We all have certain beliefs and assumptions that we make about time. One common assumption I encounter: getting more done requires running faster. Some time management systems encourage us to work faster to save maybe 10 or 15 percent of our time. And while a saving of 10 percent is always welcome, there are much…
Category Archives: Planning
Quote: write your goal
A quote for the day: The discipline of writing something down is the first step toward making it happen. – Lee Iacocca
Plan from your passion
Last week I received the audience feedback from a conference workshop I led in November. One respondent commented anonymously: “So inspiring, clean. Made a promise to myself as a result of this session.” This is what I live for! I was leading my popular session “Plan to Thrive – how to shape, track, and follow…
Strengthen your success with a gratitude journal
Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but also the parent of all the others. — Cicero For years I had kept a gratitude journal — a notebook in which I recorded things large and small in my business for which I felt grateful. I knew that great thinkers from all ages and traditions…
Recipe for productivity
Like a featured recipe in a cooking magazine, productivity has many ingredients. Some are obvious (oh, there’s beef in the beef stew!) while some are subtle (who knew that excellent doughnuts actually require a whisper of nutmeg??) We can leave something out, we can make substitutions, but the dish won’t achieve the same heights without…
Getting it done without deadlines
There is a certain category of tasks that languish on our lists because they lack a firm deadline. Catching up with filing is one example; everything with a deadline can come before filing. Writing a book or developing a new product can be another example unless you have a publisher and a contract, in which…
Where do I begin? How to set goals that matter
Over the years I have heard a lot of debate about the best starting point to use when setting goals. Begin with the ultimate vision? Begin with an analysis of current conditions to identify opportunities? Like a ship’s sail in fickle winds, the prevailing view has shifted one direction, then turned back again. I thought…
Feeling lost?
For those days when none of your plans seem to be working out, here’s a bit of fun from Jessica Hagy’s blog Indexed. Hagy designs her daily posts using graphs and Venn diagrams sketched on index cards in order to “think a little more relationally without resorting to doing actual math.” This one is titled…
The Only Thing to Fear
by Margaret Lukens, New Leaf + Company My plans for 2009, and the nation’s plans for the inauguration of President-elect Obama, have sent me back to past inaugural themes. While the planners in Washington have chosen to sound the keynote from Lincoln’s inaugural address, “a new birth of freedom”, it is another one, Franklin Roosevelt’s…
Your Inauguration Day
by Margaret Lukens, New Leaf + Company LLC It has been many years since the United States has shown such excitement over the arrival of a new president. Like the inaugurals of 1961 and 1981, this inauguration is made more thrilling because it comes amid military, economic, and social challenges as well as historic opportunities….