This week’s Weekly Planning Hack, gets you to consider the question “If not now, WHEN”? Many of us have a list of items that sits there. While it is invaluable to get these ideas out of our head and onto a resting place, these lists can grow to be unmanageable and can create a sense of overwhelm in and of themselves. This week pull out any lists you have been creating and ask the question – If not now, WHEN? Some items may naturally fall into your calendar (Schedule them!), some may go back onto a new list to immediate To Dos, and others may gravitate to a new long-term list. In exploring this question, you may find yourself at the end of the process, with yet another long list. Two different frameworks you might apply then: 1. The 4 D Model. Going through that list and further refining it into: Do it – And give it a time frame. Dump it – Let go of it. Defer it – Put it off to another time. (And schedule this in your calendar/planning system.) Delegate it – Consider who to delegate it to, and when they will do it 2. Prioritization – Using the impact/likelihood matrix (see section 4 of PlanDoTrack or Coaching Business Builder), assign each (or most) of the items a priority. Schedule these in accordingly. Enjoy your prioritization! Best, Jennifer Jennifer Britton - Potentials Realized
Author of PlanDoTrack (2019), Coaching Business Builder (2018), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013). Pick up a copy of any of her books at Amazon Book Jennifer for a coaching session to explore productivity, teamwork and business issues. Contact her by phone at (416)996-8326 Check out the new 19 Productivity Tips on-demand program. Explore this video based program at your own pace, and join Jennifer for bi-weekly calls as part of your course. Follow the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series on Instagram
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![]() Week 41 Focus – Chunk It Down to Gain Momentum Focus Question: As you consider your big tasks right now, what are the chunks, or discrete packets, at the core? Description There are many different models of time management and one of them is about chunking. Chunking invites us to break tasks down. In chunking we may put tasks of a similar nature together. Chunking can create momentum so we may be able to quickly get those items off our list. One of the other areas that I've touched on in this book already is the notion of finding the times of day that work best for you. What does momentum mean for you? What are the top 6 you can get off your list quickly? What are the things that will help you gain some momentum and get things done on a consistent basis? Businesses are often built in spurts. Parkinson’s Rule asserts that tasks expand to the amount of time we give them. Sometimes it can be useful to “corral” a task, giving it a very fixed timeline in order to ensure that it gets one. Here are some examples of what you might do in spurts or by chunking:
Activity What are the elements you need to break down? Connection to the Workbook and Planner In your monthly planning process, break down your activities and projects into smaller chunks – tasks, activities. Use the To-Do pages to start drilling into the core packets of work. Download a one-page copy of this week's 52 Weeks of Plan, Do and Track here. Best wishes, Jennifer Read and download the initial weeks of the 52 weeks of Plan, Do and Track Jennifer Britton - Potentials Realized
Author of PlanDoTrack (2019), Coaching Business Builder (2018), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013). Pick up a copy of any of her books at Amazon Book Jennifer for a coaching session to explore productivity, teamwork and business issues. Contact her by phone at (416)996-8326 Check out the new 19 Productivity Tips on-demand program. Explore this video based program at your own pace, and join Jennifer for bi-weekly calls as part of your course. Follow the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series on Instagram ![]() Week 32 Focus – One Percent Rule to Business Development Focus Question: What are the consistent daily steps you want to undertake? Description Since 2005 I have been sharing what I call the One Percent Rule to Business Development. I've heard from a lot of entrepreneurs that they like this notion of incremental business action. So here it is! The 1% rule to business development consists of a series of 8 different stages: 1. Create the Vision: Our vision sets the broad swath of possibility. It gets us thinking about what is possible. It also helps to anchor us when we think about where we want to go and what we want to do. Making our vision detailed and keeping it visible can be important. How are you enshrining your vision? 2. Prepare. During the preparation phase we want to get clear on what the requirements are for our work and projects. We want to know what a successful result looks like. We want to be clear on what resourcing is needed. During the preparation phase we will gather all the information we have so we can pull together a plan. 3. Create an action plan. In my work as a coach, I usually get my clients to create a One-Page Action Plan. The value of the One-Page Plan is that it contains all of the most important information in one page. The One-Pager be placed in a visual location so that you can refer to it quickly AND regularly. What’s on your action plan? 4. Seek out support. What is going to help you achieve the key goals you have set out for yourself? Support can take many forms – financial, technical, people. What do you need to be successful? 5. Take ongoing small steps. As my father, a retired entrepreneur himself, always reminds me that “Rome was not built in a day”. The premise behind the workbook planners is about taking REGULAR, CONSISTENT action. In building a business by ourselves burnout may be a possibility if we move too fast. It can be important to take regular small steps to create the momentum needed for things done quickly. 6. Test, Learn, Retest. In the sixth step were going to test things out. Today's volatility and complexity requires that we experiment regularly. With the data we receive from the initial test or action we can learn and apply then retest and learn again. This is an iterative process which continues. Throughout the business cycle we may move through different bouts of experimentation. Each cycle creates an opportunity for learning and growth. 7. Learn, Iterate and Act. Each action creates a reaction, which over time creates its own momentum, making it easier to achieve the goal. Along the way learning and feedback will help to shape what we do. 8. Ultimately our goal is achieved. Based on our experience we will further refine the vision that we set out for ourselves, expanding it or modifying it based on our experience. This will further support and shape our actions are we move forward with the next cycle and process. This cycle may take place in a short amount of time, for example a day or it may be phased over the longer term of a project. Activity Using your business or a current project, work through the One Percent Rule. What can action and learning look like around one of your most important goals? Map out the 8 steps of the One Percent Rule. Connection to the Workbook and Planner Refer to the One Percent Rule to Business in Section 1 on page 29 of the Coaching Business Builder, or page 31 of PlanDoTrack. Download a one-page copy of this week's 52 Weeks of Plan, Do and Track here. Best wishes, Jennifer Read and download the initial weeks of the 52 weeks of Plan, Do and Track Jennifer Britton - Potentials Realized
Author of PlanDoTrack (2019), Coaching Business Builder (2018), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013). Pick up a copy of any of her books at Amazon Book Jennifer for a coaching session to explore productivity, teamwork and business issues. Contact her by phone at (416)996-8326 Check out the new 19 Productivity Tips on-demand program. Explore this video based program at your own pace, and join Jennifer for bi-weekly calls as part of your course. Follow the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series on Instagram ![]() Week 31 Focus – Marketing Review Focus Question: What needs a tweak with your 5 P’s? Description Last week we started to take stock of where you are around dialogue and marketing of your work. Whether you are internal, or external, we are regularly marketing ourselves. Internally we may be focused on personal branding and/or creating and positioning a business case for our work. Externally, we want to offer the best item of value to our customers or clients. When we explore the topic of marketing and program/product design, we often talk about the Marketing Mix or the 5 P’s– Product, Placement, Promotion, People, and Price. Knowing our 5 P’s and reviewing it regularly ensures that we are on target with what our customers or stakeholders want. This week, as review, note what’s worked, and what hasn’t recently in the five different areas of the 5 P’s. Activity Use associated worksheet to note what’s worked and what hasn’t around the 5 P’s around your product or service offering. Undertake a review of your metrics. This could include numbers of subscribers, engagement, posts, views, follows, comments etc. What do you notice? What’s working around your marketing right now? Consider the business which has come in, over last six months. What sources led to it? What is in the pipeline? What has shaped this? Do an audit on your content. Consider:
Connection to the Workbook and Planner Part of doing a marketing review is reviewing metrics and trends. Take a look back at your notes. What do you notice? You may want to:
Download a one-page copy of this week's 52 Weeks of Plan, Do and Track here. Best wishes, Jennifer Read and download the initial weeks of the 52 weeks of Plan, Do and Track Jennifer Britton - Potentials Realized
Author of PlanDoTrack (2019), Coaching Business Builder (2018), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013). Pick up a copy of any of her books at Amazon Book Jennifer for a coaching session to explore productivity, teamwork and business issues. Contact her by phone at (416)996-8326 Check out the new 19 Productivity Tips on-demand program. Explore this video based program at your own pace, and join Jennifer for bi-weekly calls as part of your course. Follow the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series on Instagram The mantra for today is for many “Bigger is better” but when it comes to goals in fact it may be that “Less is more”. With workplaces ripe with ever-changing priorities it can lead to a lack of engagement and clarity on the part of employees. When we are pulled into meetings last minute and not able to focus on some of the core tasks we had planned, it can feel disruptive and disempowering. While we may never be able to focus on all the tasks we have planned, being able to focus, and take action on, our top 3-5 goals in a day or a week, can help employees feel as if they have some control. As you will note with the Coaching Business Builder and PlanDoTrack, many of the planning templates have space for you to note your Top 3 – 5 goals each week or month. These can serve as anchors in what sometimes feels like a sea of change! Do you already ask yourself every day or regularly, “What are my top 3-5 goals?”? If not, now many be the time to experiment with this practice. See what you notice. Let us know how you are using the different planning resources in PlanDoTrack or Coaching Business Builder in the comments here, or jump into the discussion over at the Conversation Sparker Zone. Enjoy the conversation! Jennifer Jennifer Britton - Potentials Realized
Check out the Weekly Planning Hack Facebook Live each week here. Author of PlanDoTrack (2019), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013) ![]() Week 30 Focus – Marketing Review Focus Question: What’s working and what’s not? Description In this week’s focus, we’re taking stock of different marketing approaches – what is working and what is not. We’ve spent several weeks exploring different promotional strategies, including LinkedIn and Instagram. Building a regular practice of doing a review of what’s working, and what’s not, around marketing in your business, can save a lot of time in the long run. Some of the things you will want to consider as you go to do a marketing review are:
Activity Note the data you are tracking. From a high-level overview what does it indicate? Looking to each of the marketing items you track, which one is progressing as you would like it to? If you have multiple posts, which ones are working best? Which ones are not getting traction as you would like? Are you tracking the things that you want? Where is your energy and enjoyment with this process? Connection to the Coaching Business Builder/PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner Review the metrics you have which may be part of:
Download a one-page copy of this week's 52 Weeks of Plan, Do and Track here. Best wishes, Jennifer Read and download the initial weeks of the 52 weeks of Plan, Do and Track Jennifer Britton - Potentials Realized
Author of PlanDoTrack (2019), Coaching Business Builder (2018), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013). Pick up a copy of any of her books at Amazon Book Jennifer for a coaching session to explore productivity, teamwork and business issues. Contact her by phone at (416)996-8326 Follow the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series on Instagram Welcome back to another Wednesday Weekly Planning Hack. This is #24 in the series. This week’s WPH is about a great prioritization tool using post its. It builds onto last week’s focus of using post its in planning, and in ensuring all voices in a team are represented. In this week’s blog post let us explore another very visual way to prioritize – this time using post its. Here’s what I wrote about the Planning Matrix in PlanDoTrack and the Coaching Business Builder: “The prioritization matrix is a quick visual tool where all you will need is some post-it notes or a white board. First, identify all of the priorities you have, writing each one down on a separate post-it. Then rate them according to their impact and likelihood of getting them done (or other criterion). Place them along the matrix of impact and likelihood. This activity is very visual, and stimulates dialogue amongst the team members themselves. An important part of the prioritization process for teams is about sharing information, and also busting assumptions that might be held. This seems to have the potential to be a great structure for facilitating that conversation.” (Source: Coaching Business Builder, Jennifer Britton, 2018) What ways can you incorporate post its, teamwork and planning? Best, Jennifer Jennifer Britton - Potentials Realized
Check out the Weekly Planning Hack Facebook Live each Wednesday here. Be sure to like our page to be updated each week! Author of PlanDoTrack (2019), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013) ![]() Week 29 Focus – LinkedIn Focus Question: What does your LinkedIn profile portray? Story LinkedIn is an important social media vehicle especially for those who are looking at working in organizations and corporations. Many HR professionals or leaders may go to LinkedIn to check out the resources. What are the things you want to include on LinkedIn? You might consider:
Activity Review and update your Linked In profile. What does it showcase? What needs updating?
Connection to the Workbook and Planner Use any of the content scheduling tools to plan for and track your LinkedIn focus. Download a one-page copy of this week's 52 Weeks of Plan, Do and Track here. Best wishes, Jennifer Read and download the initial weeks of the 52 weeks of Plan, Do and Track Jennifer Britton - Potentials Realized
Author of PlanDoTrack (2019), Coaching Business Builder (2018), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013). Pick up a copy of any of her books at Amazon Book Jennifer for a coaching session to explore productivity, teamwork and business issues. Contact her by phone at (416)996-8326 Follow the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series on Instagram ![]() This week’s Weekly Planning Hack focuses on the Power of a Post It. From being an important visual reminder, to helping teams focus on what’s important, the power of a post-it can become a colorful way to prioritize and focus. Here are a couple of ways you might consider using post its to help you with your productivity:
Here’s what I wrote in a 2008 blog posts on post its called A Facilitator’s Ally: Post Its and Index Cards: I love post it notes and index cards! Many of you will know that it made my top 10 list of most useful tips and tools for 2007. Today's post, builds on a much older post of mine from last year, about how post it notes and index cards can be a really valuable tool in your toolbox. Here are some ideas on how you can use post-its and/or index cards: 1. For program development. Using a new post it or index card, brain storm all the ideas you have about upcoming programs. Lay them out on a table or floor to start sorting/grouping. 2. To get quick feedback from all participants during a program. As an evaluation tool, have participants write out their responses to your evaluation questions (1 question/answer per card), and have them post them on the wall. 3. For business planning or strategic planning sessions. The photo above is from a recent team planning session I facilitated late last year. There is nothing like getting people up and moving to boost engagement, excitement and ownership of their work! 4. As a quick poll of the group regarding what questions are popping for the group. 5. To ensure that all voices of the group are being heard. It is quite common for groups to be dominated by certain members. As a facilitator it's important to ensure that all voices are heard. Having participants write out their questions or responses, and then post them, or share them, can provide participants who introverts are, shyer or those who require more time to process questions, the opportunity to participate and "be heard". 6. As a "vote" regarding where to go. Have participants show their support for a discussion item by putting up a post it note. (Different colours can represent different categories.) 7. As a brainstorming tool. You can bring post-its/index cards into exercises where participants want to/need to brainstorm. For example,
Here’s a link to that original post. Enjoy your use of post its! Jennifer Jennifer Britton - Potentials Realized
Check out the Weekly Planning Hack Facebook Live each Wednesday or Thursday here. Be sure to like our page to be updated each week! Author of PlanDoTrack (2019), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013) ![]() Week 27 Focus – Communities on Social Media – Facebook, Mighty Networks, LinkedIn etc.… Focus Question: What are the communities you want to build on social media? Description In early 2018 Facebook announced it was going to place an emphasis on communities in their social media ecosystem. In addition to having a profile on the varying social networks, building community intentionally on social media has multiple benefits including cultivating connection with like-minded people, sharing resources with people who have a common interest, and also adding value to a community who can refer. What are the communities you want to build on social media? There are several different platforms you might want to consider including:
Activity Consider what community you might want to spearhead in social media.
What content would you populate your new community on social media with? Consider material you have created, go-to resources from others, and polls to find out what people want. Consider dedicating each day to a different theme: Throwback Thursday, Motivation Monday… Connection to the Workbook and Planner Use the Content Daily Trackers, and Content Brainstorm to identify key content you are sharing or plan to share. Download a one-page copy of this week's 52 Weeks of Plan, Do and Track here. Best wishes, Jennifer Read and download the initial weeks of the 52 weeks of Plan, Do and Track Jennifer Britton - Potentials Realized
Author of PlanDoTrack (2019), Coaching Business Builder (2018), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013). Pick up a copy of any of her books at Amazon Book Jennifer for a coaching session to explore productivity, teamwork and business issues. Contact her by phone at (416)996-8326 Follow the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series on Instagram |
AuthorJennifer Britton is the blogger behind the popular Teams365 blog, a daily,blog for team leaders and members since 2014. Her latest publication is the PlanDoTrack Workbook and Planner. Pick up a copy at Amazon. Pick Up a CopyUpcoming Programs
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