The benefits of Planner Pad:

• Monthly view
• 2 pages weekly view
• Different sizes calendars to choose from
• Space for roles, tasks, and appointments
• Room on the weekly pages to capture bits of information
• Designed to make all aspects of your life funnel into each week, in one place

Click here to See the Planner Pad video

Remember kindergarten? Specifically, do you remember the kindergarten routine? I had a chance to visit a kindergarten last year. My client at that time was a kindergarten teacher.  Not much has changed in the kindergarten classroom since my kids were in kindergarten. There’s still the reading/story time area, the activity tables, the colorful bulletin boards and the art area. What also hasn’t changed in kindergarten is the importance of routine. Every kindergartner knows what happens in their classroom when they first arrive, then what happens next and what comes after that – all the way to the end of  their day.

Just like kindergarten, we all have routines. Having a routine helps you get through your day smoothly. It’s predictable and heck, most times it’s downright comfortable.

Do you need to get a handle on your routines? Sometimes our routines need to be re-evaluated, adjusted and/or added to.

Re-evaluate

Is your routine working?  Is there room for improvement? Is the routine an old habit that no longer serves you? Is it time for a change? Our lives are not stagnant so sometimes the routine needs an adjustment. Take a moment and assess what part of your routine is working and what may be missing.

Adjust

The first adjustment that might need to be made is your outlook.  Do you have a good attitude towards this routine or do you do it begrudgingly? If your routine no longer serves you, be realistic- say good-bye and stop doing it. Often a routine simply needs to be tweaked or changed a little depending on the present day situation. Sometimes just shifting the time of do in which you do a routine will make it more effective or work better in your day. Make small adjustments at a time and give yourself time to get used to them.

Add

If you are happy with the routines you have, is there another routine you would like to establish? The best way to create a new routine is to pair it with an existing routine. Plot out the new routine and begin to establish it, but give it time. It takes time to get “in the groove” of a new routine and have it established.

“You have to have consistent effort to win the game, period.” -Chris Smith

Once you have a handle on your routines, don’t forget to periodically revisit these three steps –  reevaluate, adjust, and add – to keep your routines working optimally for you.

The “U” in FOCUS stands for:

Use a planning tool

Dwight Eisenhower said, ” Plans are nothing, planning is everything.”

In other words, it’s not about what you are going to do, it’s about what you have planned to do.  So set up some type of planning tool.  There are many varieties to choose from: white boards, wall calendars, paper planners, pdas and smart phones just to name a few.   Use what works for you.

Set aside time each week to plan your schedule, not just your time sensitive appointments but time allotted for your projects, your family and, most of all, time for yourself.  Make sure to leave margins in your schedule too. These are gaps of time that allow for things like travel time, meetings that run late, and last minute errands. Remember we have already discovered that you can opt out of a few things…. To be productive also think in terms of time blocking.  This means using chunks of time for similar tasks.  For example:

1. Run all your errands on the same day instead of going one or two different places each day.
2. Set up a specific amount of time to spend checking email and being on the internet.
3. Make all your phone calls in one chunk of time, instead of spreading them throughout the day.

If you need help finding a planner or learning how to do weekly planning, I’m here to help!

Click on the word below to see and hear this topic!
Planning (Don’t leave home without it!)
For quicktime, click here: Planning

Planning goes a long way in helping your productivity. Whether you use a paper planner or a digital one, such as a PDA or a new iPhone is not the issue. You should use what works for you because you like it, not because everyone has one. The real benefit of having a planner of any type is actually using it to plan.
Set aside a time weekly that you can look forward into the next week to 30 days and review your appointments and assign your tasks. Making a giant to-do list, is not planning. After the to-do list is made, you will then need to assign a date or time frame to them. Without a deadline, how can you be accountable to completing a task?
Time blocking is a helpful tool to being more productive. Time blocking involves consistently setting aside a set amount of time for the high priority activities. For example, if you need to make sales calls, you would set aside a block of time each week, where you make those calls. This time should be uninterrupted. Let your emails go unanswered, close your office door and focus on the task at hand. Some may even find it useful to use a timer.

Join me for Organize Your Office Day – virtually. This is a virtual event where we will work using email and targeted phone sessions that day to get your office in shape for the New Year. If you want more information on how this class works, jump on my website to register for the free preview call!

We use recipes to cook food, GPS tools to map the routes to businesses, yet we don’t have a plan for our week! The most overused excuse is “If I had more time, I would….” I believe that if one wants some control over their 24 hour day, they must plan! Planning does not mean having to take the Franklin Covey course and hefting around a 5 inch binder or becoming tech savvy and purchasing an iPhone.

Planning your week does not need to be complicated. In fact, planning your week can be liberating! I like to call the time I use to plan my week a “Brain Dump”. I sit down on Sunday afternoons and write down every thought, idea, have to, want to, need to item that is flying around in my brain. This is similar to brainstorming. A free flow of information out of my head and onto paper. No time constraints set, no due dates established, just capturing the thoughts and actions first. I like to use categories as I do this exercise as a way of helping me keep my life balance in perspective. You can make up your own categories, I have listed mine just to give you food for thought:

1. Personal
2. Family
3. Friends
4. Speaking
5. Business
6. Marketing
7. Networking
8. Service

Once I have written down everything I can think of for each of these categories, I then take a look at my scheduled appointments and commitments I have already made for the upcoming week. I would then write down any other timed commitments that need to be made as a result of my brain dumping exercise. What’s left? Essentially a task or to-do list.

Again, looking at my calendar, I begin to assign a day to the remaining tasks. The date assignment depends on several things: proximity to a needed location (running an errand for example), availability of non-appointment times (in which to complete the task), and the level of urgency or importance. Taking these factors into consideration I begin to funnel the tasks into each day of the week. One day may be heavy with tasks because I have few scheduled appointments, another day may have less tasks because I am busy with appointments.

In the end, the important things to remember is to plan your week, every week at the same time each week. I plan on Sunday afternoons, but you may want to plan on Friday mornings. This exercise works with a Franklin planner, a Daytimer, Outlook, a PDA or an iPhone. How you choose to capture the data is up to you, the point is to capture it and plan it out weekly!

You’ve come home from a long day at work and now you have to think about dinner… You don’t know what is in the freezer or the kitchen cabinets. Or you just went shopping yesterday and now you have to put a meal together and you forgot a particular ingredient. If this sounds familiar, then maybe try menu planning. Planning in advance what to have for dinner can actually alleviate some of your daily stress.

Typically, a menu is created for a week or two at a time. But as with many things, just start slow… try planning your dinner menu for just the next five days. As you write down what it is you would like to prepare, also write down the ingredients (groceries) that you are lacking. When you are finished planning, your shopping list is now ready to take to the store. If you plan to use a particular recipe, write down the name of the cookbook and page number or location of the recipe so that it can be easily retrieved when needed.

Don’t feel controlled by your menu plan. If you planned to cook chicken tonight and you’re just too tired then open a can of soup or eat a sandwich. That particular meal can be prepared on another day. Sometimes you may find that you need to switch days on the menu plan. For example, let’s say I planned hot meatballs sandwiches for Tuesday and a crock pot dish for Wednesday. My son has an extra soccer practice (last minute of course!) on Tuesday. So, I switch days and have Wednesday’s meal on Tuesday because I can fix and forget it until after we get home from soccer practice!

After planning your menus for two months, not only is it a habit but you can start rotating the same meals and not have to spend as much time planning! Menu planning has also helped those who are seeking to change their eating habits by planning more low calorie, low fat meals. Menu planning will also have a positive effect on your food budget because you will be making less trips to the grocery store and eating out less! If you would like a sample menu plan sheet, email me at craftynat@prodigy.net.