As I searched for a productivity method to assist me, which eventually led to the Middle Way Method, I found that preparing was a big part of my personal productivity. It is good to periodically go through and examine what you want to accomplish, or need to accomplish, and make plans. In addition it is also possible to always be preparing, and to never accomplish anything. So that while everyone should take some time to prepare for productivity, they should limit the time preparing to a minimum.
The Levels of Preparation
Each level of preparation, will involve a different level of granularity about your life. As part of the review process you will want to look at each of these large items and break them down into steps, or groups of steps to make projects. Projects are your overall large goals for the year broken down into steps.
The preparation process can be divided into four phases:
- Yearly
- Monthly
- Weekly
- Day
The Yearly Review
A yearly review may be done at any time, but around the New Year holiday is a natural point in which to conduct this review. This review should be sweeping in its scope. You are not going to get into the fine details here. For example at this level you may decide large things, I want to go back to school, learn to play an instrument, write a book, start a blog. The idea is to get them on the board for the year.
The Monthly Review
At the start of each month identify the tasks from your set of projects that you want to accomplish. Try to balance all of life’s commitments so that you can be successful without getting bogged down in to much to do.
The Weekly Review
How to prepare to be successful:
- Review each week after it has occurred to learn lessons, and evaluate progress and effectiveness.
- Examine the committed time for each week, as well as the time needed for tasks.
- Include in each week a set of goals for the rejuvenation of yourself.
The weekly review is the heart of the reviews. It is the ideal time to do two things:
- Review the past week
- Plan the next week
Reviewing the past week will allow you to learn lessons from the time just ending, and how to apply them to your life. It will also let you know if your plan is still on track, or if changes need to be made.
Planning the coming week should be a straight forward exercise of looking at commitments, and tasks and ensuring you are not doing to much, or to little. Try to work in time for yourself to grow and improve.
The Daily Review
The daily review is the review of time commitments for the day, and choosing which weekly tasks to accomplish. It can be accomplished usually in a couple of minutes each day.
Conclusion
We need to set up our own success. We often rush forward into life without any idea of what we really want to accomplish, and this leads to less than successful productivity. Taking a small part of time every so often to look at the big picture at different levels helps us to avoid the mistake of only preparing, and also helps us to know what we are moving towards.