Not tomorrow, not once. It's perfect now.

00:26:58:07 - 00:27:03:23

Christian Soschner

Open your Journal The book where you have written your book. Go down and make a note.

00:27:03:23 - 00:27:25:15

Christian Soschner

What steps did you take today? Write it down. It's not to charge yourself. It's continuing. Building your new identity. Writing down means I moved. And when you look at it every single day, that's how your identity shifts.

00:27:25:21 - 00:27:37:05

Christian Soschner

So before we close, I want to set the standard. Not from business, but from professional sport, because it's the highest level. There is no confusion

00:27:37:05 - 00:27:50:15

Christian Soschner

about what commitment actually looks like. Here is Vadim Fedotov describing what showing up every day meant in his career in pro basketball sport.

00:27:51:10 - 00:28:10:02

Vadim Fedotov

Listen, I've heard there are people who want to have success and be Instagram famous but cannot work. That's unfortunately, that's the new reality. And this is this is something that it's becoming harder and harder to explain to people because they want to 28 they want to have things that we couldn't dream of when we're when we turn 56 years older.

00:28:10:04 - 00:28:30:24

Vadim Fedotov

I tell people, listen, I mean, when I was an athlete, my day was 530, was a first workout setting was meeting, then we had classes, 1030 was a second workout. Then we had class A, 6 p.m. was our third workout. We did this 13 days in a row with no breaks. We wouldn't go out. We would sit, would sit in the evening, watch film.

00:28:31:01 - 00:28:58:22

Vadim Fedotov

I had a case where I had two knee surgeries, I had a broken nose, arthritis in both of my wrists and and a bad ankle. And I still had to go into class seven class. Because you don't skip, you don't miss things. There was majority of the days my third year, my my third season was I couldn't get out of bed without painkillers and two hours later I still would be on the court diving on balls and and playing as hard as possible.

00:28:58:24 - 00:29:22:17

Vadim Fedotov

So when you get out of this world and you come to the corporate world and somebody says, I'm too old to sit at 930 in my office chair and I can't go to lunch break, and I'm too tired and have to go home by five, you're like, that's not the cloth that were made off, because we experience what real physical limitations are, what real pain is, and this is something that most people will never experience.

00:29:22:17 - 00:29:43:10

Vadim Fedotov

This is why the athletes, when they get to a certain level, their pain threshold, their discipline, their expectations of themselves is just much, much higher. So when I speak to those kind of people who are like, oh my God, I want to do want, I want to move to the buy here. Sure. Yeah, yeah, sure you can. You can walk whatever you want, but you have to actually first do something before getting all those things you want.

00:29:44:04 - 00:30:01:12

Christian Soschner

I mean, doing something is, in the good state is pretty easy. But, then there are the hardest days in the tough days. And you said you had some, some injuries but motivated you. What kept you going to show up then for practice and not just say, okay, let's go screw it and go home and watch the movie.

00:30:01:14 - 00:30:02:22

Vadim Fedotov

That's it. You want to lead by example.

00:30:02:22 - 00:30:15:17

Vadim Fedotov

You can't I can't get mad at my teammates if they start missing practice because they're hurt. If I start missing practice because I'm hurt, I can't get mad at my teammates that are not working as hard as they could. If I'm slacking, I can't. I can't be mad at my teammates.

00:30:15:19 - 00:30:46:17

Vadim Fedotov

If anything that I expect from them, I don't expect from myself. First and foremost. So you need to be that person. I mean, I can I, I went on record, I never understood from a, from a physical capability perspective. I worked corporate for 13 years. I had zero sickness because mentally I was never in a position where I'm like, I am too sick to sit in a chair.

00:30:46:19 - 00:30:53:08

Vadim Fedotov

And that's something that I just think if I wouldn't have the professional athlete career beforehand, I would have never got to that point.

00:30:53:08 - 00:31:01:18

Christian Soschner

And that's the difference. Not talent. Not ambition. Standards. Now choose yours for today.

00:31:01:18 - 00:31:33:22

Christian Soschner

And finally, here is a useful way to think about how progress actually begins. Ed Sheeran once described his approach to songwriting like this. When you turn on an old clock, tap, what comes out first is not clean water. It's dirty. It's not your server. The clock tap is noisy, dirty, muddy, nothing you want to drink.

00:31:33:24 - 00:32:13:04

Christian Soschner

But if you let it run without charging it, without turning it off too early, suddenly, slowly, step by step, the water begins to clear. And eventually it flows as crystal clear water. And most meaningful goals work the same way. Early effort is not perfect. It's really elegant. Direction is often uncertain. The first attempts feel unremarkable, sometimes even discouraging.

00:32:13:06 - 00:32:54:17

Christian Soschner

But this early movement, the daily execution, getting their reps in, is matters more than precision. At the beginning. Starting creates data. Repetition creates clarity, and over time, what once felt forced begins to feel natural. And many people wait for confidence, for certainty, and for the right plan handed to them on a silver platter. But in practice, those things usually arrive only after action has already begun.

00:32:54:19 - 00:33:00:05

Christian Soschner

So as you step now further into 2026, remember this

00:33:00:05 - 00:33:03:02

Christian Soschner

you don't need to overhaul your entire life.

00:33:03:02 - 00:33:26:23

Christian Soschner

You don't need to overhaul your entire business and team. You don't need a perfect system right from the onset. The first thing that you need in life, in business is one direction. You can live with. So today, choose one goal. Make yourself familiar with this new future.

00:33:27:00 - 00:34:06:17

Christian Soschner

Write it down. Write it in colorful explanations. Make it positive. Make it big. Protect your daily process of improvement and start before it feels natural and before you are what you want to become. And then just let it run every single day. And by the time it clears, something important has already changed. Happy New Year 2026 and I am glad you are here with me on the podcast.