1. Prepare the Night Before
First, prepare your work list for the following day the evening or night before. The best exercise is for you to plan your entire next day as the last thing you do before coming home from work. When you plan your day the night before, your subconscious then goes to work on your plans and goals while you are asleep. Very often you will wake up in the morning with ideas and insights that apply to the work of the day.
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Sometimes, the answer to a problem that you are working on will pop into your mind when you wake up, or when you are getting ready for work.
Often you will gain a new perspective on a problem or job, or see a different or better way that it might be accomplished.
A major benefit of preparing your daily list the night before is that this exercise enables you to sleep more soundly. A major reason for insomnia, for tossing and turning, is your laying awake trying not to forget to remember everything that you have to do the following day. Once you have written down everything you have to do on a piece of paper, it clears your mind and enables you to sleep deeply.
2. Scheduling Your Time to Reduce Stress
Scheduling your time reduces stress and releases energy. The very act of planning and organizing your day, week and month gives you a greater feeling of control and well being. It makes you feel in charge of your life. It actually increases your self-esteem and improves your feelings of personal power.
3. Get an Early Start on the Day
Start your day early. The more time you take to sit, think and to plan, the better organized you will be in every area of your life. In the biographies and autobiographies of successful men and women, almost all of them have one 86
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thing in common. They very early developed the habit of going to bed at a reasonable hour, and rising early.
Many successful people arise at 5:00 am and 5:30 am, so that they can have enough time to think and plan for the coming day. As a result, they are always more effective than those who sleep in until the last possible moment.
A few minutes of quiet reflection before you begin any undertaking can save you many hours executing the task. When you get up early and plan your day in advance, you tend to be more calm, clear-headed and creative throughout the day.
4. Use an Organized Filing System
Resolve to use an organized filing system both at home and at work. As much as 30% of working time today is spent looking for misplaced items.
These are things that are lost because they have not been filed correctly.
Does this sound familiar to you?
The best and simplest of all filing systems is an alphabetical system. In conjunction with a filing system, you should have a master list or record of all your files in a single place. This master list gives you the title of each file and tells you where the file is located.
One of the finest tools for an office filing system is a Rolodex. There are many different uses for a Rolodex at home as well. You can purchase them 87
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in any stationery story and they will allow you to keep track of a variety of files, in a variety of ways.
There are few activities so frustrating as spending your valuable time looking for misplaced materials because no thought was given to a filing and retrieval system.
5. Do Important Work during Prime Time
Organize your life so that you are doing creative work during your internal
“prime time.” Your internal prime time is the time of day, according to your body clock, when you are the most alert and productive. For most people, this is in the morning. For some people however, it is in the evenings.
Occasionally, a writer, an artist, or an entertainer may find that his or her prime time is in the early hours of the morning.
It is important that you be aware of your internal prime time so that you can schedule your most important projects accordingly. Your most important work usually requires that you be at your very best, rested, alert and creative.
What time of the day do you most feel this way?
You must also be aware of external prime time. This is the time when your customers or clients are most readily available. Each person should give some thought to structuring their day for both their external and internal prime times.
6. Use a Dictaphone
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Learn to use a Dictaphone for correspondence and notes. Dictating equipment can be one of the very best time saving devices in your business or private life. Once you learn how to use a dictating machine, you can cut your time in writing by as much as 80%. It takes 20% or less time to dictate than it takes to write something by hand, or type it personally.
A dictating machine also saves the time of the person who is going to type it for you. It is usually much easier to transcribe from a tape than to interpret a person’s handwriting.
When using a dictating machine, there are three keys to assure maximum efficiency:
First, write an outline of what you are going to dictate. Jot down the major headings and subheadings before you begin. Think through the sentence structure in your mind before you begin dictating on to the tape. Don’t be afraid to go back, erase and do it over again using a better choice of words.
Second, when using a dictating machine, don’t try to be a perfectionist.
Sometimes, your natural conversational voice is the best and most correct grammatically. You can always go back and correct the major mistakes later.
It’s much easier to edit something that has been transcribed than to write it or dictate it perfectly in the first place.
Third, concentrate on getting your thoughts dictated as quickly as possible, and then go back and clean it up before you finalize it. In no time at all, you 89
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will be dictating perfectly correct letters and reports that need no correction or editing at all.
7. Make Air Travel Productive
An important area where personal organization is important is travel, especially air travel. Since so many people are traveling by air for business today, it is essential that you know how to make every hour of traveling time count for yourself and for your company.
Some years ago, Hughes Air West, a regional airline, hired a consulting firm to compare the efficiency of flying first class with flying economy class, and with working in a normal office.
What they found was that one hour of uninterrupted work time in an airplane yielded the equivalent of three hours of work in a normal work environment. The key word was “uninterrupted.” If you plan ahead and organize your work before you leave for the airport, you can accomplish an enormous amount while you are in the air.
Get the Right Seat
The starting point of getting the most out of air travel time is to prebook a non-bulkhead window seat. The reason you want a non-bulkhead window seat is so that you have a tray that opens up in front of you that you can work on.
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You also want to keep your briefcase handy during take-off and landing, and with a bulkhead seat this is not possible.
When you travel, your briefcase becomes your traveling office. The reason you want a window seat is so that you can get out your materials and go to work without the interruption of someone who wants to get past you to go to the washroom. Be sure to specify to your travel agent that you do not want a seat opposite the kitchen or the bathroom on an airplane. These seats are too noisy and distracting for concentrated effort.
When you pack your work for a trip, organize it by subject. Sit down at your desk before you leave and go through what you are going to get accomplished while you are in the air.
Before you depart, make sure that you have all materials, envelopes, stamps and Federal Express envelopes on hand when you begin working. Your briefcase should be fully equipped with everything you require. You will be amazed at how much work you can produce on an airplane when you put your mind to it.
Get There Early
An important technique to get the most out of your traveling time is for you to arrive at the airport at least one hour before your departure. Most business flyers arrive today with only 30-40 minutes to catch the plane, even with increased security measures. Studies have showed that if you arrive at the airport at the last possible minute, you experience enormous stress. As a 91