The 34 days between Thanksgiving and New Years are considered the Holiday season. A festive time of food, parties, gifts, giving, and all around good cheer. A GREAT time of year. But they are also the most unproductive time of year for most businesses. Everyone puts off decisions until January, freezes spending, procrastinate, and spend way too much time on ESPN.com or Drudge Report. It's usually hard to get anything done in the month of December. Folks use up all their remaining vacation time, and it is just really hard to be motivated.

What to do? Embrace the realities, and use these 34 days for catching up, studying up, refining your product or service, and lapping your competitors. This is the best time of the year to truly make up lost ground and to get out in front for next year.

Hit the ground running now. Keep the momentum in place during the December down time. This is a GREAT time of year. And January will be here before you know it.