Plan Your Day and Stick to Your Plan

by Inez Ng

How many times have you remarked to someone that there arenot enough hours in the day? The sad truth is, not matterhow much you wish it, it is unlikely that you can get morethan 24 hours in each day. So, the trick to timemanagement is really how you get the most out of the hoursyou have. One way to do that is to become an exceptionalplanner of your day. It is not very difficult – just takessome basic knowledge and a lot of discipline. As a coach,I can help you with both, but the knowledge is what I’llcover right now.

Set aside time to plan

This is really the first step. You have to make planning ahabit, and do the task religiously. I set aside an hour onSunday mornings to plan my week. In order for me to makesure that the week goes according to plan, I have to have“a plan” to start with. In the beginning, it may take youlonger than an hour, but once you’ve done the planning fora while, you’ll get more efficient at it. You will alsofeel much more focused when you have identified what youwant to accomplish for the week.

Schedule at least one week at a time

Some people only plan one day at a time, but I think thatyou need to be more forward looking than that. So, Isuggest you focus on at least one week at a time, but alsoreview what may be coming up in the next month while youare considering what to prioritize for the next week. Themore proactive you are about your life, the less often youwill find yourself having to react to unforeseen situations.

Identify your “big rocks” for your week

If you don’t know what I mean, you have to read StephenCovey. He made a masterful illustration using a bucket,some sand, and several rocks of various sizes. Heexplained that the sand represents all the busy work thatwe have to do, like answering the phone, reading email,filing away papers, etc. The rocks represent all theimportant things that we have to do, such as setting goalsfor the year, launching a new project, creating a visionfor your team, etc. The bucket represents all the time wehave for all the demands of our lives.

What happens with most of us is that we fill up our bucketswith the sand first, and then we can only put a few rockson top, and there’s no more room for the rest. What hesuggested is that we put all our rocks into the bucketfirst, and then fill in all the available spaces with thesand. And miraculously, everything fits in our container!

This is the philosophy you need to employ when you scheduleyour week. Identify all your big rocks, and block out thetime to handle these first. Then worry about the sandafterwards. We have to make sure that we handle theimportant stuff first, and not let the busy work consumeour days.

Think 24/7

I am not suggesting that you plan to work 24 hours a day, 7days a week. But I am suggesting that you account for 24hours a day, 7 days a week in your schedule. If youneglect to consider Saturdays and Sundays because those areyour “days off”, you may find on Sunday night that you havenot handled any of the household chores that you needed toget done. Or if you are planning on having a dinner partyon Saturday night next week, you had better block off sometime Friday or Saturday to straighten out the house, or goto the market.

Plan personal and play time

Don’t think that a schedule is only for work, this is aplan for your life. So, make sure that you block off timefor exercise, or “date night” with your spouse, orcheerleader time for your kids’ games in your schedule.Remember that the goal is to have time to handle everythingthat’s important to us, not just things that are importantconcerning work. If you want Friday to be a mental healthday, block that off. You don’t need to put in any moredetails than that. But you know that if you don’t plan forit, it won’t happen.

Leave some contingency time in your schedule

You know better than to expect that your days all goexactly as planned. Just when you are about to reallyfocus on that important analysis you needed to do, yourboss calls you into a meeting where your expertise isdesperately needed, and your schedule is shot. So, don’tcram every hour of your day with activities. Leave somecontingency time for you to catch up when the unexpectedhappens.

Discipline, discipline, discipline

Once you have your days scheduled, you need to exercisediscipline and stick to what you planned. Do everythingyou can to eliminate distractions and really focus on whatyou have to do. You will be amazed how much moreproductive you can be. So, close that email program, turnthe phone ringer off and let voicemail handle the calls,close your office door for an hour of so. Then when it istime for you to handle email, and phone calls, and drop-invisitors, give all your focus to those activities then.

Leadership coach Inez Ng helps busy professional and entrepreneurs get better results quickly. Learn more about coaching with her at http://www.RealizationsUnltd.com . Check out her ebook packed with tips and strategies on saving time on email at http://www.easyemailstrategies.com

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