Happy Spring! I just love all the myriad shades of green this time of year! And all the fragrant flowers – they’re everywhere!
I hope you have some beauty blooming in your yard or at least something really colorful you can see from your windows.
We have the good fortune of living on the banks of a little lake, our own oasis in the city. The muskrats are busy swimming back and forth, the geese are loudly claiming their territory and the beautiful egrets have finally returned.
I can’t wait to hang some flowers from the balcony and plant my little herb garden in a nice big pot. What’s on your spring to-do list? Anything I can help you with? Keep in mind that I’m really well connected too, so if I can’t help you I can probably find someone who can.
‘To do’ or ‘not to do’, that is the question…
So you’ve got a ‘to-do’ list a mile long. Where do you begin? First of all, I like to start my lists with action words: ‘call’, ‘go’, ‘do’, ‘read’, ‘write’, ‘consider’ is my standard format. I make a chart. One column for each action.
You may have other more specific categories: ‘at home’, ‘at work’, ‘with family’ etc. If each ‘to-do’ item begins with an action word or specific category you can cluster similar tasks together e.g., make all your phone calls in one time block, schedule your errands in a loop in order to make the most of your mileage or have uninterrupted time at your desk to get your writing done.
Research indicates that switching gears back and forth from one type of task to another throughout the day is not only inefficient, it uses up precious mental energy and focus. Wondering about the ‘consider’ column? I use it for things I need to reflect on or discuss with someone before I make a final decision.
Are you familiar with Steven Covey’s thoughts regarding ‘important vs urgent’ tasks? To read more about it on his blog, see the Quick Links section in the upper left of this newsletter.
Remember that a professional organizer can help you finally accomplish those ‘important but never urgent’ items; the kinds of things that need to get done but never really have a deadline e.g., create a paper or digital filing system, or plan, create or troubleshoot other systems for time management and record-keeping.
If it has anything to do with information, an organizer will always have plenty of ideas about how to manage it. Contact me to discuss your current information management needs. Let’s get those important things off your ‘to-do’ list!
All the news that’s fit to print…
I called the support line a few times to re-size the photo, align the text and make some changes to the contact list (virtual assistant Kris Jamieson from Resourcefully Yours imported it – thanks Kris!). Overall it was really an easy process.
If you’re thinking of having a newsletter for your business or organization (or even for your family and friends), I highly recommend Constant Contact. For more information go to the Quick Links section (above left).
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