Time Management

Fundamentals
Welcome
Hi, I'm Dave Crenshaw, and this is Time Management Fundamentals. In this course I'll
lay the groundwork to help you manage your time simply and effectively and become
more productive in the process. We'll start by exploring the three principles of
productivity, space, mind, and time. I'll walk you through the process of identifying and
managing these three principles in your life. We'll cover how to have a more organized
workspace. I'll also demonstrate how to manage email in a way that automatically
applies these time management principles.
And finally, I'll show you how to create structure in your week to make the most of your
time. We’ll be covering all these concepts, plus plenty of other tools and techniques to
maximize your precious hours over the course of Time Management Fundamentals.

Using the exercise files

Throughout this course I'll occasionally ask you to fill out worksheets to
better understand your own time management needs and create personalized systems
for success. These worksheets have been provided in the exercise files for all
lynda.com subscribers. At various points throughout the course I'll be asking you to
pause the video and fill out a worksheet. By taking action and doing something about
the principles I'll share you're more likely to build lasting habits.
To get the most out of this training I recommend you download and print these
exercises out now so you have these worksheets on hand. Lets get started.

Getting the most from this course

This course was designed to provide advice you can apply immediately, no matter
which video you jump to in the training. However, to get the best result, I strongly
encourage you to complete this training as a whole, in one, maybe two, sittings. Here
are a few recommendations to make that work. Number one is schedule the time to
complete it. To view all the videos, as well as complete activities that I'll give you, it'll
probably take you several hours. My second piece of advice is to complete the
course while in your workspace.
Your workspace is the laboratory for you to learn the science of time management. This
training is very hands-on, so when you schedule that block of time to complete the
course, schedule it so you can be where you do your paperwork, where you answer
your emails, your workspace. Also, when I ask you to do something in this training, do it
right then. Pause the video, do what I've asked you to do, put it into action. Rather than
rushing through all the videos, put your emphasis on taking action.
By implementing immediately, you'll condition yourself. It's a bit like how athletes or
professional musicians use repetition to create muscle memory. I want you to create
productivity memory. This will help you develop mental and physical conditioning so you
automatically behave in the most productive manner with things like email, paperwork,
incoming phone calls, and the ideas that pop into your head. If you take action
immediately, that will go a long way toward building your mental muscle memory.
Finally, set your goal to be a lasting change. Many of my clients who have completed
this program have experienced a near permanent boost in productivity that lasts for
many, many years. How can you accomplish that? By putting greater emphasis on
timeless principles, rather than rapidly changing tools. The tendency for many people is
to believe that the new software, the next computer, or a smartphone upgrade will
suddenly improve their productivity by virtue of advanced technology.
The truth? Technology itself will not make you more productive. What will make you
more productive is using the technology in a way that's based on timeless principles,
principles that never change, regardless of advancements in technology. For example,
one of the things that you'll learn in this course is that you need to carry your
calendar, your contacts, and your tasks with you, wherever you go. The brand of phone
and its operating system don't matter as much as the commitment you make to live that
timeless principle.
The next time you think that buying a new tool will make you more productive,
remember, its value is dependent on how well you live according to the principles of
effective time management. This course will outline those simplified principles, and,
more importantly, help you practice them, so that they become second nature to
you. It's in the habits you'll develop where you'll experience lasting change. In summary,
schedule the time to complete the course, preferably, in one complete block. Complete
this course in your workspace.
Take action immediately to apply the principles I'll share, and focus on a lasting change
by putting emphasis on timeless principles ahead of rapidly changing tools. Do these
things, and you'll get the maximum benefit from this course.

Determining your productivity style

What is your productivity style? Through years of working with people in a variety of
cultures, industries, and careers, I've found that there are three primary styles of how
people behave inherently when it comes to productivity. It's best understood with a
graph. On the far left, we have focus. And on the far right, we have chaos. Those who
are naturally on the far left, I call the Focus Masters. These are people who naturally
understand organization and productivity.
The best of them have never had any issue at all with time management or
organization. A Focus Master's biggest challenge? Being frustrated by the inefficiency of
the people all around them. They may tell others, just do it my way. But this rarely
works, simply because they're not talking to other Focus Masters. If you find yourself in
the Focus Master category, go through this course with the mindset of learning a
framework you can share with others to help them become more productive.
Those who are inherently on the far right of the scale I call Chaos Masters. Chaos
Masters have always struggled with organization and productivity, almost from
birth. This isn't to say that they aren't successful, it's just that they've learned to be
successful in spite of their natural tendency to be a little, well more than a little chaotic
and disorganized in everything they do. These are those who often have piles all around
the office, yet claim they know where everything is.
The Chaos Master's biggest challenge? Learning how to be organized and productive in
a way that doesn't stifle their inherent creativity. If you find yourself in this category, go
through this course with the mindset of simplifying your life, freeing up time and space
for you to do your greatest work. And those in the middle, these are the Nomads. These
typically make up the most common productivity style. Often, they consider
themselves inherently focused but have somehow been pulled away from that natural
tendency to be organized.
Circumstances at work, or just life in general, have pulled them out of that focused
existence, and it's frustrating for them. If you find yourself in the Nomad category, go
through this course with the midset of discovering how you lost focus, and how you can
establish new habits that will protect you from ever losing it again. Hopefully this helps
you get a good idea of your productivity style and what to look for in this course. I share
this with you for one additional reason, though.
Those who have successfully completed this program have often said how helpful it
was for them to understand where I, your instructor, fit on this scale. The truth? I am
inherently a Chaos Master. You would think by the way I operate now, that I am a Focus
Master. Well 99% of the time, but in my past, you literally had to use a shovel to get
from the front door to my desk. I was jumping around from career to career.
One day, I met with a psychologist, who gave me two tests, and then he said the words
I'll always remember. He said, "You are off the charts ADHD. "If there was a fifth
standard deviation, "You would be in it." This caused me to build this unified system that
we're going to cover now. And that has helped other Chaos Masters, Nomads, and
Focus Masters like yourself. The methods I'll share come from the standpoint of
somebody who had to learn to compensate for an incredibly chaotic way of operating.
This might give you some hope, most other time management training you may have
tried before were built by Focus Masters, they're typically hard for the rest of us mere
mortals to grasp. The principles we'll cover here are simplified and universal. They apply
regardless of your career, culture, and productivity style. Wherever you fit on the
scale, between focus and chaos, there's something here for you.

Finding your personal motivation for lasting change

What would you do if you had an extra 10 hours per week? Pause for a moment and
ponder that question. If you had an extra two hours every work day, how would you
reinvest that time? Would it be on hobbies? Would it be on friend and family? Would you
reinvest it to further develop your career? One of the critical elements in becoming more
productive and mastering time management is to have a strong motivation in mind. So I
invite you to carefully consider this question.
If you had an extra 10 hours per week, how would you spend the time? This motivation
is a vision of the future. What you will do or what life will look like once you've reached a
certain point. It's my experience that those who follow this course get a similar
result. They gain at least an extra 10 hours per week of increased productivity in their
schedule. So, before we go through the process of getting that time, I would like you to
decide, right now, what you'll do with that time once you get it.
Right your answer down. When I have an extra 10 hours a week, I will and then fill in
the blank. Then, put that in a prominent place where you can see it. As you go through
this training, continually look back at that question and remember your personal
motivation. There are going to be moments where you find what I ask you to do to be a
bit challenging. A little bit challenging is necessary for growth, right? So whenever you
feel challenged, and maybe a little inclined to not complete the course, look back at that
answer you posted and remember your vision of the future, of what you'll do with the
extra time you'll uncover.
Regularly refer back to your motivation and the likelihood of your follow through will
increase.

Addressing the myth of multitasking

Ironically, the biggest obstacle to effective time management is something that many
people believe is what makes them more productive. Let's address the myth of
multitasking before we dive deeper into time management. In order for you to
experience this myth firsthand, let's do an exercise together, adapted from my book
"The Myth of Multitasking." We're going to find out how well you use your time when you
multitask. You can download and print out a handout from the course page.
You can also use any piece of white paper to do this exercise. Notice that I have the
phrase at the top of this exercise,"Switchtasking is a Thief." When people think they're
multitasking, very often instead, what they're doing is switchtasking. Switchtasking
occurs when you attempt to perform multiple attention requiring tasks at the same
time. Switchtasking is a thief. It’s a thief of time. It's a thief of money and it's a thief of
your sanity.
And you're about to experience, firsthand, what I mean. Here's how the exercise
works. Wait to hear all of the instructions before you begin. First, recopy the
phrase, "Switchtasking is a thief," in the first row. And then, underneath that in the
second row, write the numbers one to 21, one number for every letter in that
phrase. Use a timer while you do this and write down your time underneath the second
row.
Great! Now let's do this again. This time, I want you to switchtask. Switch back and forth
between each letter and number. Again, wait until I give you all the instructions. For
every letter you write, you're going to write a number. You'll begin by writing the letter
"S," and beneath that, you'll write a one. And then you'll write a "W" and beneath that,
you'll write a two. “I" and three, and so on. Again, use a timer and keep track of how
long this takes you.
What you just experienced is the myth of multitasking. Rather than getting more done
faster, you got worse results slower. This is because your brain is physically
incapable of handling multiple active tasks at the same time. In your everyday activities,
switching back and forth rapidly between tasks gives the same result as what you just
experienced when you switched back and forth between the numbers and the letters.
No, I'm not talking about doing something active while something mindless or mundane
happens in the background, such as exercising while watching TV. To clarify, I call that
sort of activity, "background tasking." But when most people say they're multitasking, or,
"I'm a good multitasker," they're referring to attempting to perform multiple active tasks
at the same time. This is switchtasking and it's disastrous to effective time management.

Understanding the consequences of multitasking

Let's cover the three effects of switchtasking. Remember, when someone thinks they're
multitasking, what they're often doing instead is switching back and forth rapidly
between tasks. This isn't multitasking, it's switchtasking. Number one, this is most
obvious, when you switchtask, the amount of time it takes to complete things
increases. I'll give you a brief example. I once worked with a business owner and asked
her to tell me of a recent time when she was multitasking.
She described a situation where she was doing three things at once: typing an email,
talking to her assistant, and talking on the phone. She spent a total of one hour doing all
three of these things at the same time. At least, until the person on the line asked her to
stop. The person on the phone could tell by the business owner's multitasking
voice. We've all heard it, right? So, finally, she went out into the hall and focused on the
phone call.
To finish the call, it took her seven minutes. She went back in to talk to her assistant, it
took three minutes. She sat down and answered the email, it took her three minutes. In
short, when she tried to do all three things at the same time, it took her an hour and she
accomplished none of them. But when she did them one at a time, it took her less than
15 minutes and she completed them all successfully. This is where that feeling comes
from at the end of the day, when you put your feet up on the couch and you're
exhausted.
You've been working hard, but what did you accomplish? You've been juggling and
jumping between tasks, finishing hardly anything. Number two is quality. When you
switchtask, the quality of your work decreases. Or, in other words, the likelihood of
mistakes increases. How many times have you seen someone delegated a very clear
instruction? Something that's just obvious. Maybe you even gave it to them in
writing and they still didn't get it right. Frustrating, right? Whenever you see highly
intelligent people making fairly obvious mistakes, it almost always is a symptom of
switchtasking, not incompetence.
And the final, perhaps less obvious, but still powerful effect of switchtasking is its impact
on your stress levels. Whenever you introduce switchtasking, even a simple list of
activities becomes highly stressful. Even with so many time-saving devices, we are
more stressed out and more starved for time than we've ever been in the history of the
world. This is largely due to a cultural acceptance of multitasking.
So, let me recap. The three effects of switchtasking, what most people are doing when
they think they're multitasking, are the amount of time it takes to complete things
increases, the quality of the work you do decreases, and your stress levels
increase. The good news? We'll be working on reducing the number of switches in your
day. So, you'll be able to complete work faster, make less mistakes, and experience
less overall stress.

Understanding the three principles of productivity

In order to help you gain focus and find more time, there're three key areas we're going
to cover: space, mind and time. While this may sound abstract, these represent the
critical components of productivity you deal with daily. The first fundamental principle of
time management is space meaning your work space, the physical items that are
around you. How well are you using that physical space that you have? In particular, the
more gathering points you have the more switches you make, so let's have as few
gathering points as possible.
A gathering point is any place where things that are unresolved come together. I'll refer
to these unresolved items as unprocessed. Typical gathering points include piles of
paper, stacks of bills, drawers stuff full of miscellaneous items, even email inboxex,
voicemail boxex and receipts stuffed in your pockets - all of these are considered
gathering points. We'll go through the process of reducing the number of gathering
points you have, which will reduce the switches you experience and help you regain
buckets of time.
The second fundamental principle is your mind. In particular, keep your mind clear. Yet
many people use their mind as a gathering point When this happens you allow to-dos,
and tasks, and projects to swirl around in your head. Think about the last hour. How
many times did you interrupt yourself when a new thought popped into your head? Each
one of these little self-interruptions was a switch, and switches, remember, will cause
things to take longer, cause you to make more mistakes and will increase your stress
levels.
A mind filled with to-dos and action items is constantly in a state of switching. This is
terribly inefficient, very stressful, and a recipe for lots of mistakes. I've even seen people
who don't sleep well because they go to bed at night thinking about all the things that
they need to do and wake up in the morning thinking about all the things that they need
to do. One chapter in this course is devoted to helping you find an effective system to
get all these things out of your mind forever.
This will allow you to better focus throughout your day on the tasks at hand and not
distract yourself. The third and final principle deals with time itself, in particular, focusing
your time on that which is most valuable. There're many ideas and opportunities that
compete for your time daily. Those who are most productive have mastered the skill of
making conscious choices about where they will focus their time. They've also become
skilled at creating boundaries that protect their attention.
You can do the same. This begins with identifying your MVAs, your most valuable
activities, and then creating a budget to spend time in those most valuable activities. It
also includes underspending time to make sure you never go over budget. By
underspending you'll actually get more done, have less stress and, paradoxically, have
more time. For now, just remember these principles.
Focus on your most valuable activities and underspend time. By mastering the trifecta
of space, mind and time you'll find yourself better prepared to stay more productive and
focused.

Taking an inventory of your gathering points

Let's begin by helping you live the principle of space. We'll start by finding out how many
gathering points you have. Remember, a gathering point is any place where you gather
unprocessed items, things like email, tasks, to-dos, ideas, busy work, assignments,
projects, and so on. Unprocessed means you haven't clearly decided yet either what to
do with it, when to do it, or where its home is. If any one of those three things are
missing, what, when, or where, then that place where the item is located is a gathering
point.
We've provided you with a very simple worksheet you can use to determine how many
gathering points you have. On this worksheet, for each type of gathering point that you
have, add one. So, for instance, in the example at the top of the worksheet, you'll see
voicemail. If you have three voicemail accounts, such as personal voicemail, cellphone
voicemail, and work voicemail, then the number you would put there would be three. For
desk areas, if you had two piles of paper on your desk, then you would write two, and so
on.
Pause this video now and complete the gathering points worksheet. Then come back
and I'll discuss your results with you. Great, you've completed the gathering points
worksheet. For many people, this process is a real eye-opener. Let's see how your
beginning gathering points number compares with the average results that I've
seen through the years of doing this exercise with clients. Prior to completing this
course, the average person has between 30 and 40 gathering points.
So, if you had a number somewhere between 30 and 40, that's about average. The
lowest I've seen from someone who hasn't completed this time management course is
12. Pretty impressive and that person was, as you might imagine, a focus master. The
highest number I've ever seen personally is 161 gathering points, which, of course,
came from a chaos master. If you're in that range, it's a significant number and we have
a lot of work to do, but we also have the greatest opportunity for improvement.
Now that you understand where you fit on the scale of beginning gathering points, I'll tell
you the target number we're going to shoot for. The number of gathering points that you
want to strive to have by the end of this training is six or less. In the next videos, I'll
explain what the six gathering points are and steps you can take to get to that number.
Narrowing your gathering points
In order to manage time effectively and reduce the number of switches that take place
in your day, you should strive to have six or less gathering points. I refer to these as
"approved gathering points." The gathering points you choose. I'll begin by outlining the
six gathering points I recommend my clients use. Then in future videos, I'll discuss
each approved gathering point in greater depth. The first one is the inbox, meaning a
physical inbox.
A physical inbox is the place where everything that is physical and unprocessed should
go. Papers, receipts, magazines, books, even cords, cables, things that haven't been
put away. Because you don't ever want it to be too full, I recommend that you have a
reasonably large inbox. The second gathering point is a portable inbox. The portable
inbox is simply the mobile extension of your inbox.
It's something that you take with you wherever you go. Understand, a portable inbox is
not the entire briefcase. Rather, it's one spot within the breifcase, or it's one pocket
within your planner. The third gathering point is a notepad. Notepads can be either
digital or paper in a variety of shapes and sizes. Use whatever medium and form works
best for you. Notepads are unique in that you're going to have a combination of
unprocessed action items with just general notes.
The fourth gathering point is one email inbox. You may have multiple email accounts;
however, we want them all to go into one inbox or folder. this will save time from
having to check many different accounts. You only need to go to one place to see all my
unprocessed email. It's typically easy to make this happen with just a few changes in
your settings. And the fifth gathering point is voicemail. Voicemail is still a necessity for
most everyone, but you only need to check one voicemail account, at most.
In a future video, I'll show you some steps that you can take to minimize the number of
voicemail accounts that you have. And finally, the sixth gathering point is not
required, but given to you as an option. It's the wild card. There are several different
options that could work, but you want to choose the one that will make the most sense
for you. Later in this chapter, I'll give you some guidance on how to select a wild card
gathering point that fits your unique needs. Let's begin by exploring the first approved
gathering point: your physical inbox.
Setting up an inbox gathering point
Your inbox is the most important tool when it comes to keeping your space
organized. Your inbox will become the home for all unprocessed physical items. By
home, I mean that, if there's anything out of place, anything unresolved, or anything
where you don't have a scheduled time in your calendar or task list to deal with it, toss
that item into the physical inbox. Think of your inbox as one big box that sits on your
desk or close to your work space.
Anything that you see that's out of place, should be picked up and put into that
box. Papers, receipts, cables, books, magazines, anything that's physical should go in
there. One productivity obstacle some people face is when they allow these things to
pile up in different places and then in a whirlwind of frustration they put everything
away. I call this binge and purge organization, and it's a huge waste of time.
Instead, cultivate the habit of putting things into the inbox rather than putting them
away when they're out of place. Then, at a scheduled time, you'll go through that
inbox with the system I'll show you. You'll be able to clear everything out bringing it to
empty at least once per week. So, how big should your inbox be? This varies according
to your position and everyday work needs. Make sure that it's big enough that it never
gets to the point of overflowing.
If your someone that deals with just a handful of papers each week, then maybe a small
plastic tray will work for you. Maybe you deal with larger items. For instance, I once
worked with an interior design company that has swatches of fabric and granite and lots
of different kinds of samples. They needed to go get a very large tote sized
basket. There's no right or wrong inbox. Get whatever works for you. This is a great
example of a large inbox that would work for most people.
It leaves plenty of room for everything that you might encounter in a week, without
getting too full. Take a moment right now and decide what inbox you're going to use for
your physical gathering point going forward. This is an important first step toward
becoming more productive and getting more time.

Working with a portable inbox

The second gathering point you'll want to select is one portable inbox. I previously
explained that your main inbox is the home for anything physical that's out of place in
your work space. The portable inbox is the mobile extension of that physical inbox. It's
what you take with you when you're out on the road, or when you're out and about,
when you go to the store. Really, any place that you go, with the exceptions of maybe a
night on the town or perhaps participating in sports, you'll want to carry this portable
inbox with you.
Then you'll be prepared when someone hands you a business card or a receipt or a
piece of paper. You just put it in your portable inbox. Any space that's large enough for
the type of paper that you receive in your day will work. To be clear, when I say a
portable inbox, I'm not referring to an entire briefcase or a purse. You may have lots of
other useful items that you carry with you, however, only one slot in that briefcase or
purse should be designated as the portable inbox.
Or, if you're carrying a planner or padfolio, only one pocket in that planner or
padfolio would be your portable inbox. For instance, this portable inbox is an example of
something many of my clients use. There's one pocket in there that's large enough for a
regular sized piece of paper, so if someone hands an item to me, I can put it in that
pocket. Then, when I get back to my office, I take my portable inbox, open it up, and
dump all of its contents into my physical inbox.
Choose whatever form of the portable inbox that works best for your situation. Just
make sure that you have a clearly designated spot and it's something you're
comfortable taking with you most everywhere you go. Now, just a comment from
experience about the portable inbox. Some of you are uncomfortable with the idea of
carrying around a large planner, briefcase or purse wherever you go. If that's your
preference, let me recommend an alternative. Have a small pocket or high-quality file
folder that you put in your car or your roller briefcase.
Then, whenever you're at an event or at a store and someone hands you
something, you can take these new items back with you and put them into that folder. In
general, I don't recommend this, because it adds two extra steps to your system that are
unnecessary; one being that you have to remember to take the items back to that
folder, and two being you have to remember to take that folder out of your car or roller,
take it into your office, and dump it into your physical inbox, but, if you're concerned
about carrying around bulk, putting a portable inbox in the car is an option that some of
my clients have found helpful in the past.
Now's a good time to take a moment and decide what portable inbox you're going
use from this point forward.

Getting the most from a notepad

A notepad is a flexible gathering point you can take with you wherever you go to jot
down ideas, notes, and action items very quickly. The notepad is a little bit unique in
that it combines some of your hand-written notes with no direct action required with
other concrete action items that need to be processed. First, let's talk about what kind of
notepad you might use. There are two main options. Digital and paper. Many tablets or
phones allow for hand-written or quickly typed notes into a notepad program.
For instance, currently, I'm using Evernote to gather hand-written notes, take
pictures, or even record voice, or written notes to myself. If you're quick with
technology, using a notepad app like this can be very effective. Just make sure that
whatever you use it syncs across all devices. Otherwise, you may end up
accidentally creating more gathering points. Some of my clients prefer the feel and
ease of a paper notepad.
This is easily combined with the portable inbox inside a padfolio. This makes it simple to
carry both gathering points with you wherever you go. Some people also have had
success with a very small notepad. Such as this one, here. You can find these notepads
at any office supply store or online, at a reasonable price. This is nice because you can
easily carry it with you in your pocket wherever you go. Whichever one of these
notepads that you use, here are a few best practices for gathering items to the notepad.
Number one, because notepads will often combine general information with actionable,
unprocessed, tasks, make sure that you clearly indicate action items. Separate them
from just your general notes by using some sort of a symbol. In my case, I use an open
check box which lets me know that I need to process it. This is very different than
completing it and I'll show you later how you process these items. The second best
practice is that when you get back to your inbox, or to your office, if you're using a paper
notepad, rip off all the pages, and bring the notepad to blank.
Then, put all of those pages into the inbox This makes it easy for you to not have to
remember to go back and look through the notepad to find all those action items. This
practice gives you a blank slate each day. Helping you to not multitask and be
distracted by other, unresolved items that you've written down previously. The third best
practice is if you're using a digital notepad, to move items after they are processed into
a separate archive folder.
Process them the same way you would email, which is something I'll cover later in the
course. Take a moment right now and decide what kind of notepad you're going to carry
with you wherever you go.

Consolidating multiple email accounts

Although some people wish it was less so, email has become part of our everyday lives,
especially at work. In a later video I'll show you how to process the email you deal with
each day. Right now, I just want to help you reduce the number of email gathering
points you may have. To keep your gathering points down, I recommend you have only
one email inbox. This means that if you have multiple email accounts, for instance a
Gmail account, an Apple account, a Yahoo account, a corporate account, no matter
how many accounts you have you want them all to go into one email inbox.
Because there are so many kinds of software programs available for handling email, it's
not practical for me to give you a full walk through in this training of how to consolidate
accounts for every program. There are resources available on lynda.com that will help
you understand these various email programs better, and I encourage you to take those
courses, however, what you'll want to do right now is if you have many email
accounts combine all of those into one central email program.
Some people may be concerned by this concept. feeling that they want to keep work
and personal separate. Now, if there are legal considerations behind that or if your work
requires you to keep them separate then you're going to have to have an extra
gathering point and there's really no way we can avoid that, but if you have the ability to
combine work and personal I highly recommend it. You'll actually gain a much greater
amount of efficiency and productivity if you deal with both personal and work at the
same time when it come to processing.
By handling all of your emails in one spot you'll get into a rhythm of making those
decisions faster and easier. Also keep in mind that most email programs give you
the flexibility of being able to respond to an email using the account that is was sent
to. You can also have separate signatures that automatically go out depending on which
account you're using. For instance you can have a work signature
automatically attached to your email when you're replying to work emails and a personal
signature automatically attached to email when you're replying to personal emails.
Take a moment right now and consider all the different email accounts you have, then
decide what one central email program you're going to use to handle all that email in the
future.

Consolidating multiple voicemail accounts

How many voicemail accounts do you have? No matter how many voicemail accounts
you have, your goal should be to get to where you only need to check one place for all
voicemail. The simplest way to do this is to set up call forwarding on one of your phone
lines. For instance, if you have a work voicemail and a cell phone voicemail, set either
your work phone to forward to your cell phone if the call isn't answered, or set your cell
phone to forward to your work phone if the number isn't answered.
In this way, only one voicemail account will be used and you only have to check one of
those voicemails. Another option, and this works for some people, is to delegate the
responsibility of checking the voicemail. For instance, if one of your voicemail
accounts is a home voicemail, but your spouse does most of the checking already, see
if you can delegate the responsibility for checking all of the home voicemail to your
spouse. Or perhaps, if you have an assistant, you could have them check your
voicemail for you.
These examples may not apply in your particular situation but this is an option for some.
Another option is to eliminate the need for voicemail completely. How do we do
that? Well, some office phone systems and mobile providers, have built in systems so
that when someone leaves a voicemail, it forwards that as an audio attachment in an
email. Sometimes these systems even transcribe the message. This technology actually
eliminates a gathering point because, even though you can check your
voicemail through that system, you don't need to.
All of your voicemail is now pushed into the email gathering point. There are even third
party tools you can use to replace your mobile voicemail that do the same thing. New
services come online monthly that provide comparable features. By searching for a
voicemail transcription or voicemail to email, you can explore these options. However
you decide to handle your voicemail, it's important for you to get down to one or even
zero voicemail accounts.
Doing this will increase your efficiency by reducing the number of switches of going
back and forth between multiple voicemail accounts. Right now, please right down all of
the voicemail accounts you're currently using and decide how you're going to
consolidate them into one or no voicemail accounts.
Establishing a wild card gathering point
The sixth, and final, gathering point that you may have I call the Wild Card. This Wild
Card gathering point just represents whatever optional gathering point you might need
to fit your unique situation. For instance, if you need a separate personal email
inbox from a work email inbox the Wild Card allows you a sixth gathering point. One
potential gathering point is text messaging. If you're someone who sends and receives a
lot of text messages in your day or if your work environment requires you to use
text then I would recommend that you treat text messaging as a gathering point.
Have a set time and a set place to go through those text messages along with the other
processing that you do. Another Wild Card option is a to-do list. The to-do list is a
gathering point few are using productively. Rather than checking things off of the to-do
list as you complete them, instead, check them off as you process them. Most people
are trying to operate directly from the to-do list when, instead, you should process
items off of the to-do list and put them on to your calendar or into task reminders.
Remember, processing is simply deciding what you're going to do with it, when you do
it, and where its home is. Once you've made the what, when, where decisions you can
check an item off your to-do list. Social networking sites are another Wild Card option
for some. For instance, if one social media account doesn't forward to your email then
you would need to check it separately. If you're fortunate enough to have a dedicated
personal assistant, meaning, that person who handles your schedule and acts as a
gatekeeper for you in a dedicated way, then you can use that person as a gathering
point.
This means that whenever something comes into your mind that you have to do, you
can turn to your dedicated personal assistant and say, "Remind me to do that." On a
side note, many people do ask others for reminders, but they're asking co-workers or
family members. This just creates random gathering points that are unreliable. In
summary, you don't have to use the sixth or Wild Card gathering point but I leave it to
you as an option because I recognize this course needs to be adaptable to a wide
variety of situations.
Try your best, though, to not exceed six total approved gathering points. The more
gathering points you have the more switching will occur in your day. So, right now, take
a moment and consider: do you need a sixth gathering point? And, if so, what would
you choose as that sixth option?
Separating work and personal gathering points
Once you've established your gathering points, a common question comes up. Should
you separate work and personal gathering points? In other words, should you have
two of each kind of gathering point? Should I have a personal inbox and a work
inbox? Should I have a personal voicemail and a work voicemail? The answer to that is
avoid having two of each kind of gathering point if possible. The key phrase in there is "if
possible," because for some people it's not practical for them to combine work and
personal into one space.
A physical inbox, for instance, only works well for both personal and work if you're
working from a home office, but if you have to travel to work and then have lots of
unresolved things at home, you're probably going to have a personal inbox at home as
well. Earlier, I shared the principle that the more gather points you have the more
switches you make. This means that every gathering point you allow in your life will slow
you down, cause you to make more mistakes, and increase your stress levels.
So, should you have one of each gathering point for work and personal? Try as much
as possible to not do that. Keeping your gathering points down will increase your
efficiency. It will reduce your mistakes and reduce your stress levels. Most of my clients
have found that when they combine gathering points and process work and personal
together they're much more efficient and much more effective. Remember, processing
isn't actually performing tasks. It's simply deciding what you're going to do when you're
going to do it, and where the homes for the items are.
So, you'll be able to schedule personal tasks and appointments during personal
time and schedule work items during your work hours. In short, try to reduce the number
of gathering points by combining work and personal if possible. This will increase your
likelihood of success, but this course is flexible enough that if you need to have both
work and personal, you can still succeed.

Taking the next step to controlling your space

I've now given you an overview of the six gathering points and an in-depth explanation
on what each of them are and how to make the best use of them. At this point I would
recommend that you do not continue until you have those gathering points clearly
identified. Make sure you've decided on and designated homes for the following; one
physical inbox, one portable inbox, one notepad, digital or paper, one email inbox, one
voicemail accountant an additional wildcard gathering point if necessary.
After you've done that you're ready to move on to the next step and begin taking action
to implement this training for everyday use. Remember, all of these gathering points
exist for you to put things in them. Try not to put any unresolved item anywhere other
than these gathering points. The next time you're tempted to write a note on the back of
an envelope or stuff something in the drawer to be dealt with later, instead, use one of
the six gathering points you've chosen.
Get in the habit of whenever you find something unprocessed quickly put it into a
gathering point. Not only will this reduce clutter in general but it will help you stay more
focused and more productive.

Selecting your mind clearing options

The second principle I recommend you practice in order to improve your productivity is
to have a mind that is clear, a mind uncluttered with to-dos, action items, and
unresolved ideas. To accomplish this, you'll want to have a system, ready at a moment's
notice, to clear your mind of any unresolved items that pop into your head. In the
previous chapter on the principle of space, I shared the six approved gathering
points for you to use to keep your physical space organized.
The wonderful thing about these six gathering points is that they can also be used to
keep your mind clear of clutter as well. When an idea comes into your head, get it out of
your mind as quickly as possible and put it into the most convenient, approved
gathering point. For instance, if I'm at my office and suddenly remember I wanted to
hang up a new picture on the wall, I can write myself a note to hang up a new
picture and toss the note in my physical inbox.
If I'm away from my office and remember an unresolved task to deliver a report to a
coworker, I could also write a note and put it into my portable inbox, or I could make the
same note in my paper or digital notepad, the third approved gathering point. Perhaps
I'm at the store and see something I want to research online when I can focus on
thinking about it. Perhaps I could send myself an email. Maybe you're driving while you
think of a project you need to work on at home.
It's not appropriate to write or type something by hand, but you could leave yourself a
quick voicemail message while waiting at a stop light, and finally, you can keep your
mind clear by using any wild-card gathering point you chose in the previous
chapter, such as sending yourself a text message or leaving a message for an
assistant. One suggestion; if you find over time that you're better at working with one of
these gathering points than another, for instance you process email faster than you
process your physical inbox, then try as much as possible to put your unresolved ideas
into that favorite gathering point.
Play to your strengths. Begin cultivating this habit immediately. Did something come into
your mind that was unresolved while you were listening to this video? Put that idea into
an approved gathering point right now. The more you practice doing this, the more
conditioned your brain will become to keeping itself open, more creative, ready to
communicate with others, and more focused.
Clearing your mind of its to-dos with mental triggers
I've explained the principle of keeping your mind clear. Now what? If you're like most
people then you have accumulated a vast pile of to dos. Unresolved items that are
floating around in your head. I want to give you a clean slate. Let's clear all of those
items out of your head and get them into an approved gathering point. This will make it
easier for you to process them in the future. The simplest way to do this is to use a list
of mental triggers.
We've provided a handout you can download that gives you a list of triggers for every
single aspect of your life both work and personal. By using this list, you'll be able to
clear everything from your mind and get it into an approved gathering point. Please
download the mental triggers list and I'll show you how to use it. This process is really
pretty simple. First, read through each trigger on the list one at a time and think for a
moment about that trigger.
If anything comes to mind that's unresolved, write it down then move to the next trigger
on the list and repeat. If something comes to mind that's completely unrelated to the
trigger, great. Go ahead and write that down. If nothing comes to mind, that's fine
too. Just move on to the next trigger on the list. I compare this to mining for gold. As you
go through the list, you'll have lots of spots where nothing comes to mind. Eventually,
you'll hit a rich vein of unresolved tasks and to dos and you'll just mine that for a while.
So don't feel that you only need to write down one item per trigger or that you're not
doing things right if nothing comes to mind. This will be easier to understand if we do a
little practice run together. Get your favorite gathering point handy such as a
notepad. I'm going to read a trigger from the list and you will think about the trigger. If
anything pops into your head as unresolved, write that task down. Let's go ahead and
practice for just five items on the list.
Got your gathering point ready? Let's begin. Filing. Gathering points. Areas to organize
or clean. Computers, monitors or printers. Software and apps. Let's stop here. How
many items did you write down? You've got an idea now of how this process works and
you're ready to go through the full mental triggers list.
In my experience, this process of going through the full list takes about an hour. While
you can complete this process by yourself, I'd recommend you find a partner to help
you. It's easier to clear your mind with a partner because having someone else read the
list aloud will help you stay focused on clearing out your mind and therefore have less
switches. If you don't have a partner that's available right now to help you, you may
want to contact someone and set up a time on both your calendars when you can sit
down and go through the entire list.
And if that's not an option, you can still do this by yourself. This simple mind clearing
activity is powerful but the real power comes when you've completed the entire list and
scrubbed your mind of its many to dos.
Setting a mind-clearing schedule
Once you've completed your first session of clearing your mind of unresolved to-dos
and tasks, and actions, you're likely to feel some initial relief. You've been storing all
these items in your head and now you've cleaned them out. This is just the beginning
step. Think about the initial mind clearing exercise like a spring cleaning. You cleared
everything out of your head and gave yourself a blank slate to work with. Over time,
you'll become more practiced at avoiding filling your mind with clutter because you have
a system to keep things out of your mind.
However, it's very normal to miss things, to allow those unresolved items to begin to
accumulate, once again in your head. So we need to build a system, or schedule, for
you to clear those items out of your head. I'd recommend that you set up a time every
three months, once per quarter, to clear out the tasks in your head. At the scheduled
time, you're going to go back through the mental triggers list, just like you did the first
time.
Open up your calendar and create a recurring appointment with yourself every three
months, once a quarter, to clear your mind of all the unresolved tasks and action
items. You're likely to find that these future recurring minds clearing activities will go
much faster than the initial one because you're really just looking for a handful of little
tasks that are hidden in the corner of your mind, rather than dumping an entire back
load of ideas. Let's do it now.
Open your calendar and schedule a recurring appointment for one hour, every three
months, to make sure that your mind stays free and clear of unresolved tasks.

Taking the next step to keeping your mind clear

At this point, it's natural to be concerned about this huge list of tasks and action
items that you've cleared out of your mind. When are you going to do all of this stuff? If
you find yourself in that position, I'd encourage you to continue forward with this
course. A little later, we'll create the habit of processing. I'll show you step-by-step how
to take each item on the list and decide what you're going to do with it, when you're
going to do it, and where it belongs.
You do have enough time to get everything done. You just may not know it yet. What
matters at this point is that from this point forward you cultivate the habit of clearing
anything out of your mind the moment it begins to interrupt your thoughts. When that
unresolved to-do pops into your head, immediately pull out an approved gathering
point and write it down. Leave yourself a message. Get it out. Embrace this habit.
Don't let anything swirl around in there. And remember, your mind is not an acceptable
gathering point.
Choosing the right calendar for you
I imagine it's not a big surprise when I say that your calendar is the most important
tool when it comes to time management. It's such an important tool that it deserves your
careful consideration and selection. There are two main categories of calendar, paper or
digital. Most people are using digital calendars now. But let's discuss a paper calendar
for a moment. Paper planners are affordable, fast to access when you need to write
down an appointment, and require little training to use.
If you do choose to use a paper planner, get a weekly view planner that shows the
hours of each day. If a planner doesn't show the hours, it ceases to become an effective
time budgeter. Because you really don't have any idea how much time you have
left. However, there are some big disadvantages with a paper planner. First, it has
limitations when it comes to recurring appointments. Let's say every Tuesday at 3
o'clock, you have an appointment with your co-worker.
Putting that into a paper planner is very difficult. You'll have to recopy that appointment
every single week. Second, paper planners can also be pretty bulky because you're
carrying around many weeks at at time. And third, if you lose or accidentally destroy that
planner, you lose all that information, ouch. This is why I now only recommend the use
of digital calendars. The ideal option for your digital calendar is a smartphone calendar
that syncs automatically the cloud with your laptop or desktop computer.
This will ensure your calendar is perpetually up-to-date, looks the same no matter what
device you're using, and that your data is easily recoverable in case you should lose or
accidentally destroy your phone. The option you choose for your digital calendar is
completely up to you. Just be sure you choose something that is fast, easy to access,
and portable so you can have it on you at all times and be able to make updates
quickly. This is one place where I recommend you don't skimp.
Make an investment to get the best technology you can afford and that is most
comfortable for you. I do recommend you try as much as possible to stick to one
operating system or provider. For instance, if you've been using Google Calendar, then
the best choice of phone and tablets are Android. If you've been using Apple, stick with
Apple devices. While it's possible to make different devices work together, the goal here
is to reduce complexity and the number of potential attention switches in your day.
Take a moment right now and decide and commit to which calendar option you're going
to use for your time budget. If you haven't been using your calendar much, get ready
because I'm about to help you to become much better acquainted.

Using your calendar effectively

The calendar is the primary tool for time management success. But are you using it
effectively? Over the years of coaching people to improve their productivity, I've found
there are six fundamentals to help you get the most out of your calendar. First, think of
your calendar as your time budget. What does that mean? Well, time isn't money, not
always, but it does behave like money. It must be budgeted because when it's gone, it's
gone.
When you schedule things into your calendar, think of it the same way you would think
about withdrawing money from a bank account. Everyone has a weekly limit of 168
hours. That's your maximum time budget. You should live within that budget and never
overdraw. If you overdraw, you'll go into time debt, and you'll end up paying interest on
time. Interest on time means switching cost, and switching cost means things take
longer, you'll make more mistakes, and you'll increase your stress levels.
So, use the calendar to keep track of your time withdrawals. Schedule almost
everything. This will help you automatically track your time budget and help you avoid
overspending. This leads to the second principle: avoid double-booking
yourself. There's only one of you, so don't try to schedule two things at once. Double-
booking is a bit like spending time on a credit card: lots of overspending, lots of
switching cost.
When you double-book yourself, even if you think one of the appointments might fall
through, you’re creating a situation where you're going to be tempted to multi-
task. You'll have to often reschedule and retrace your steps. The third principle will help
you avoid double scheduling, which is: never commit to an appointment without putting
it into your calendar. Sometimes people will make an appointment and say, Let's do
lunch next week, or I'll call you next Tuesday, but they don't put it into their calendar.
Avoid this mistake. It puts pressure on your mind to keep track of your
commitments. Also, getting appointments in the calendar keeps you within budget, so
always have your calendar on hand and use it consistently. Fourth, schedule buffer and
travel time for appointments. In other words, avoid having appointments that are back-
to-back-to-back: 1:00, 2:00, 3:00, with no room to breathe between them. This isn't
practical or realistic, especially in today's information-overloaded world.
Leave space between your appointments for unexpected interruptions, to take a
moment to relax, to prepare for the next meeting. And certainly, if you have to travel
from one meeting to the next, make sure to give yourself even more buffer time for
travel. Fifth, think of your calendar as a commitment. It's a commitment to others and to
yourself. When you budget time in a calendar, stick to it. The calendar is not the place
for maybe or perhaps.
It's the place for deadlines and follow-through. Anything that has a deadline
and anything that is longer than fifteen minutes has to go to your calendar so that you've
properly budgeted time to complete those items and complete them in a timely
manner. And the sixth principle: think long term. Most people feel like they don't have
enough time to get everything done simply because they're only thinking in terms of
what can be done this week or the next.
The truth is, you have an abundance of time as long as you open your
perspective weeks and months into the future. Begin cultivating the habit of
scheduling deeper into the future and you'll experience less stress and less pressure to
do everything today. The more you use these six mindsets with your calendar, the more
control you'll begin to experience over your own time.
Saying no to others
There is one word that's more powerful than any other when it comes to focusing your
time. That word is "no". I'd like to help you gain the art of saying no to others, gracefully
and tactfully. As you become more productive and manage your time better, others may
see your success and want you to participate in projects or causes or other things that
they have going on. That isn't to say you'll always say no, but it's important to say no
more often than you say yes.
You're time is limited, so whenever you say yes to one thing, you're, in effect, saying no
to something else. In other words, spreading yourself thin will sabotage the success of
anything you’ve already committed to. Here are a few simple and effective ideas that
you can use whenever someone asks you to participate in something. First, you might
ask for the request through email. This gives you time to consider the request in a calm
environment where you can look at your calendar, and consider whether you truly have
the time in your budget to participate.
Also, it allows you to prepare a response that's diplomatic and kind in the case that you
do have to say no. Asking for an email request allows you to prepare a response in a
written format rather than making an excuse in person or, worse yet, saying yes, simply
because you’re uncomfortable with a face to face no. And, let's be honest, some people
may not actually follow through with asking you.
Many people ask for help simply because you're face to face, but they weren't really
committed to having you involved. This gives them the opportunity to back out
gracefully or fail to follow through. Now, what if it's your boss making the request or your
customers? Often it's wise to say yes in these situations. Just make sure you get a
when, meaning a date and time of completion or action. For instance, let's say that your
boss asks you to get a report to them.
You can ask the question "When is the deadline for this report?". This will allow you to
make prioritized decisions about what you have in your calendar. A common mistake of
managers and leaders is that they delegate many responsibilities to their employees but
don't provide clear deadlines. This causes confusion and makes it difficult for
employees to budget their time. Help others out by asking them to give you a
when whenever a task is delegated. Part of saying no is also asking the question
"when?".
Maybe you're not going to say no to it altogether, but you are going to say "not now but
later. “This is when I'm available to do it. By learning the art of saying a tactful no to
others, you'll protect your time budget and improve your focus on your most valuable
activities.
Saying no to yourself
No is the most powerful word in your vocabulary when it comes to focus. Many people
don't have a challenge with saying no to others, but they have a significant
challenge saying no to themselves. I see this occur most often in entrepreneurs or in
people who are in highly creative fields. They have many ideas that compete for their
attention. But instead of saying no to some of these ideas, they put all of them on their
calendar and end up spreading themselves and their available resources very, very thin.
I would like to help you gain some skill in the art of actively saying no to yourself. The
easiest way to say no to yourself is to create what I call a "Perhaps" List. A Perhaps List
is filled with ideas, innovations, things that you might do someday but haven't yet made
the commitment to do them. When an idea comes into your head, if you're not fully
committed to it, put it on the Perhaps List. This will allow you to consider the idea later
on without tying up valuable and previously committed resources.
Set a recurring appointment for yourself to review this Perhaps List, usually once a
month to once every three months. Then, as you review the Perhaps List, you can take
a moment and decide whether or not you're ready to take action on that idea, delete it,
or leave it on the list for future review. When is also a powerful word when saying no to
yourself, meaning, when are you going to do it? When a new idea comes into your
head, ask yourself, do I need to do this now, or can I do it later? As long as you are
using your calendar properly as a time budget, procrastination can actually be your
friend.
Appropriate procrastination can help you, because you're still going to complete those
ideas but do so by putting them further into the future on your calendar. In my
experience, most people think too short-term when it comes to their calendar, only what
can be done today or within a week. Instead, think in terms of months or even
years. When adding something new to your calendar, a new project, a new idea, a new
initiative, ask yourself, when is the latest that I can complete this? Then put it into your
calendar as far into the future as is reasonable.
This will allow you to focus on the tasks at hand and not get distracted by every
idea that pops into your head. By learning the skill of actively saying no to
yourself, you'll be better able to focus and complete the projects you already have on
your plate. And you'll likely see more success by bringing projects to full
completion before switching to the next big idea.

Preparing for action

Up to this point in the course we've been discussing principles of productivity. We
haven't talked too much about what to do with these principles yet. That's about to
change. The next chapters of this course go into hands-on implementation of your time
management strategy. There are three things you'll want to do to prepare for the next
section. First, insure you're in your workspace. Second, budget time to complete these
chapters. And third, check to make sure you have all of the items on my recommended
resources checklist.
First, please watch the remaining chapters in your workspace. By workspace I mean the
place where you most often handle things like email, paper work and scheduling. Most
people have some sort of home base when it comes to doing their work, and that's what
I mean. If you have a mobile office that's fine, just have your briefcase, bag and any
work-related resources on hand while you go through the next chapters. You'll get the
maximum benefit from this training if you complete it in your workspace.
Very important. Next, in terms of time budget, since the next chapters are so hands
on, they take a few hours to complete depending on your level of chaos. To get the best
results, please check your calendar and your day, and make sure you'll have enough
uninterrupted time to complete these chapters in one sitting If not, you may want to
schedule some time with a reminder to complete them later. Last, we've provided a
simple checklist for you to download, the resource checklist.
This isn't necessarily a shopping list. If you already have these items on hand, you don't
need to go buy them. But if you're missing any items, I recommend that you go get
them prior to moving into the next chapters. It's very possible you won't need every item
on this list. Yet it's much better to have these items on hand and then return anything
you don't use, rather than finding this process interrupted because you're missing
something.
Just a quick overview of this checklist. First, you'll want to have an inbox. Something like
this really deep file box that's legal sized, the bigger the better. Then you'll want to have
some large cardboard or plastic boxes, at least eight of them. Really any kind of box
where you can put things will work. You'll also want to have an electronic labeler with
batteries, similar to this one. The exact make and model doesn't matter. Also, in case
you have some straight disks, you may want to have some place to put DVDs or
CDs, like this storage wallet.
Next, you'll want to have a set of hanging file folders that match the size of your filing
cabinet. Then you'll want to have a set of manila folders that fit your cabinet. Usually
around 100 of these will do. Also, pick up two sets of something like these, which are
alphabetical guides for your hanging file folders. They're not absolutely necessary, but
they can save you a lot of time if you don't want to write out letters by hand. Then you'll
want to have a set of stacking trays.
Six will do. These will be used to create homes, or places, to put processed items
temporarily. The less expensive plastic ones will work, but you can get higher quality if
you're concerned with the aesthetics of your office. I recommend the horizontal loading
kind instead of the vertical. This layout makes it easier to put papers in and pull them
out. And finally, if you've made a decision to update your technology or calendar in any
way, please take care of that before moving forward.
For instance, if you've decided to get a new phone this week, or use a new programmer
for calendaring, get that taking care of first, since you'll be using your calendar a lot in
the next few chapters. If you're undecided though stick to what you've got right now. It
will still likely work. Once you've got these items, and you're in your workspace, and
you've budgeted the time to complete the final chapters, you're ready to go. So, let's get
started.
Preparing to gather
Now we're ready to start taking action. The first step that we're going to take is
gathering. We’re going to reduce the number of physical gathering points that you
have and we're going to do it quickly. The way that we're going to do that is we're
going to gather everything that's unprocessed into an inbox. When I say processed, I
mean you know what to do with it, you know when to do it, and you know where it
belongs. If any one of those three things is missing, what, when, or where, then it's
unprocessed and it should be gathered.
You may have enough unprocessed items at the moment that if we gather them all, they
won't fit into any one inbox. That's why I asked you to get those large boxes and to have
them on hand. No matter how many boxes we end up with, think of it as gathering
things into one big inbox. Before I actually walk you through an office and show you how
to gather, we need to be very clear about what should be gathered and what shouldn't
be gathered.
Things that you shouldn't gather are things that are where they belong. I use this
phrase, "Everything has a home, "and no visitors allowed." If something is in its correct
home, it's where it belongs. It's processed and it shouldn't be gathered. But if you have
things mixed into a home, let's say we've got sticky notes on your computer, we want to
pull those pieces of paper off and put them into the inbox. Also, set aside one special
box right now.
You'll never repeat this step after the first gathering, but for this training it's important to
do it. Call this temporary box the one week box. As you go through the gathering
process, ask one question about each item: Will I need to use this or take care of
this during the next week? If so, put it into the one week box rather than the other
boxes. That box, that one week box, is going to be a place where you start processing.
This one time distinction allows you to develop your time management systems without
getting buried in lower priority stuff. Put everything else into the other boxes. Absolutely
everything. Don't throw it away, don't sort, don't organize. Just put unprocessed items
into the boxes. Now that we have the ground rules set, let's begin.
Gathering to your inbox: Desk
The more gathering points you have the more switches will take place in your
day making you much less productive. In this video I'm going to show you how to
reduce the number of physical gathering points in your office. Before you begin, make
sure you're in your office or your workspace. We're going to take all the gathering
points that are physical and in your office and put them into one giant inbox. At this point
you should have a series of empty boxes, about six to eight to be safe, including one
special box set side - the temporary one-week box.
For this gathering session only this one-week box is where you put any unprocessed
item you need to deal with or access during the next week. Let's begin. We're going to
take everything that's in here that's unprocessed and we're going to put in the gigantic
inbox. Let's start with the obvious stuff you have on your desk. Sticky notes are good for
one thing and one thing only - making notes for someone else.
You're going to start using your calendar for the reminding, so we don't have to depend
on whether or not you look at this piece of paper to remember when to do stuff. Let's rip
off all the sticky notes and throw them in. This one note needs to be dealt with this
week, so I'll put it in there, the one-week inbox, and the rest of this can go into the big
inbox. Let's find any other things that are unprocessed. We'll use the principle
"Everything has a home, "and no visitors allowed".
So, if you see something that's sharing a space with something else, I call that a
visitor, you need to get it out and put it in the box. Then later you can process it and put
it in its correct home. This pair of scissors is sharing the home with pens, so it needs to
go. This top page here needs to be dealt with this week, so I'll rip it out and put it in the
temporary one-week box. Everything else can go in the big inbox.
Let's check the drawers and see what we've got here. Everything has a home, and no
visitors allowed. So it looks like this should be the home for the pens; anything that isn't
a pen goes in the big inbox. By the way, I recommend that you use divider trays like
this, or even small baskets, and that way you can have more slots and have more
homes. Trays are a great way to take a drawer that's just wide open and turn it into a
place where you can have many different homes.
This is where the labeler I asked you to get comes in handy. Creating labels allows you
to quickly see where things are and to also find things quickly. For just one example, I'm
going to create a label called "Pens". I'll use this label to show where I'm keeping my
extra pens. It doesn't matter where you put the label, just put it some place where it's
visible to you. Here's a good rule of thumb when creating homes. Things that you use
multiple times a day, such as pens, or a stapler, or even sticky notes, you may want to
be able to have them right at hand.
Things that you maybe use once a week you want to have at some place like the
drawers. And things that you use less than once a month, you can have them out of the
room. When you're gathering, please don't throw anything away, with the exception of
dirty food trash, like a banana peel or a candy wrapper. Throw everything else in the big
inbox. Here's why. We're developing muscle memory and conditioning your mind so that
when you see something out of place you put it in the inbox.
When you come to your office every day and see all these things pushed aside into
corners, it’s actually very stressful and very draining on your day. Cultivate the habit
from this point forward that whenever you see something out of place you put it in the
inbox and nowhere else. This will help us avoid a lot of switching cost in the
future. Many people are in the habit of what I call "binge and purge organization". They
allow the disorder to grow until they say, "I can't take it anymore", and then they take a
whole day, they throw things away and they put them where they belong.
This becomes a cycle that they repeat over and over, and it's very time-consuming and
stressful. By conditioning yourself to always put unprocessed items in the inbox, you'll
break that negative cycle. As you're gathering, keep telling yourself, "Everything has a
home, no visitors allowed." Any item that violates that rule, take it out and throw it in the
inbox. It looks like we've gathered everything here. While going through this process, it's
natural to tell yourself, "I should have taken care of this.
"I should have taken care of that." Relax. You can know that in the future we're going to
take care of absolutely everything here. We're going to process each item, one at a
time, using the system I'm going to show you. In summary, here are your action
steps. First, move all unprocessed items into one big inbox. Second, put any items that
need to be dealt with or accessed in the next week into the temporary one-week inbox.
Third, don't throw anything away. Fourth, remove anything that is visiting in the wrong
home. These are unprocessed items. Fifth, dump any miscellaneous drawers or
files into the inbox. These are unprocessed items. Sixth, create more homes for items
as necessary. And seventh, label homes as you create them. Now it's your turn.
Following the example I just gave, please pause this course and gather everything from
your office and put it all into your big inbox. This will help you cultivate the habit of never
putting anything unprocessed anywhere other than your inbox. When you're done, come
back and we'll discuss what to do next.

Gathering to your inbox: Elsewhere

Now that we've gathered everything from your desk, you may think that we're done. Not
quite yet. We need to cover every single area where you might have gathering
points.Remember in an earlier chapter where we did an exercise to count all your
different gathering points? Well, we need to gather items from all of them. So now, I'd
like you to stand up and take a look around your office. Are there any places that you
missed? Are there any spots behind cabinets where papers may have fallen or may
have gotten lost? How about closets or storage areas? You can pause the video and go
check those areas out.
Are there any visitors here that are in the wrong home? Remember, everything has a
home and no visitors allowed. Please be absolutely thorough when it comes to
gathering. If you are, you may never need to repeat this process again. You may have a
question about large items. Let's say you have a picture frame that needs to be hung
up and it's larger than all the boxes put together. That's a common issue. If you have
something that's bigger than the boxes, make a note to deal with it later and put that
note into one of your approved gathering points.
This will save us some space and time during gathering. After gathering everything from
all hidden corners of your office, take a broad look around and ask yourself, "Are there
any changes that I would make here?" Do you need different shelving? Do you want to
re-paint or re-decorate something? Are there pictures that need to be hung up? And,
are there things on shelves that you don't want there anymore? Any kind of aesthetic
changes that you want to make to your office, anything that you see, write down a
note and put it into an approved gathering point.
After finishing up with the office, do you have any other gathering points to
consider? What about your car? What about your home office, or your home? What
about the basement or garage? We also need to gather from those areas. At this point,
you should be an expert in the process of gathering, right? You know how to find things
and you know how to put them in boxes. You understand the principle of everything has
a home and no visitors allowed. Let's not interrupt this course too much, though.
So, pull out your calendar and budget some time, ideally within the next 30 to 60 days to
gather items from those places, perhaps your car, home, basement, garage, a storage
area.Wherever they are, write down enough time to gather from those areas. Usually
this takes, for larger areas, about an hour per room. Once you complete the entire
gathering process for every aspect of your life, you'll find that a strong habit has
formed, and you'll find it easier to avoid falling back into binge and purge organization.
One important final word, we just took everything unprocessed in your life and gathered
it into one place. Do you feel relieved? Scared? Excited? Whatever you're feeling right
now is perfectly normal. When I've asked coaching clients, at this point, "How do you
feel?," many are concerned. They put all of their unprocessed items into one place but
they don't know what to do with it. This is why moving on to the next chapter and
completing the entire course is essential.
I'm about to show you how to handle every single item in all of those boxes. We're not
going to do it all at once. We're going to take one step at a time, helping you learn new
habits and new muscle memory so that pretty soon processing all these items
correctly will become second nature to you. It will be as natural as putting on your
clothes each morning. But first, we need to learn a new way of dealing with these items
one at a time. Let's move on and I'll show you the first step to processing your inbox.
Mastering the what, when, where processing system
If you've completed all the training up to this point, you'll understand how critical it is to
process. Processing is simply the act of deciding what the next step is to completing
something, when you're going to do it, and where its home is. What, when, where
processing is at the heart of helping you master your time. In this video, I'll provide a
brief overview of the what, when, where system. Then, in the next videos I'll analyze
each part of this system in greater depth.
The first step of the what, when, where processing system is to take one item from one
of your approved gathering points. Remember, an approved gathering point is one of
those six places where anything unresolved should be put. When it comes time to
process, you pull out just one item and begin processing that one item. It's critical that
you take only one item at a time. If you pick up two or three items or halfway through
processing one, stop and pick up another, you're switch-tasking.
Switch-tasking is inefficient because it slows you down, causes you to make more
mistakes, and increases your stress. So, pick up one item and ask yourself the
question, "What is the next step?" Meaning, what is the next step I must take to move
this thing toward completion? The second question you ask yourself is, "When will it be
done?" Meaning, during my available time, when should I take that step? Should I do it
now? Should I do it later? When is that time? Then finally, ask yourself the
question, "Where is its home?" Meaning, where does this thing belong? Should I file it
away? Should I stuff it into a drawer? Should I throw it away? Get in the habit of asking
yourself these three questions every single time you pick up an item during processing.
What is the next step? When will it be done? Where is its home? In fact, for the first
hour or so that you use this new system, ask yourself these questions out loud. What is
the next step? When will it be done? Where is its home? Saying this out loud helps
condition your mind and build mental muscle memory. Repeat these questions over and
over until you get to the point that you can't pick up a new item until you hear yourself
asking these three questions.
What is the next step? When will it be done? Where is its home? If you consider these
three questions, you'll realize you're already processing. Everyone has to process. You
have to answer these three questions or nothing gets done. However, if you haven't
been following a system like this you're likely making these choices haphazardly and
incompletely. You're switching throughout your day asking the what, when, where
questions haphazardly and it's causing you to lose significant amounts of time, make
lots of mistakes, and increase your stress.
Rather than processing randomly throughout the day, we're going to create a consistent
schedule to go through this processing. This schedule will help you process quickly and
with minimal effort. It all begins with these three questions: What is the next step? When
will it be done? and where is its home? Before you've processed your first item
though, let's explore these questions in depth.
Processing question 1: What is the next step?
Let's take a close look at the first question of the processing system, which is: what is
the next step? When processing, it's critical you figure out just the next action step. Just
the next thing you must do to move this item, this piece of paper, this email, whatever it
is you have in front of you, forward toward completion. Take the time to think about this
and make a clear decision. It usually takes only five to ten seconds of mental effort to
make a clear decision about what the next step is.
However, many people jump over determining the next step, which is a big part of the
reason why items get perpetually stuck in the inbox. Many people have conditioned their
minds to have such short attention spans, that if they pick up an item and are uncertain
in any way about the next step, they put it back in the box and skip over it to something
easier. Please don't do that. Hang in there, and maintain focus on answering this
question: what is the next step? Don't worry about answering this question perfectly.
Just give it your best guess. Once you've decided what the next step is, you may want
to consider briefly, is this something I want to be doing with my life? That may sound
like an abstract question, yet it has value. Many people, particularly in an
information overloaded world, find themselves in a pattern of just doing stuff to fill the
time. Yet, this stuff has little meaning or value to themselves personally. This means the
person didn't make a conscious choice to participate, but just did it because it was
there.
Someone asked you to show up or help with something, and you just said "yes" without
thinking about it. If the item you're processing doesn't line up with what you want out of
life, disengage from it. Disengage means find a way to get out of it. Find someone else
to fulfill the obligation, or just plain tell yourself, "I'm not going to spend any more time
working on this thing". Perhaps, instead of disengaging completely, you want to
delegate the action to someone else.
Many of the steps you take, no matter how important they are, are better handled by
others. Perhaps someone else is better qualified to do them, or perhaps, it's a more
valuable use of someone else's time, where your time is more valuable when spent
focused elsewhere. For instance, creating this training program was something only I
could do, but proofreading it was delegated to someone else. Also, be aware that the
next step may be waiting for, meaning you're waiting for something to come to you.
Waiting is an action, and is sometimes appropriate. Waiting is especially appropriate if
you delegate that step to someone else. I remember this concept with a little rule of
thumb: a delegate out is a waiting for in. Whenever you delegate, create a step for
yourself, reminding you that you're waiting for them to complete it. The next processing
question, "When will it be done?", will help you determine how long to wait.
So, in summary, when considering one unprocessed item, you ask yourself what the
next step is, and stay focused until you decide on that step. If it isn't something you want
to be doing with your life, then disengage from it. Sometimes, the best step is to
delegate it to someone else, and waiting is an action which may be appropriate. Let's
move on to the "when" portion of "what, when, where" processing.
Processing question 2: When will it be done?
After you've decided what the next step is now you get to decide when you will do that
step. The question When will it be done? doesn't apply to the entire thing you're
processing, or the entire project. It's just referring to when to do that step you decided to
do. While determining the "when" for your action step be specific. Decide on both the
date and the time. I'm going to do it sometime next week is vague.
Choose a specific time, such as I'm going to do it next Tuesday at three o'clock, or even
right now. But how do we know which when is best? Here are a few rules of thumb my
clients have found very helpful. First, if the item can be done in 5 minutes or less do it
right then, do it now. Why five minutes? Well, suppose we decided to put this off a little
bit, just scheduling the step would take a couple of minutes, plus we have to account for
the switching cost involved.
Remember, switching cost is the transition time of mental effort and energy when you
switch from one task to the other. The switching cost alone is at least two to three
minutes, so if something can be done in five minutes or less just do it now. Second,
calendar the item if it will take more than 15 minutes, or if it is time sensitive. If
something takes more than 15 minutes, even if it doesn't have a deadline, and even if
it's of minor importance, it must be budgeted in a calendar.
Why? Well, something that long isn't going to fit quickly into a busy day. We have to
reserve some space in advance, or budget to get it done. Otherwise it will just get
pushed off into the future over and over. So if it takes more than 15 minutes put it in
your calendar. Also, if the step is time sensitive, meaning it has a deadline and must be
completed by a certain date, you also need to put that in your calendar. Your calendar is
a solid, firm commitment of how you're going to spend your time.
In general, if you're processing properly, most everything will either be done now or end
up on your calendar. Third, everything else belongs on the task reminder list. Everything
else refers to steps that take between five and 15 minutes and aren't time sensitive. The
task reminder list, sometimes called a task list or reminders, is most effective when
used for short, brief, and flexible actions.
Typically, the minority of the items you process will end up here. If the calendar is
solid the task reminder list is fluid. Use the task reminder list to remind you of possible
dates and times when you're going to take action steps. If you don't perform the task at
that specific time you can snooze, or reschedule the reminder. Another tip for when will
it be done is that you may find it helpful to group repetitive tasks.
For instance, if I have a series of bills to pay, rather than have a bunch of separate
calendar items scattered throughout my week or month, it may be wise to have a
recurring appointment in my calendar to pay all the bills at once. Grouping repetitive
tasks can be an efficient way to get in the groove and accomplish many things of the
same type efficiently. Another rule of thumb, leave buffer space between
appointments. Avoid over-scheduling yourself, or putting appointments back to back to
back.
We live in a fast-paced and interruptive world, so let's leave breathing room between
appointments. A little bit of extra time before and after your calendared items. In general
leave at least 10 minutes of buffer space for every scheduled hour. So if you have a two
hour appointment, that means you're going to need to leave 20 minutes of buffer space
after the appointment. Leaving buffer space will leave enough room for you to stay on
top of unexpected interruptions and give you time to prepare for your next appointment.
You'll also likely feel less stressed in general. So, in summary, be specific when
answering the when will it be done question, do it now if it can be done in five minutes
or less, calendar it if it will take more than 15 minutes or is time sensitive, use a task
reminder for everything else, group repetitive tasks, and leave space between
appointments. And now we're ready to move to the final processing question, where is
its home?

Processing question 3: Where is it home?

The final step of the What, When, and Where processing system is Where is its
home? This means that you need to decide where you're going to put this physical or
digital item you've been processing, and possibly where you need to be to perform the
next step. In the next video, we'll discuss how and where to file. In this video, I want to
cover some helpful rules of thumb. First, remember this phrase. "Everything has a
home, and no visitors allowed." This means that items of similar type should be grouped
together, and kept separate from everything else.
This makes it much more efficient and easy to find things and put things away in the
future. What kind of home should you use? Well, you can use things like folders, boxes,
trays, shelves. The tool you use can be flexible, as long as you create clear
boundaries between different items, and don't mix them together. Next, what if you think
you need to throw the item out? You may have heard the phrase "When in doubt, throw
it out." That's a good rule of thumb when it comes to physical items, such as pieces of
paper and so on.
When it comes to digital items though, "When in doubt, keep it." If you know you'll never
need to access that email or digital file again, then go ahead and hit the delete key. If
there's any doubt, store it. The cost of digital storage goes down year after year, while
the ability for search engines to locate these items continues to improve. So when it
comes to physical, “When in doubt, throw it out." When it comes to digital, "When in
doubt, keep it." This leads to another rule of thumb, regarding where you keep the
information of all the contacts you have, such as phone numbers, emails, addresses,
and so on The rule is to keep them all in one place that you can access at any time.
If you're using a computer, rather than a paper planner, which I recommend, then use a
service that syncs the data continuously, and makes it easier to share with others. That
way, you don't waste time searching for those contacts again, or, worse yet, calling
coworkers and asking them to look up information, which interrupts both of you. One
optional suggestion of the Where question of processing, includes categorizing tasks
and calendar items.
Some of my clients have found it helpful to categorize items in their calendar, and task
reminder list. This is especially useful if you work at multiple locations, or meet with a
variety of individuals. For instance, you can group all of the tasks that are performed at
a particular office into the "At Carpenteria" category. Or you could group all of the
items that you need to shop for into the "At Shopping" category. This makes it easy to
find them, depending on the context of where you are at the time.
You could also use a category for recurring meetings. For instance, if I have a regular
meeting with Susan, every single week at 10 o'clock, if I put all the items I need to
discuss with her in my task list under the category of "One to One Susan," then when I
go to the meeting with Susan, I can pull open the list, and there they all are in one
place. So, to summarize, when you're answering the "Where is its home" processing
question, "Everything has a home, and no visitors allowed." With physical items, "When
it doubt, throw it out." With digital items, “When in doubt, keep it." Keep all contacts in
one central location, and Categorize all your task and calendar items if that helps you
be more efficient.
In the end, we want to be able to put things away quickly, and find them just as
quickly. Now let's discuss how to accomplish that with your filing.

Filing made simple

Let's explore how to simplify and speed up the process of basic paper filing. First, when
filing non-financial documents use a simple alphabetical system. Set up hanging file
folders and label each file folder alphabetically. You can usually purchase hanging file
folders in groups of 25. One short of the full alphabet. So if you find yourself a folder
short combine the letters X and Y which brings you to a total of 25 file hanging folders.
Whenever you have some new document that you need to file pull out a manila
folder write on the manila folder what you're going to put in there and then put that piece
of paper in the folder. Use a manila folder rather than putting items directly into the
hanging file folder. This will make it easier to retrieve the items in the future. So let's
take an example with this piece of paper. This is a poem that I really enjoy. This is an
inspirational quote. I might want to copy this and share it in a meeting or just refer back
to it.
Where do I file this piece of paper? Well, I simply file it under the first letter that comes
to mind. So if I think of P for poems then I pull out a manila folder write poems on it stick
the poem in there and then put it under P for poems. Now perhaps Q might come to
your mind for quotes so you put it under Q for quotes. What letter you choose doesn't
really matter. And that's part of the simplicity of this system.
Just write down the first thing that comes to mind stick the papers in and then put the
manila folder into the hanging file folder. This system works very well for any
miscellaneous type of document that you have. But what if we have a client? If it's just a
few putting them in the main filing system is enough. But if you have many many
clients then you may need a set of alphabetical files reserved for that category. Clients.
Or vendors. Or any other category where you have large number of one particular type
of file. Then, using the client example whenever you file a client folder away you put it in
there according to alphabetical order. So for instance here is a document from the
Explorer California Company. So I'll pull out a manila folder I already had created for
them in my client files under E.
I'll stick the document in that manila folder put it back and I'm done. What about
financial documents, though? If you work in a larger company there probably already is
a well established accounting filing system. So just use what's in place. For an individual
working out of a home office or a small business create a set of 12 file folders. One for
each month of the year. Then whenever you receive a statement or receipt any financial
document put it into the month in which it was dated.
If there wasn't a date file it within the month you received it. This simple system works
well for home-based businesses service professionals or just personal finance. To be
safe you'll want to keep those records for at least seven years. So create a new set of
12 month folders for each new year. Using a simple system like this will make it fast as
possible to file documents and simple to find them again when needed.
Now let's discuss how to handle filing documents on your computer.

Digital filing made simple

What about digital files? I mentioned in a previous video that when it comes to digital
items, when in doubt, keep them. But you may be wondering how to organize it
all. There are many different approaches and new technology advances that are made
almost daily that change the tools you might use. Because of that, I just want to share
six fairly universal principles for digital organization regardless of the tool you use. What
I'm about to share with you applies to everything except e-mail, which I'll cover later in
the course.
First, if you're using a computer that contains both personal and work files, create two
main folders; personal and work. This initial separation will make it easier to store items
and find them later. Second, create broad categories within these folders. For instance,
under my Work folder; I have legal, marketing, financial, sales, speaking, and so
on. Third, you may create one more layer of subfolders.
For instance, in my speaking folder, I have subfolders for handouts, slides, and
images. I use this more specific personal example to show you that there's no one right
or wrong way to create these folders. Just use folder names and subcategories that are
meaningful to you. Let me pause for a moment and summarize that I just suggested you
have three layers of folders and no more. First, personal versus work.
Then, broad categories. Then, subcategories. I recommend you not go any deeper than
this. Otherwise, you give yourself too much work trying to sort and organize
things, which is really not necessary in today's age of ever more effective search
engines. Once you've created the basic structure, then you'll have one folder name that
you'll include in every subfolder you create called old. This is where you move older
versions of files that you no longer are actively using.
This allows you to recover old information and archive it quickly to make space. For
instance, when I create a new version of my slides for my focused business speech,
you notice that I move the older version into the old folder. Now it's not lost but it's no
longer cluttering up the main subfolder. This leads to the file naming itself. I recommend
that to avoid confusion, you save each new version under a new name.
The easiest way I found to do this is with the year, month, day convention. Sometimes
shown as this. Not only does this make it easy to create a new file version and not worry
about making sure I'm calling it by the right version number but it comes in handy when
viewing files sorted alphanumerically because it brings the newest version to the
top. Then, after creating the new version or when I see an older version, I can drag and
drop it into the old folder.
One final tip, make sure all of your files have automatic back-ups. There are many ways
to accomplish this and software and hardware tools become outdated frequently. So, to
avoid mentioning any product in particular, I'll just say, find a tool that you're comfortable
with, that creates off-site back-ups of your files without you having to think about it. That
way, even if your computer is completely destroyed, all you have to do is re-sync with
your tool and in a matter of a day or two, all of your files will return.
By keeping your method of digital filing simple and consistent, you'll make it faster and
easier to store and retrieve files when needed.

Processing your first inbox

Now that you understand how what, when, where processing works, it's time for you,
and me, to start practicing. I want what, when, where processing to become second
nature to you, to get you conditioned to follow the same system every time. In the
beginning, this system may be a little bit awkward for you, and that's okay. Just take
your time, be patient and repeat with one item at a time until it becomes
automatic. During the gathering video, I asked you to separate, into one box, any items
that need to be dealt with this week.
We're going to begin practicing with this temporary one week box. I'm going to give you
a few examples of how this is done. First, I pick up one item out of the gathering
point. It's an offer for a credit card. I ask myself the question, what is the next step? So I
pause to consider it. In this case, do I need a credit card? No. I don't need another
credit card. So, I'm going to throw it away, that's the next step. When will it be
done? Well, I'm going to do it now.
And, where is it's home? I want to be safe with my identity, so I'm going to throw it into a
plastic slot that I've set aside and labeled for shredding. I have time set aside monthly
for shredding. What I just did may seem very slow for something that seemed obvious
to you. Keep in mind that repetition is a powerful teacher. So, even on obvious items,
ask yourself the what, when, where questions.
Let's pick up one more item, a bank statement. What's the next step? Well, the next
step is, I need to review it and make sure there aren't any strange charges on it. When
will that step be done? Can I do it in five minutes or less? Yes, in this case I can do it in
five minutes or less so there's no need to schedule it. No need to even pull out my
calendaring system. So, I'm going to take it out and look at it. Where is its home? When
I'm doing this step, its home is right here in my hands.
So I'm going to go ahead and do it right now. Oh great, it looks good. Am I done, yet? I
reviewed it and everything looks good, so I processed the item, right? Not yet, because
there are still more steps until its complete. I need to process it again, right now, by
repeating the what, when, where questions. What's the next step? Now the next step is I
need to file it. When will it be done? I can definitely file it in five minutes or less, so I'm
going to do it now.
Where is its home? Well, its home is right here in the financial files that I set up for the
month of January. So I stick it in the month of January, and I'm done with that. Now let's
take an item that's a little bit more complex, that requires a little more action on my
part than just filing something or throwing it away. I have a note here for myself, to
follow up with Bob Jones. He was interested in receiving coaching and wanted me to
follow-up in three to four months.
So, what's the next step? The next step is, I need to send him an email about
this. When will it be done? Three to four months from now. That's pretty flexible; can I
do it now? No, I can't do it now. Should I calendar it or task it? Will it take me more than
15 minutes, or is it time sensitive? Its completion date is flexible, and I doubt that
sending an email will take more than several minutes. So, this belongs in the task
reminder list.
I'm going to create a task reminder to e-mail Bob Jones. Let's open this up on the
computer screen so you can see it. I'm using Google calendar right now, but most any
program that can create automatic reminders can handle this. First, I'm going to create
a secondary calendar, just for task reminders. These are not firm commitments on my
schedule, but just reminders of when I'm most likely to do them.
Within this calendar, I'm going to set a pop-up notification to occur for anything I put
in, zero minutes before it happens. Meaning, right on that time. I could also add e-mail
or phone notifications if I preferred those to the pop-up. Then, I create an appointment
to contact Bob Jones. Down in the description box, I could put some notes to remind me
about our conversation, if I want. And then I'm going to put the time and the date on
which I think I'll contact him.
Now, for the last question of processing, I have a what, I have a when, but now I need a
where. Where is its home? Well, for the piece of paper that I'm holding, the home is the
trash can, I don't need it, and when in doubt, if physical, throw it out. Let's do another
quick example so I can show you how to use the calendar. Right here I have a pile of
thank-you cards. These thank-you cards are for people who hired me to speak for their
company last month.
Let's process it. What is the next step? Now, I need to write a handwritten note for each
one of these clients, and I have several cards. When will it be done? Can I do this in five
minutes or less? No, because I want to write a thoughtful note to each client. in fact, it
will probably take me about thirty minutes. Because it's going to take me over 15
minutes, I know immediately this step has to go to the calendar. Most items you process
will end up on your calendar.
I open up my calendar to set a time. Again, while you see me using Google
Calendar, any calendaring program has this ability. I'm going to set a time in my
calendar to complete these thank-you cards next week, on Thursday, at 9 A.M. That
should give me plenty of time to go through and write thoughtful notes. I also want to
look at my calendar and make sure there is plenty of buffer space on either side of
this, and that I'm not cramming it in, and Thursday at nine looks good.
I've got at least a half an hour of space on either side of this, which is more than
enough. Now that that's scheduled, I ask myself the last processing question, where is
its home? I still have these cards, right? So, I pull out a manilla folder, label it, "Thank-
you Cards," put the cards in, file it under "T" in the Miscellaneous Folders, and I'm
done. I've processed the item, and it's complete.
Now, it's your turn. Please pause this course, and begin processing items from your
inbox one at a time. Spend at least one hour practicing with the existing items that you
have. This will help make this processing system become second nature to
you. Conditioning your mind to get faster and faster at what, when, where processing.

Setting your processing schedule

If you completed the task that I assigned you in the previous video, then you've already
spent one hour processing items, one at a time, out of your inbox. If you haven't done
that yet,I encourage you to pause and schedule one hour to complete that task first,
before proceeding. After you've completed your first hour of processing you'll realise
that while you're off to a good start you likely still have a lot more processing to do. In
fact, you'll always be processing.
It will now be a lifelong habit. Your target should be to get in a rhythm so you bring each
of your six approved gathering points to zero at least once per week. Not all at the same
time, but each of them to zero at least one moment per week. Sound intimidating? Don't
worry, it's very possible. First, you'll want to set a recurring appointment in your
schedule to do processing.
My recommended weekly allowance of processing is 5 hours a week. Some people
need less and some people need more. After you've worked your system for a
while adjust to your needs, but let's start with five hours for now. When should you
schedule that five hours a week. To find the best time for your recurring processing
schedule consider the times at which you're least likely to be interrupted. All of us have
interruptions in our day, but there're also ebbs and flows in your weekly schedule to
those interruptions.
Look at your calendar and find the natural times at which you are least likely to be
interrupted. For instance, let's say that earlier in the morning I'm usually not bothered by
other people. In that case I could schedule every morning from 8am to 9am for
processing. That would give me five hours a week based on a Monday through Friday
week. Incidentally, I recommend you don't schedule in increments of less than one hour
of time.
Why? Because I found that most people get into a productive processing rhythm at
about the 25 to 30 minute mark. Schedule at minimum one hour at a time to make the
most of that rhythm. You can even schedule entire chunks of time, such as five hours of
processing in a day. If I preferred to work in a large chunk of time, perhaps I could
schedule every Friday from 8am to noon, that's four hours, and I'll give myself an hour
lunch break, and then schedule another hour from 1 to 2.
That way I get all my processing done in one day. Are you concerned that I'm asking
you to spend five hours a week? The truth is you're already likely spending two or three
times that right now. Everyone has to process since it's simply the act of deciding what
is the next step, when will it be done, and where the homes for things are. But most
people do this haphazardly throughout their day, back and forth, all over the place.
In comparison, this system is asking you to spend less processing time, but do it in a
focused way. This leaves us much more time for doing the work and performing
tasks. Now it's up to you to decide what schedule you want to try first. Please pause the
video and set up in your calendar your recurring schedule for processing, at least five
hours each week. Then come back for one last step.
Pause now to schedule your recurring processing. We're almost done with scheduling
your processing, but not completely. What about the backlog, in particular, the backlog
of all those boxes. During the gathering process you may have finished with many
boxes, perhaps dozens. The average person ends up with about four backlog
boxes. Also if you completed the mind clearing exercise you may have gathered dozens
of incomplete tasks that were floating around in your head.
No matter how many boxes and incomplete tasks you have you'll need to schedule
extra time for processing, just this once. In general, scheduling 1 extra hour per large
unfinished box and 1 hour for every 30 unresolved tasks you gathered from your
mind. This means that if you had five boxes beyond your normal inbox and 60
unresolved tasks you'll have to schedule an extra eight hours of processing.
You don't need to go through it all now, or even next week, but try to schedule this to
occur as soon as is reasonable for your schedule. A good target to aim for is completing
this backlog processing within the next month. I've seen first hand that many of my
clients have had a liberating experience when they bring the backlog of inboxes to zero
for the first time. It’s so helpful and powerful, and I want you to experience it. So please,
once this video stops, go to your calendar immediately and schedule extra time for your
backlog of large inbox processing.
Applying what, when, where processing to email
The system of what, when, where processing applies to email, as easily as it does to
your physical inbox. What, when, where processing is when you take one item at a time
from one of your approved gathering points and answer the questions, what is the next
step? When will it be done? And, where is its home? Your goal in processing your
email is the same as your goal in processing your physical inbox. Bring it to 0, meaning
completely empty, at least, once per week.
Some people keep emails in their inbox to serve as reminders of things they need to do,
items that are unresolved. Some keep email in their inbox because they're worried
about losing them. Other people depend on unread or bold emails to let them know of
emails that they haven't answered yet. These habits make it unnecessarily difficult to
find things. They also hurt your focus because when you scan a list of emails, it
encourages switch tasking, the primary culprit behind the inefficiency that you're feeling
in your day.
Focus instead on the total count of emails in your inbox and set your target to bring your
email inbox to 0. This will help you stay focused while working and reduce your stress
overall. Reaching 0 weekly is very possible, and I'll show you how to process and file
processed email away quickly and easily. For this section on email, I'll use Gmail to
demonstrate the what, when, where processing system.
But keep in mind, all of the features that I use in this video can be found in other popular
email programs because what, when, where processing is very flexible.

Setting up an email archive folder

Do you hoard email in your inbox? If so, you're not alone. I've worked with some
clients who have kept tens of thousands of emails in their inbox. The good news is we
can gain a lot of productivity by removing the little attention switches caused by a full
inbox, that are chipping away at your time. To get this time gain, we need to set up a
very quick and easy method for filing email. If you get a lot of email, like I do, you'll find
the concept of filing email a bit intimidating and time consuming.
There was a day when I would create separate folders and put emails into their
separate folders, categorizing things meticulously. However, every popular email
program includes powerful and effective search engines. So there's actually no need to
subcategorize processed emails. Let's make this as simple as possible. All you need to
do is use an email folder called Archive. Gmail includes this automatically. If you're
highlighting an email and click the archive button it will move out of your inbox, but still
be available for searching.
Other email programs, such as Outlook, require just one additional step. For instance, in
Outlook, simply right-click on personal folders, select new folder, and then name it
Archive. By the way, this folder is different than Outlook's archive feature which I do not
recommend as it may potentially exclude emails from your searches. To make this
folder easy to find again, I'll also take that Archive folder and drag it up into the favorite
folders window.
Then, whenever I'm done processing an email by walking it through the what, when,
where processing system I answer the question, Where is it's home? by dragging and
dropping email into the Archive folder. I recommend doing this with every kind of email.
Subcategorizing and putting it into separate folders would just duplicate work that's
unnecessary. Email search engines allow you to quickly and easily find email with a
simple text search or a more advanced search by date sent, sender, or subject.
When it comes to filing your emails, keep it simple. Use a single folder for everything
you process. Just throw it into that archive. Then let the search engines do the work.

Creating email rules or filters

Before I walk you through how to process email, I need to take a moment and show you
how to set up email filters, sometimes referred to as rules. Email filters, or rules, are
automatic features that deal with certain emails when they come in. The most basic
example of this is a coupon email from your favorite business. Many people are afraid to
sign up for coupons because they're worried that it's going to clog up their email
inbox. I'll show you what I do and why I sign up for every coupon site for vendors that I
frequent regularly, and why it doesn't affect my inbox at all.
Bear in mind that setting up filters may be easier to do on a desktop or full browser
email client, as some mobile clients may not support these features. But, once set up,
they should work for wherever you're viewing email. Here, we have a coupon from a
local pizza place. I like to order pizza from them. And I'd like to be able to get coupons
that I use regularly. So, what I'll do on this email, is I'll click on the drop down menu on
the email, and select Filter Messages Like This.
I can also create filters by highlighting an email, and clicking on the More button. You'll
see a popup window where I can create a wide variety of different rules for an email. If I
get an email from a certain email address, if it's sent to a certain email account, if it has
certain words in the subject, and so on. There are more advanced options. But really, all
we need is the most simple kind of rule, what email address did it come from? I'll select
the rule if I get an email from the pizza place, and I'm going to skip the inbox or, archive
it.
This means I'll never see this type of email appear in my inbox. Now, I want to apply a
label. Here it's okay to create a new label, or if you're using a program other than
Gmail, a new folder other than Archive. I'll do this for one reason: this is automatic
filing. It requires no future effort on my part. Also, using a separate, pre-sorted
folder saves time by making it easy for me to find these rule based emails when I need
them again.
So, I'm going to create a label called Coupons. I'll check Also Apply Filter to Matching
Messages to make sure it catches anything that may be in my inbox, and then click
Create Filter. It searches the email inbox, archives any applicable messages, and
applies the Coupons label I created. This makes it very, very easy for me in the future if
I ever need to buy something. I can just click on the Coupons folder, or I can search for
the email by the pizza company, and find it very quickly to get the discounts or the best
deals.
You can apply these same kinds of rules for all sorts of informational emails that you
get, such as newsletters and software updates. I once worked with a mortgage
company, that would get rate updates multiple times throughout the day. So we created
a rule to put any email like that into a Daily Rate Update folder. It freed up the inbox, but
still gave them instant access to the information when they needed it. Now, an important
caution. Avoid setting a rule for an email where you may have to process it manually
ever.
Otherwise, you may accidentally create another email gathering point. The only place
you should ever need to check email is your inbox. Let me give you an example. Let's
say your favorite aunt has the habit of sending you funny pictures and stories a lot. Be
careful about creating a rule for her, because if she does send you something, and it
does have actionable information, such as a family get together, then you may miss out
on it. Remember, when you set a rule for an email, you're telling the computer to
automatically answer all of the "what, when, where" processing questions for you.
What's the next step? Store the email. When will it be done? Right now. Where is its
home? The folder. It handles all of that automatically for you, so be cautious. Filters and
rules, when used properly, can save you valuable time and make processing even
easier.

Processing an email walk-through

Now we're ready to do a brief walk-through. I'm going to show you how to process a few
example emails. The first email is a newsletter that I want to receive. I'm going to ask
myself: what is the next step? The next step is to create the rule. When will it be
done? Right now. Because it's five minutes or less. And where is its home? Let's answer
that by creating a filter. I’ll click on More and select Filter messages like this.
I'll select whenever it's an email from this address create the filter Skip the inbox, and
then I'll create a label called "Newsletters". I'll select Also apply filter to matching
messages. Click Create filter, and there - I've created the filter. It's processed. Let's do
another email. Here's an email from Judy asking if I can attend an appointment next
week. So I ask myself the question: what is the next step? The next step is I check my
calendar and see if I'm available.
When will it be done? Well, I can check my calendar in five minutes or less, so I open
up my calendar and take a look. The time she suggested will not work for me, I have a
conflict. So I need to start the processing system over again. What's the next
step? Send a reply to them proposing a new time. When will it be done? Well, it can be
done now because it can be done in five minutes or less. And where is its home? When
I'm done with it I'll put it in the archive.
So, I send a reply saying, "Here is the time that I'll be available." And then I hit Send,
and now I'm done with that email, so I click Archive. By the way, there's also a Send
and archive button in Gmail, which is a handy option to reduce clicks. Before I do that,
let's imagine it's really important that I have this meeting with Judy. Let's say that I have
to follow up and make sure that the meeting takes place.
In that case there is a next step after this, right? So, what I'm going to do is take this
email and create a task reminder for myself by copying and pasting the details from the
email into the task reminder calendar I created. Remember this is not my actual
calendar, this is just a place to put reminders for things I need to do in the future or
follow up on. So, I copy all the information from the email and then I click on the
calendar, select the task remider calendar and go into Edit event.
In the detail section, I can post the email in case I need a reminder as to what this is
about. Then I type in a subject line "Waiting for Judy's reply on the meeting" and save
the reminder. Finally, I have to answer "Where is its home?" And since I'm done with the
email I click Archive, and I'm done. Now I don't have to worry about it anymore; the
computer will do all the reminding for me. Let's do one more quick example dealing with
scheduling some work for myself.
Here is an email with someone telling me that I need to visit this site to learn more
information and see if this is a service we want to use. So, I ask myself: what's the next
step? It's to visit the site. When will it be done? Let's say this is something that I really
want to give some good thought to. I may spend 30 minutes looking at the site and
really analyzing it carefully. So, in this case the "when will it be done?" must be
calendared.
Why? Because since it will take over 15 minutes I must budget time for this step. So, I
copy the email, then I open up the calendar window, and create a new
appointment, and paste the email info into the details. So, I'm going to schedule this
time for 30 minutes making sure that I have buffer space on either side, because I don't
want to schedule myself too tightly. If I wanted to, I could colour-categorize this to
identify the kind of work I'm doing, but that's optional.
Finally, where is its home? All processed email, except for obvious deletions, go into the
archive. I click Archive, and I'm done. Processing email is very similar to processing
physical items. The medium and the tool you're using is different, yet the principle stays
exactly the same. Now that I've given you a walk through the three different emails, it's
time for you to practice and start to condition yourself to use the "what, when, where"
processing system.
Now is the time for you to begin building mental muscle memory. As soon as this video
ends, I recommend you spend at least one hour practicing the training I just gave
you. It's your turn to put these principles into practice. Give it a good hour, and you'll
begin to cultivate lasting habits.
Processing email vs. checking email
At this point you should have spent at least one hour processing your email to build
mental muscle memory. If after processing email for an hour you still have many
unprocessed emails, you’re going to need to schedule extra time for processing the
backlog. Remember, during processing time your goal is to bring your email inbox to
zero, empty, at least once per week. We may need to do a little catch-up first
though. Typically, by scheduling one hour per 100 unprocessed emails you can
gradually chip away of the pile.
So, if you have 500 emails in your inbox, you probably need to schedule an extra five
hours of email processing. It might take you less than that time, but it's always better to
overestimate how long things take. Incidentally, if you have over 1,000 emails in your
inbox I first recommend that you take everything older than two months and just archive
them first, before scheduling your extra email processing time.
That will make this a bit more manageable for you. In Gmail you can find those emails
by searching for Before: full year/month/day. For instance, Before: 2015/12/01. Then
select All, then select All messages that match this search, then click Archive. Right
now go ahead and schedule some time to process the backlog of email, one hour per
100 of your inbox items.
Pause this video and then, after you do that, come back. Before I wrap up the training
on email I want to make a comment about processing email versus checking email. At
this point in the training you should have already established a regular processing time,
starting at five hours per week, and you should have that time set up in your
schedule. This should be enough for most people to bring all their gathering points to
zero using the "what, when, where" processing system.
But what about the emails that arrive in your inbox in-between your scheduled
processing. What if you feel you need to check your email more often? Processing
email is the act of deciding what is the next step, when will it be done, and where is its
home. Checking email is slightly different. It's just looking at your email and deciding if
there's anything that needs to be dealt with right now and can't wait until your scheduled
processing time.
I'll show you on the screen what I mean. Let's say it's been a few hours since I've
processed and I have accumulated new email. I want to have a regularly scheduled
time to check my email, maybe 15 minutes two times a day, at noon and at 4
o'clock. During this checking time I’m going to just simply scan through the emails and
ask myself one question: can this wait until my scheduled processing time? If it can wait
until my scheduled processing time, I'm going to leave it alone.
I look at this one. Can it wait until my scheduled processing time? Yes. But this next
email, can it wait until my scheduled processing time? No. If I have one like that, then I
immediately go into processing that email. What's the next step? When will it be
done? And where is its home? I process the email. In brief, it's okay to check email and
it's okay to process email that's urgent and cannot wait until my regularly scheduled
processing time.
However, be careful not to check email continually, or you'll fall back into a very
inefficient habit of switch-tasking. Instead of leaving your email window open all day
long have a regularly scheduled time to check your email. The specific times and
frequency don't matter, just as long as it's scheduled. The schedule depends a great
deal on your job description and what industry you're in. If you're having a hard time
coming up with the checking schedule that will work, I would say three times a
day: beginning of the day, middle of the day and end of the day.
Schedule only about 15 minutes per checking time. This will force you to deal with only
the urgent issues, only the ones that need to be dealt with today, and get you in the
habit of putting off anything else until your regularly scheduled processing time. Please
take a moment now and choose an email checking schedule that makes sense for you.

Understanding
The first step to creating a time budget is to understand the difference between "you"
time and "work" time. When people experience challenges with work-life balance and
time management in general, it's often because they don't make a clear distinction
between the two. To be accurate, think of work time as including time spent working,
travel time to and from work, and time spent thinking about work while at home or away
from the office. It's usually that last part of the definition, the time spent thinking about
work that causes some people to pause and think.
If you're paid to use your mind at work, if you're thinking about work, regardless of
where you are, are you not working? I would say yes. I'll give you an example. I worked
with a CEO and helped her estimate where she was spending her time. She accounted
for approximately 190 hours of activity in a 168 hour total week, which of course is
physically impossible. We analyzed her time estimates, and she realized most evenings
she thought she was spending time with her family but she was really spending time in
the presence of her family, focused on doing stock research.
In other words, she was in work time, not you time or family time. Take a moment to
estimate how many hours you believe you spend working in an average week. Include
travel time to and from work, and time spent thinking about work while at home. Write
down your answer. For this discussion, think of anything related to work as work time,
whether you're doing work, thinking about work, whether you have multiple jobs or
you're working two businesses.
It's all work. Everything else is considered you time, including recreation time, sleep
time, eating time, and family time. That way we can keep the discussion clear between
the two. Got your answer written down? Good, let's move on. To stay productive and
balanced, it's helpful to establish a boundary line in your schedule between work time
and you time. Many people, particularly those who are inherently very driven, adopt the
attitude that they'll work until work gets done.
They'll work however late is necessary to complete projects. This may lead someone to
work late hours, 8 o'clock, 9 o'clock, 10 o'clock, or past midnight, believing they're a
hard worker and being more productive. But the reality is, while you may be able to be
successful to a degree by working long hours, you can be even more successful and
productive by stopping at a set time each day. When you clearly define a finish line in
your day that says, "I will not cross this line between work time and you time," it forces
you to be more efficient with your time budget.
It forces you to evaluate your personal systems and make wise decisions about how
you use the scarce resource of your time. Remember, time will always fill up the space
you give it. If you allow too much time for things to take place, you'll automatically fill up
that space. Rather than giving yourself a blank check to an endless amount of time, give
yourself a boundary line, a budget, to work with. You'll find that you can get just as
much done, but you'll be more efficient.
Right now, take a moment to look at your calendar and create that boundary line. Make
a commitment of the time you're going to stop work and focus on you time. There's no
right or wrong answer here. Other than just start somewhere, and don't make it too
difficult. If you've been in the habit of working until 9- or 10 o'clock at night, try to create
a line at perhaps 8:30.Or if you want to stop working on the weekends, commit that
weekends are off-limits, beginning at 5 o'clock on Friday.
Then, open up your calendar and make a brief, recurring appointment that says, "Work
time ends." Establishing this boundary line in your calendar will get you started on the
path of greater balance and improved productivity.

Establishing the most valuable activities

Few people have a work position that requires them to do only one thing. Most people
have job descriptions that require them to perform several different activities. Typically,
the smaller the organization, the wider variety of these activities you are likely to
have. However, of all the different activities that you perform, only a couple of them are
truly the most valuable. What do I mean by valuable? Keep in mind, I am talking about
work time only, not you time.
For instance, there's no way to put a value on being a parent, or being a friend to
someone else. But we can very clearly put a value on what it would cost us to replace
certain work activities. To keep this simple, let's measure the value of an activity by the
amount of money that you would pay someone else to perform the same task at the
same quality. That means activities you excel at, the ones that would cost you the most
per hour to pay someone else to do, the top two, would be your most valuable activities.
I sometimes call them MVAs for short. All the other activities that you do during work
time other than those two MVAs are your less valuable activities, or LVAs and if you're
like most people, you're likely spending the majority of your work time in these very low
value, low impact LVAs. When I speak to executives, I'll sometimes do an on the spot
poll and ask the audience how much time they're spending on their top two most
valuable activities.
And consistently I find the average executive spends less than 20% of their time in their
most valuable activities. This is significant, because what it means is that while they
have the capacity to do work that is worth perhaps several hundred dollars per
hour instead, they're choosing to spend the majority of their time on activities that are
worth much, much less. In order to achieve maximum results during the limited amount
of work time you have each week, you'll want to focus the majority of your time on your
most valuable activities.
In this next section, I'll take you through a process that helps you discover your top two
MVAs. And then, we'll create a time budget to ensure you spend appropriate amounts of
time in them each week.

Identifying your most valuable activities

Let's go through a brief exercise to help you identify your top two most valuable
activities, your MVAs. We have provided the handout in the Exercise Files to help you
with this process. On this simple chart, list all the different activities that you
perform. You'll see I've already added two activities for you in the handout. The first is
travel, meaning "travel time to and from work", and the second is wasting time, meaning
"choosing to waste time at work", such as viewing social media sites, or spending
excessive time gossiping with coworkers.
Hey, we all waste a little time, right? Begin now and list the other activities that you
perform during work. For example, managing employees, calling for sales, marketing,
writing press releases, booking travel or janitorial tasks. Think of them as mini
positions. Imagine yourself wearing many different hats, each of them representing the
position, and every time that you have to switch hats that would be a different activity.
Go ahead and list as many of those activities as you can think of in the first
column. Pause the video right now to make this list, then come back when you're
done. Now that you've created a list of activities, let's move on. In the second
column, next to each of those positions that you listed, write what you guess is an
average annual salary for someone on that job assuming you hire them full-time.
Go ahead and write that number down in the column next to it. If you don't have any
idea about the annual salary you could use a search engine to look up salary
information. However, don't be too particular about it. Just give your best guess on the
number and write it down. We're looking for rough numbers here, not perfection. Go
ahead and pause the video while you list the estimated annual salary for each of these
many positions. Now that you've listed the activities you perform and their estimated
annual salary, it's time for some simple math to determine the estimated hourly wage.
Use a calculator and divide the annual salary by 2,080, the average number of work
hours in a year. Divide each of those annual salaries by 2,080 and write the
result. You'll end up with a rough estimate of the hourly wage for each of those
activities. Go ahead and pause the video now to complete this column. And finally, the
last step is to rank the different activities according to their value per hour, one being the
highest.
The first two that I gave you are travelling and wasting time; these are both worth zero,
absolutely nothing. So, wait to rank them until the end as they'll be dead last. Once
you've created a rank for all these different activities, you'll be able to easily identify your
top two most valuable activities. These two MVAs are worth the most in your
workday, are the most difficult to replace and bring the most bottom line impact both to
your company and your career.
Now, let's explore how we can focus time on these activities.

Budgeting time for your most valuable activities

Once you've identified your top two most valuable activities, it's time for us to open the
calendar, and create a time budget. The time budget is different than your normal
working calendar. You're not actually going to schedule anything into this time
budget. Instead, you'll use it as a tool and a frame of reference. Many calendaring
systems allow you to create multiple calendars, and compare them side by side. In
Google Calendar, I'm going to click on the drop-down menu next to my calendars, and
select Create new calendar.
I'm going to name this new calendar, "Time Budget", and jump to the bottom, and click
Create Calendar. This is where I'll create a time budget for my top two most valuable
activities. How much time should you spend in each of your most valuable activities? It's
up to your judgement. Choose an amount of time that's reasonable for your career and
your industry. However, much time you're spending on your MVA's right now, try to
budget a little more time, stretch yourself.
I recommend you strive to spend at least 40% of your total work time in just those two
most valuable activities. For most people, this would be a significant improvement, as
the average executive is spending less than 20% of their time in their most valuable
activities. Let's say, for example, that I identified my two most valuable activities as
writing, and developing business systems. So, I'm going to set aside time in my
calendar to devote to just these two activities.
First, let's do writing. I find that Fridays are typically slow days. Most people are too
busy to talk with me during those days, because they're winding up for the end of the
week. I also find my thinking is more clear earlier in the day, so I'm going to schedule
hours on Friday, beginning in the morning, to devote to writing. Let's say that my work
time budget is 40 hours a week. So, if I took 40% of that, that's 16 hours.
I'm going to split my writing, and business systems time in half. So that's going to be
eight hours to each of them. That means, I need to schedule eight hours for writing. And
I'm going to set aside my entire Friday for writing. Next, I'll create a time budget for my
second most valuable activity, which is, developing business systems. Again, I need to
schedule eight hours per week to this budget. I don't want to devote an entire day to
this, I'd rather spread it out a little bit, so I'm going to spend part of my day on
Wednesday, and part of my day on Thursday working on business systems.
Now, I created my time budget, but how do I use it? I use it as a guide when answering
the “When will I do it?" question, in the "what, when, where" processing system. I want
to try to schedule tasks and projects related to these most valuable activities in those
time slots I just budgeted. I also want to avoid scheduling anything else during those
time slots, because they should be protected. One final note about using the time
budgeter.
Some of my clients find it helpful to also budget time for one, or two of their least
valuable activities, their LVA's. Why would we want to do that? Because we want to limit
the amount of time that we're spending on those activities. By using the time budget for
our least valuable activities, and creating a small window of time for them, it forces us to
constrain the amount of time that we're going to devote to those activities. Use this new
time budget as a guide post to ensure you spend sufficient time in your most valuable
activities each week.
It can also help you avoid, allowing your schedule to get filled up with many less
valuable activities.

Using your time budgeter

Now that you've created a time budgeter for your most valuable activities, I'd like to take
you through a few examples of how you can use it effectively. Watch how I use the time
budgeter as a tool to help me answer the "when will it be done?" question of the "what,
when, where" processing system. For example, let's suppose I am about to process a
note I wrote down, reminding me to create a system to train Cameron on how to better
manage employees.
What's the next step? The next step is I'm going to pull out my system's template and
begin writing. When will it be done? This is definitely going to take me longer than 15
minutes, so I know it has to go to the calendar. I think it will probably take me 90
minutes. I then refer to my time budget calendar which shows me the best time to
complete this type of activity. So, I find the time that I budgeted on Wednesday
afternoon to write systems and I schedule those 90 minutes there - in my actual
calendar, not my time budget.
Let's try another example. Let's say I have an idea or an opportunity to write an article
for a newspaper. Writing is one of my most valuable activities. So, what is the next
step? I'm going to brainstorm ideas for the article. When will it be done? Well, let's say
it's going to take me 30 minutes to brainstorm. I scheduled Friday as my writing time
budget. So I'm going to schedule 30 minutes in my calendar during that writing time
budget.
Having the time budget makes it easy for me to figure out where to put things. What if
I'm processing an item that isn't my most valuable activity; it's an LVA, or a least
valuable activity. Let’s say my accountant sent me an email that says we need to review
my finances for last year. It's important, but not one of my top two most valuable
activities. My accountant in his email asks me if I can schedule the meeting on Friday at
10 o'clock during the time I budgeted for writing.
You'll have situations like this where you'll be tempted to schedule less valuable
activities on top of your time budget for your most valuable activities. Don't do it! Just
because someone proposed a meeting time to you does not mean you have to
respond to the first option they give you. So, I reply back to my accountant and say, "I'm
not available Friday at 10 o’clock. “Can we meet on..." and I look at my calendar, and
find a place where I don't have any conflicts on my time budget.
Monday morning looks good. So I send an email, "Can we meet on Monday at 11
instead?" For some, protecting your time budget might not be a challenge. For everyone
else, for those of you who have the tendency to say yes too quickly, use your time
budget as a guide. Refer back to it before making a scheduled commitment, whether
you're responding to a meeting request, or you're scheduling work for yourself to
do. Protect your most valuable activities and you'll increase the value of your time.

Maintaining your productivity gains

Congratulations on completing the time management fundamentals course. We've
covered the program my clients have found invaluable to get the most from their
time, and my hope is that you'll now experience the same benefit. My goal in this course
was to introduce you to the principles of successful time management and
productivity while not necessarily diving into specific software or tools. As long as you
live correct principles, almost any product can work for you.
If you're interested in getting help with specific software programs or tools, there are
courses on this site to help you master them. I recommend that you complete the
specific courses for the software programs and products you intend to use for time
management. Learning how to better utilize your chosen tools will maximize your
chance of success, especially now that I've shown you the flexible fundamentals of time
management. Also, I'd recommend that you create an action item for yourself to review
the videos in this time management course every three months or so.
We all get caught up in the chaos of working day to day, and are understanding of even
the most basic principles will fade over time. By reviewing these videos regularly, you'll
increase the likelihood of your consistent success with time management. If you have
specific questions about anything you learned here, you're welcome to visit
davecrenshaw.com . Go to my blog and ask questions in the comment section.
I process and respond to all questions on my blog weekly. Thank you for allowing me to
share these principles with you, and may you continue to be even more productive in
the coming weeks and months.

Dave Crenshaw on getting himself organized

So, before I got organized myself I was one of the most chaotic people you ever would
meet. My wife can verify that. I was jumping all over the place, from career to career; my
workspace was disorganized. You used to have to use a shovel to get from the front
door of my office to my desk. It was extremely chaotic. And the turning point for me is
when I heard two words, and the two words were "I'm pregnant".
And as a young married man, those really opened my eyes. I realized suddenly I
couldn't just float around enjoying my day quite to the degree. I had to really think about
the fact that here comes a new life into our family and I needed to provide for him. And it
was at that point that I went and saw a psychologist. He gave me a couple of tests, and
at the end of the test he looked at and he said, "Has anyone ever talked to you about
ADHD?" And I said, "Well, no, that's not really me." And he said, "You are off the charts
ADHD.
"If there were a fit standard deviation "you'd be in it. "I can say with 99.99% accuracy
you've got it." And that really opened my eyes. I now had something to work on, a name
and a face to a challenge, and I applied my background, which is actually an
entrepreneurship in business systems. And I applied that mindset of systems to my very
personal challenge of a lack of focus. So I think the people who will benefit most from
this course are people who are struggling with productivity or organization to some
degree right now.
What I call the "nomads", the people who are inherently organized but got off track, or
the "chaos masters", the people who are inherently chaotic. It's not to say that "focus
masters”, people who are inherently organized and productive, can't benefit from it. But I
encourage people who are in that place - and boy, what a great blessing they have to
be that organized -that they look at this course from the standpoint of how they can
teach others to be that organized and that productive.
I've found there's real power in having accountability. If I did not have a coach - and I
have a business coach who follows up with me - I'd fall back into the old patterns. So, I
report to him on a regular basis. The same numbers that I ask my clients to report to
me I report to him, and he checks in on me every once in a while. I've seen lots of
people who teach one thing and end up living something else, and I wanted to make
sure that I was somebody who practiced what I preach.
So, while this certainly has a very direct impact on the workday, it helps people in their
everyday life. Every day we have the opportunity to focus or not focus on friends and
family. They want to talk to us. But if we're in a state of switch-tasking where we're
constantly looking at our phones, or looking at something else and not focusing on
them, in a real way we're hurting that relationship. So, this program is also an
opportunity to increase the power of the relationships that you have by better focusing
on people.
What makes my day is hearing people who come to lynda.com, they go through the
course, and then they'll send me a nice message of something like "this has changed
my life", "I was out of control", "I wasn't able to focus", "my career was going all over the
place", and that this course helped them get on track. That really makes my day. Also
when I hear people who talk about how they're better able to focus on
relationships. That really is kind of an underlying bonus of going through this course, is
the ability to improve the relationships with your family, with your loved ones.
For me, in the end, being able to be there for your family and spend time with them is
what this is all about.