plan the week – time management strategy
Part of my time management strategy and how I start my week. I used to do it on Tuesday mornings even though my week begins on a Sunday, but since I stopped teaching my Sunday evening class at Cannons in Battersea, Plan the Week is now where it should be, on a Sunday evening at the start of my week.
Plan the week is basically collating a task and event list for the coming week. It serves as a pool for plan the day. No tasks are assigned to specific times of day but simply listed. So what are the sources for the list and how long does the whole process take?
Weekly planning session
If I can be focused then it can be done in about an hour and that includes business planning as well. But I’m usually not too focused, taking time to make cups of tea and do odd chores such as emptying the rubbish bin. So it can take up to two hours. But I don’t want to rush it because it serves as a guide to the rest of the week and the plan the day sessions so it’s worth taking the time. It takes as long as it takes I suppose and typically that can be 2 hours.
Sources of tasks and goals
And what are the sources of the list? If you take a look at the list of goals that I have for 2007, that is one list. Some of those items can get overlooked if not reviewed on a regular basis or else why did they get put on the list in the first place? I want to achieve these things not just have the idea that I want to achieve them.
The list of reminders in my pda. There’s more about that subject in the reminders article so have a look there. But only the ones for that coming week.
And business planning tasks go onto the list as well. Such as “send promo e-mail to prospective clients”. And that is why the business planning happens at the same time, because it’s the same week that they have to fit into. Even though I seem to plan my personal life and business life as two separate entities they obviously have to end up in the same week.
Balance carried forward
And there’s one more source? You can probably guess can’t you. The previous week’s list. No, not everything, just the ones that didn’t manage to get completed. If I still think that they need to be done. One of the reasons that they didn’t get completed was that they were not really important and I had just thought that they were at the time of planning. If a task gets carried over two or even three times then that is something that needs to be considered during the planning session. What is underlying that particular task? Is there a deeper issue? Is there an opportunity to learn something about myself? Maybe a breakthrough moment?
Deciding what goes on the list
How many things go on the list? Well, nowadays I tend to play it by ear. But all you have to do is to look at the existing events during the week and see where new tasks and events could fit in comfortably. I sometimes pencil in events or tasks to specific times or dates with a view to amending them during the daily planning session. The other thing to consider is my recent success rate. If I put 20 things on my list and manage all of them then maybe it was too easy and I should add a few more. Conversely if I only manage to complete 12 then I need to put a few less. I like to find the point where I just have to over reach without pushing too hard. That there is slight discomfort, but only slight.
I also have to leave spaces during the week for where I might have to book clients based on previous or recent experience.
What about spontaneity?
But what about spontaneity and doing things on a whim? What about doing things as and when you feel like it? Tough shit mate. You just have to follow the plan. No. There is always room for whims and fancies. I’m always ready to drop it all if necessary such as an old friend being in town. As Mr Covey says, one should not prioritise ones schedule but schedule ones priorities. And doing what one wants when one wants to do it is one of my main goals in life.
So two hours later on I have a basic blueprint for the week ahead. But I’m ready to throw it in the bin as well. It’s something I’ve learned from teaching yoga for so many years. You can plan your class in fine detail, but then you get a group of people with back problems and your plan goes out the window. So the plan must never be rigid. But you still have to have a plan. I think it’s like the difference between rules and guidelines. You could argue that it’s just a question of semantics, but guideline gives one a sense of leeway that rule doesn’t or at least more so.
So planning the week is about creating a direction but not the route. And also taking a little time to ask why I want to go there in the first place.