Don't forget another appointment

We all have a lot of things to do. Work meetings, projects deadlines, appointments, social events, errands and various tasks. Keeping your schedule under control will help you stay on time and get things done. Here's how:

1. Have one calendar, and only one calendar for everyone you are responsible. You can't meet that client if your child has a dentist appointment at the same time and you have the 2 events on different calendars
2. Digital vs. paper?
Digital is Great: compact & light weight, easy to make changes, easy to set recurring events with just a couple of clicks, you can set your devise to notify you within hours or minutes of any appointment
Paper calendar: you already know how to use it, serves as a paper record of everything you did in one year
3. At the beginning of the year, add every appointment you know and especially every recurring appointment. Even if it's something you do once a week and you've been doing it for 5 years, put it in your calendar. This will assure you of not mistakenly double booking your time.
4. If you have children, at the beginning of the school year, put every event, holiday, vacation, short days, teacher meetings in the calendar.
5. Use your calendar to PLAN. This is essential to being efficient. Put everything on the calendar, including all tasks and projects, such as writing for your book or blog, calls to make, answering emails, filing, organizing, networking appointments, lunch and coffee dates, facebook time, everything!
6. Schedule time to work on projects, such as I do for writing this blog. Don't just put the deadline on your calendar, (and this next point is the key to time management) but put the time necessary to complete the task before the deadline.
7. If you were unable to complete a task, move it to another time or day. Don't leave anything that needs to get done up to your memory or when you have free time.
6. Keep focused on today, but always keep an eye out for what's coming soon. I suggest you keep your calendar on your desktop or with you when you are out of your office. Refer to it throughout the day to stay on schedule and remind you of appointments.

New Leaf Organizing Tip:

Do you read your emails the second they pop into your box? Try reading your emails only at specific times through out the day. Then immediately sort the emails that you want to save into folders. Keep only those that need you to “take action” in your in-box. Now put that "action" task on your to-do list and schedule it. Multi-tasking can lead to less productivity and stress. Stay focused on the task at hand!