How I Do Daily Planning

How I Do Daily Planning

Doing a weekly plan is a great way to frame your tasks in your schedule. But it isn't enough, because you need to be able to figure out what you will do on any given day. Today we will look at how I do my daily planning, based on my weekly plan.

As I have shared before, I learned how to do daily planning when I purchased my first planner. It was a two page per day spread, with a time grid on one side, and a list for tasks on the other. Every day, I would fill in my schedule, then list the tasks I wanted to get done that day. If I didn't get them done, I rewrote them onto the next day, adding new tasks. Regardless of what my schedule looked like.

Since I was a full-time engineering student at the time, working half-time in the computer lab, participating in student organizations, well, there wasn't usually a whole lot of time. And so the tasks kept growing.

It wasn't until some years later that I realized that the daily plan has to be rooted in reality (yeah, I know, it's obvious). And while it's good to have daily goals, it has to be balanced. The daily plan is focused, but it is only with the context of the week that we see beyond what is immediately in front of us. Likewise, the weekly plan isn't worth much unless it is put into action every day (otherwise you'll likely wait until the end of week and try to get everything done on Saturday)
How I Do Weekly Planning

How I Do Weekly Planning

I do three different types of planning in order to keep myself on track and productive: daily, weekly and long-term. This month we will be looking at all three. We'll start with what I consider the most important for my productivity: the weekly plan.

When I first purchased my first planner, I didn't know anything about planning. And the system didn't educate me either. I had a 2 page per day Daytimer, and the instructions were just about how to plan a day. I was in college at the time, and I could never figure out how I always had so much left to do at the end of each day!

The problem for me, as most people I have talked to, is that the schedule is not constant. Some days are busier than others. And yet we never step back and take that into account.

Getting Things Done introduced me to a weekly plan - called the weekly review - and it was all about getting yourself reset. Get your in-boxes empty, empty your head, and process the paper. Then you review the lists - all of them - and bring them up to date to be worked on.

Even when I followed these instructions, I still didn't have a handle on my week. I still had too many days where I was busy and couldn't get things done, and too many Fridays where my task list was still alarmingly long.

And so I developed my weekly planning routine.
Evernote: Managing Someday Tasks

Evernote: Managing Someday Tasks

Most people have moments when they see something and think, "I'd like to do that someday." If you're not going to forget about it, that means you either have to do it right now or write it down somewhere so you won't forget. David Allen, in Getting Things Done, recommended having a Someday/Maybe list, where all of these ideas reside.

The problem with any sort of list is that if you keep stuffing things into it, without removing items in turn, it becomes a giant slush pile of un-acted-upon ideas.

As an IT data professional, I can tell you that a system where you only put things in, without the ability or inclination to take it out again, is a failure. If you can't or won't get data out of a system, why put it in at all? It's wasted effort/time/money.

So the ginormous list of things you might want to do, unless you regularly pull things out, is worthless.
Getting The Most Out of Batching

Getting The Most Out of Batching

The two-minute rule says that if you can deal with it in under 2 minutes, do it right then. In some cases, I think this is a good rule. But in others, I think batching is a better way to go.

Batching is grouping like tasks together and getting them done. They don't all have to be the same task - you can batch by location or equipment. For instance, you could update your calendar, pay for your pet licenses, and process your email in a batch, because you can do all these things on your computer.
20 Essential Productivity Tips For Daily Life

20 Essential Productivity Tips For Daily Life

Productivity is not simply just about how you do your work. Peak productivity takes into account your physical state, distraction level, energy, and organization. Today we will look at 20 essential productivity tips for your daily life.

I used to be a person who would make a list and just plow through it, regardless of how I felt, what was going on, or any other consideration. I hated the phrase "work smarter, not harder" because it seemed a wimpy way out. But there is a lot to be gained from working smarter, and that means I have to take into account all of the areas of my life in order to hit peak productivity with minimal effort. Here are the 20 areas that go into my strategy for getting the most done with the least amount of effort.
Boost Productivity by Simplifying Spaces

Boost Productivity by Simplifying Spaces

Many years ago I saw the effect of simplifying spaces in my home. By taking away the immediate choices my daughter had for activities, she was able to settle quicker and play longer.

I've used this principle in other areas of my life, always with the same result: a boost in productivity and creativity. Today we look at this and how I stumbled on it.
Don’t List Next Actions

Don’t List Next Actions

It is really easy to get bogged down in the minutiae. We can start thinking of all the steps that need to be done to get a specific result, and lose sight of the end game: the result itself.

I find that instead of writing down the next actions, it is better to write down what I am trying to accomplish.
Using the Right Tools

Using the Right Tools

I've talked about how you can take a tool that is not quite right and make it work for you. This is good if you cannot use a tool optimally, or don't really know how to use it fully. There are times, though, when you do know how to use a tool, but are forced to use a sub-optimal or substitute tool. And this can be a major hit to your productivity.
Learn Your Shortcuts

Learn Your Shortcuts

I was working with a colleague recently, helping him through a process that was unfamiliar with a tool he had not really used. What we were doing is less important than the conversation.

"Paste the item three times." I'll admit it, I was bored

He moved his mouse, clicked, went to the menu, clicked a couple of times in the menu to paste, then clicked in the new place.

"Did you know you could use control + V to paste things?" I didn't want to sit there all afternoon.

"I don't like to use my keyboard."

I don't think he saw me roll my eyes, but I now have a really good idea about why overall productivity level is so low. "Why wouldn't you want to use the shortcut?" I really did want to know.

He shrugged. "It takes too much effort to learn."

Shortcuts save us time and energy. Why would you choose not to learn them?