Welcome to Day 1 of the 5 Day Challenge!
Today’s task is your first, most important step. How often do you plan your week?
You may be an occasional planner or a ‘never or rarely’ planner. When you just launch into your day, dealing with whatever comes up first, you might have a rough idea of what you want to achieve but don’t have a clear idea of what your day actually looks like or how you’re going to fit everything in.
- How many things are on your list?
- When are you going to do them?
- What are your priorities?
- What happens when a new task or request comes in?
We’ll answer these questions as we go through the week but let’s start by creating a plan for your week using the attached Weekly Planner.
Use it as a template, print it off or apply the following steps to your existing planning system or app, whether that’s digital or paper based.
There’s no right or wrong way to do this, you just need to DO … something.
Before you start work, set aside a few minutes and …
1. Block out time for the fixed, non-negotiable events
- meetings and appointments - things you can’t change.
2. Then block out time for the important things you need to get done.
- project work
- Your own meetings
- Important personal commitments
- exercise/activity - yes this is important, plan it in.
3. Next, block out time for …
- Any other tasks on your list
Make sure you include Breaks! - yes, these are important too.
Start with where you are. If your week is already fully booked up, apply these steps as you start to plan ahead.
If you can’t plan the whole week, just plan today.
Got a question? Post them in the 5 Day Challenge Facebook Group. There'll be a Q&A post each day or if you’re not on Facebook, hit
reply and email me your question.
I’ll be going live on Zoom and in the Facebook Group (tech permitting) every day at 6:00pm BST / 7.00pm CET / 1:00pm EST to answer your questions. You can join me live or watch the replay.
Go create that plan,
