How have I ended up using four things for planning??

It struck me the other day that I seem to have migrated to using four things for daily planning:

• the planning filofax
• the daily carry-around
• a vertical WO2P in an A5 filofax
• a reporters' notebook

What??? I thought I was all streamlined into a compact filofax! How did this happen??

Well, it's actually not as bad as it sounds. Honest! I realise that what I have done is just reproduce the system I always used to have, but distributed it over several things in order to use a slimline as a carry-around.

My system has almost always (well, since I have had a 'system') included:

• a goals to projects to next actions section (which is now in the planning filofax along with spare diary pages - see here for how I get that to work)
• a week to view for an overview (which is still in the carry-around)
• a daily list + a daily plan (which I used to have on DPP in the carry-around when I had the ring-space, with appointments/time-sensitive tasks down the left and the rest of the daily list on the right)

It's this last bit that has morphed into two separate things I suppose. Patty from Homemakers Daily did a good post (read it here) about the difference between a  daily list and a daily plan. For me, the daily list - the list of things I need to do today - is going in the reporters' notebook. Then each morning I am drawing up my daily plan which is getting time-boxed into the vertical WO2P in the A5.

I had been doing that on the WO2P in the de Villiers, with the daily-list on the right of each day-box and the plan on the left, but it was starting to get too crowded when I had lots of 'mosquito tasks' to clear and so I started scrawling things in the notebook. I could just move back to using a DPP, the way I always used to and keep everything in one place, but at the moment I am still off work and so still based at home on a daily basis and I have a big desk and an A5 diary to use up and a stack of reporters' notebooks to use up, so why either buy or print up DPP?

No doubt I will go back to the 'all in one' binder at some point, but this is working okay for me at the moment (and handily using up the A5 diary and rubbish notebooks!).

Anyone else find that they think they've started using a new system, only to realise it's the old system in different clothes?

set-up tweaks – modifying how I cope with ‘to-do’

After blundering around in the dark for a while, I have tweaked my set-up. I wasn’t using my filofax very efficiently (um, at all) and I was struck by a post on Philofaxy about people not using their filofax when they were really busy/reaching burn-out and so on. I have been ridiculously busy recently and horrendously disorganised and I have hardly been even looking at my diary, never mind the weekly and monthly plans. In fact, when I finally sat down to do a weekly plan, I realised it had been 6 weeks since I last had and that all of my weekly planning pages were empty and/or had things on them that should have been done that week but which had been ignored and not done. Half of these weekly pages weren’t even IN my filofax and the ‘current’ month list was for April – everything was still in my holding-filofax. [I did this sort-out about two weeks ago!]

I needed to think about why I wasn’t using my filofax so much and what might make me start again and realised one of my main issues was with To-Do lists – I either have everything in front of me and then get annoyed if I have to rewrite anything not done, into the next week pages or, I realise I won’t get it all done and put it on a separate list that I then don’t look at (because it’s not in front of me). At this time of the year, my to-do lists can also terrify me with their colossus-like dimensions!

I have three kinds of tasks to do:

1. things that are advancing projects (‘next actions’)
2. things that are known about well in advance, that need to be done at particular times but which are not linked to a project (birthdays, car-insurance renewal, meter readings and so on)
3. things that are neither of the above but are things that need to be done (usually sooner rather than later)

The problems arise like this:
Most of my projects seem to be big projects and even breaking them down into smaller things to manage them better, the time for them is elastic. For example, I want to finish the first draft of book 6 before I go away on holiday, but I don’t quite know how many scenes I still need to write. I have a rough idea, but not an absolute nailed down one. Even if I did know that I had exactly 8 more scenes to write, some days it flows well and some days it just doesn’t. As a consequence, a ‘next action’ can sit on my to-do list for days or even weeks. Do I have them on a separate Post-It note and keep moving them from week to week? That feels like failure. Do I keep them on a separate list and refer to it when I have time? That would then suffer from the “it isn’t in front of me so it doesn’t exist” issue I have where, despite quite a lot of education, I seem almost totally unable to turn a page to look at what is behind it.

Category 2 is okay as long as I look at my planner – these are all transcribed onto ‘do this week’ sheets and if I look at those sheets, I do them. And there’s the rub! IF I look at them. Often I don’t.

Category 3 can be an ever-increasing list of ‘stuff’ which can end up swamping the important things. I need to do a brain-dump into a to-do list to clear my head sometimes, but there is then a danger that the list turns scary!

I haven’t cracked any of these problems completely, really. What I have done is to have one giant to-do sheet at the very front of my planner, rather than on the weekly pages (since I don’t really have many appointments at the moment).  Everything is going on it. To get around the “it isn’t in front of me so it doesn’t exist” issue, I have added “next-actions” on my to-do list in bold (so I see something that might prompt me to turn to the page behind which lists the next actions!), added the weekly tasks to the to-do list from the weekly sheets (which I have given up on) and added the ever-increasing small to-do things as and when they occur. The hope is that I can see it all (or at least see a prompt to turn the page and look at it, oh over-educated one) and can try and limit how many ‘mosquito tasks’ get added to the list.

I have ‘next actions’ in black at the top, then weekly things in blue, then ‘other stuff’ in pencil underneath. Because there is now a danger of me not actually looking at the diary pages, I also have added any appointments I have for the week to the bottom of the list, in red.

the list!

At the bottom of the page (please don’t laugh) I have a reminder to turn over and look at the next page/reverse of the to-do list so that, although I have run out of space, there may still be things lurking on the other side of the page that I must get on with. Yes, I have a first class honours degree and a PhD and I need a reminder to turn the page. I know my limitations!!

On the next page, I have the next-actions for my current projects (colour-coded).

Next actions

I’m really hoping that this set-up with the to-do at the front, will keep me organised! I’ll let you know!

Set-up change

In my last post, I described buying a WO2P diary from Paperchase and hinted that I had moved away from my week + notes set-up. Yes, the set-up that I thought was perfect for me. The one I have designed my own diary inserts around.

So, what’s gone wrong?

Life. That’s what!

Life seemed to suddenly explode a few weeks ago, between work, writing, Chimwemwe, Rotary and Life In General and although the notes side of the week + notes was working really well, the week part wasn’t. I had so much going on in each day that the smaller space of the week on one page was just too small and I couldn’t get a sense of what I was doing. I could have moved back to the week + notes + a week of DPP combo and printed myself up some DPP for use, except I know that I can start to over-plan my days with a personal sized DPP and then start to reach burn-out.

The alternative was a week to view (WO2P) and to find some way of having my weekly to-do/goals visible too (since despite completing a LOT of education, I seem unable to flip a page).

My very low-tech solution is a week on two pages plus a post-it note. Weekly to-do/tasks go on the post-it note which can then be moved as I progress through the week so I can still see what’s happening in the week.

My other change is to take all the projects notes out and move them into the navy Portland ready for when the world stands still for long enough for me to think about where my goals etc. are going these days. In the turquoise Baroque, I now have a ‘capture’ section that is half notes-on-the-run and half to-do (unrelated to any projects – just stuff I have to get done at some point). Then there are my monthly planner sheets (behind the planner tab from Paperchase), the diary from Paperchase, lists of things and finally addresses. My zipped pencil-case with vouchers and change in is still right at the front and there is the card-holder right at the back as usual.

Hopefully, this new set-up will help me stay (relatively) sane.

Time for a small rethink

I realised the other day that I’m carrying around a lot of stuff that I just don’t need out and about with me, and that it should all stay home in a non-planner filofax. Then maybe one of the ones partying languishing in the bottom drawer of my bureau could be in use.

I decided to go through my Mulberry and work out whether each page should be ‘home’ or ‘away’ (this is now sounding like a football fixture list, buy hey ho). ‘Home’ would indicate it could stay at home; away means I would want that information on me out and about so would stay in the Mulberry.

Section: Notes

Blank paper for jottings

Away

Section: Goals

A list of all the projects I am currently working on, with a fabulous quote at the start then my Life Grid, then the projects for the Life Grid.

The quote is from the film Inception

Hmm. This could really stay at home, but I like to have all my ‘planning’ stuff in one place so that I could do my monthly and weekly plans anywhere. And I love having that quote with me…

Away

Section: Months

Currently there are the monthly sheets for the rest of 2012, but nothing for 2013 yet.

I’ve recently tweaked the monthly pages so that each month has four sides of paper:

1: a list of to-do for the month, relating to my Life Grid projects

2 & 3: a month to view with important things indicated (birthdays, when I’m in Malawi, vet/doctor/dentist/hair etc. appointments) but not fine detail.

4: a page for reviewing the month

In this section, there is also a monthly review check sheet and a forward planner for noting down things for 2013 and 2014 (when the car-tax is due, when the broadband deal is up etc.)

Again, these could stay at home, but again, I would want them with me for planning.

Away

Section: Diary

This has a general to-do list at the very start (with a tag on it so I don’t forget it’s there), then a week plus notes section, then a day per page section.

Away

Section: Lists

This is where things could be pruned!!

First up is a ‘Waiting on’ page – where I’m supposed to list things I am waiting for (deliveries, payments etc), but I usually forget.

Home

Then there is a list of potential blog-post topics. Since I only write blog posts at my desk and can add any jottings made out and about to this list when I come home, it can be removed.

Home

Then comes a list of websites to look out for. Again, I do my browsing at home, so this can come out.

Home

Then there is a list of books/ things to look for in shops, which obviously I need whilst out and about.

Away (but moved to another section otherwise there will be just one sheet in this section!)

Then there are lists of topics I have written about in letters to friends. I realise that probably sounds really bizarre, but I write to about 20 people and I can’t always remember what I last told them about, so I keep a list to stop me repeating myself! Now that I am also writing to people in the Filo-pal project, I am thinking of keeping a whole filofax just for correspondence – to keep the letters from people in that project and then also notes of other letters written.

Home/correspondence filofax

Section: Info

First up is a list of log-suppliers for feeding the wood-burning stove.

Erm… Home!

Then there is a list of meter readings (gas, solar PV and electricity).

Home!!

A print-out of the maps you get on the UK on the back of an OS map, with all the maps I have ticked off, both for Landranger maps and for Explorer maps. These are so that if DH and I are out and about and see any on sale second-hand, I know if we already have them or not.

Away

To help me know which maps I have

Then there is a list of Mulberry shops worldwide, a map of the world, an out of date tube map, conversion tables, travel stuff…

Other than the list of Mulberry shops worldwide (I’m not that obsessed with the thing!) most of the rest can stay as it’s useful enough.

Away

Then I have my addresses section, which I do use out and about.

Away

Right at the back are cards and money and in the zipped pocket are stamps and other bits and bobs, which all need to be with me.

What I do note is that there isn’t an ‘In an emergency, contact…’ page or even details of ‘If found…’ Something to remedy this afternoon!

Having cleared out the lists section almost in its entirety, I’ve freed up a bit of real estate. I have been dickering about (as I have before), over the diary section(s). Now that work is hotting up again, the week plus notes is not as useful as it was in the summer, as the diary side isn’t detailed enough and so I find I am flicking straight to the day per page sheets to see what I have on, not the weekly page. I rarely have to write an appointment in to my diary more than six months in advance and I am seriously considering shifting to the monthly sheets (in the format they are in now), then just a list of to-do for the week rather than the week plus notes, and six months of day per page diary. The page per day diary is the very cheap one I bought recently and the paper is thin, so six months isn’t that thick. Despite the thinness of the paper, it’s better quality than the filofax diary paper!

But… I have tried relying on the monthly view before and it failed miserably, so it may not be that long before I revert to monthly lists, weekly lists, a year of week to view and a week of day per page! Plus ça change…

New work diary

Hmm. I was supposed to be writing letters this morning. But then I got distracted. As you do.

I was looking at my work diary and contemplating what I would use next year. I had five potential options:

1. Quo Vadis Timer 21 Planning
2. Quo Vadis Timer 21 Prestige
3. Mulberry diary
4. One of the Philofaxy range
5. Make my own

I’m quite fussy about my diary and each of the diary formats had their pros and cons.

Quo Vadis Timer 21 Planning

(screenshot from Amazon.fr)

This isn’t bad as a format, though I don’t especially like the task space being designated into calls etc. I also have no major need for Saturday or Sunday to have much space and the big Saturday, small Sunday just annoyed me.

Quo Vadis Timer 21 Prestige

(screenshot from Amazon.fr)

I really liked this one, especially for that real estate on the right-hand-side which made it almost into a vertical week plus notes format. However, that made the width of the columns quite narrow and I also didn’t need all that evening space as this was a work diary.

Mulberry diary

(screenshot from Mulberry.com)

Beautiful, simple layout. Very clean and uncluttered. I would quite like a bit more note space however.

One of the Philofaxy range

The vertical week on two pages was one I had been considering and had in fact printed off a few pages, to see what they looked like.

Already in the work diary - see the extra hole!

They were okay, but, having had a play with the source files in order to design my diary for next year for the personal filofax, I thought I would have another go, this time for my work diary.

Making my own:

I started with the base files for the Philofaxy vertical WO2P, so I absolutely cannot claim to have done most of the work here – that must go to Steve from Philofaxy and Ray from My Life All in One Place.

I didn’t want all the task list space at the bottom of each day, so I removed those lines, then changed the time slots to make half-hourly intervals. I designated the last part of the column space as ‘evening’ (though very little will go in there as that would be in my personal filofax).

I also had no need for Saturday and Sunday to have so much space, so I moved Sunday into the same column as Saturday and made the time slots hourly.

I then deleted the last column, changed the width of the (now) final column (after the days) and renamed it ‘notes’.

Then, because I wanted something a little softer, I changed all the lines to being dark green, made the font Shaker 2 (thanks again, Gerard!!) and the font colour the same dark green as the lines. Finally, I shaded the column headers in a pale green.

Why green? To match the planner. And because I find it softer than black.

Here is the finished version (click on the picture to enlarge; my camera is not doing justice to the green shading):

My version!

1. Space for brief notes about the week
2. Vertical format - my definite favourite at work
3. Half-hour appointment times
4. Small evening space (this is a WORK diary after all...)
5. Saturday and Sunday share a column (as I don't work at weekends so this will be just to note anything exciting coming up so I can look forward to it!)
6. Notes space - for to-do, project notes, whatever...

What do people think?

Small change in my filofax, big difference

I have been muttering about “approaching planner fail” for a while, coming to the conclusion that:

a) I was being distracted by a colour clash in the diary (cream and purple not working so well)

b) I wasn’t using Miss Aston properly

c) I was being distracted by Mr Holborn

I finally decided that I would use Miss Aston until 31^st May and then switch to Mr Holborn. So, with only a week to go, am I impatient to make the switch??

Er… no.

I know, fickle female and all, but, I made one smallish change to Miss Aston and as a result, things are working again. What did I do??

I made a new diary for myself and printed it on white paper and stopped using the 2DPP I had made myself.

Okay, I realise that might not have enough detail for some of you, so here’s a compare and contrast of the Old System and the New System:

Old System:

A list of projects, broken down into ‘Next actions’.

A list of other (non-project based) to-do on a giant, largely unsorted list in front of the project sheets.

A year of monthly goals sheets

A few months of weekly goals sheets

Almost a year of WO2P

A week of 2DPP

In my weekly review, I would (along with reviewing and reflecting on the past week):

1) take out the used 2PPD sheets and file or bin them

2) add a new week’s worth of 2PPD sheets

3) transfer scheduled things from the WO2P to the 2DPP

4) add things from the next action lists/monthly goals sheets to my weekly goals sheet

Each morning I was at home (rather than at work), I would plan what I was doing in the day, moving things from the weekly list onto the 2DPP sheet into timed slots. If I thought I would have time, I would also schedule other things to clear off my giant to-do list.

Advantages of this system:

I knew what I was supposed to be doing all the time.

Lots of things got done.

Disadvantages of this system:

Miss Aston was a little plump.

I felt like my free time wasn’t really free, but planned to death.

Although I liked my home-designed 2DPP sheets and WO2P sheets, I hated the colour paper I was using. I also couldn’t work out how to orientate the 2DPP – time and tasks facing each other (making a day span two separate sheets in the filofax) or a single page covering a day (times on one side, tasks on the other). I liked to have them facing one another, but then didn’t like the fact that a day was split over different sheets of paper.

[in my personal size filofax this isn’t a problem as I use DPP not 2DPP but in the personal, that was too small]

My new system has such a small tweak, yet has moved me from being close to planner fail to now being happy with my set-up. I adapted the Advanced TM week to view for pocket size from the Philofaxy site, to halve the number of tasks and add in a Coming Up section (although the Coming Up is hand-written in the picture below, it's now been incorporated into the file!). Incidentally, my life really isn't this empty - I just chose empty weeks to photograph, so I didn't have to pixilate sensitive/private stuff!

Click on any picture to enlarge.

New diary format - amended TM from Philofaxy.

Old WO2P diary - cream-coloured paper clash!

Old 2PPD

New system:

Projects to next action sheets (as before)

To-do sheets (as before)

A year of monthly goals sheets (as before)

WO1P diary + To-do (home-made)

Scraps of paper to ‘plan’ the day

In my weekly review, I (along with reviewing and reflecting on the past week):

1) transfer scheduled things from the next action lists/monthly goals sheets to the to-do sheet facing my WO1P

Each morning I was at home (rather than at work), I would look at the list and (if I felt like I needed to) use a bit of scrap paper to plan out what/when. I guess I could use a DPP for this and not have the 2PPD issue I have. On many days, I just left my filofax open in a visible place and ticked things off as I did them.

Advantages of this system:

My weekly planning takes less time

I’m not transcribing things as many times

I like the paper I have my diary on

Stuff is getting done but I’m not feeling so ‘planned to death’

I can fit the whole year of WO1P + to-do in, and Miss Aston looks positively sylph-like

Disadvantages of this system:

Haven’t come across any yet… ☺

Now, I have to say, the ‘task into time slot’ method works brilliantly when I’m at work and also when I have lots of specific-timed things at home, but at the moment, days off work are fairly empty, especially now that I have stopped training for a half-marathon! Consequently, I have a list of stuff that needs doing in a week relating to projects plus other things that need doing that week. Generally, there’s no specific date these need doing (never mind a specific time) but if there is, I make a note of it.

Then on each day I’m at home, I check for appointments/specific-timed things (usually none), check what still needs doing on my weekly list and if anything else has cropped up and just do the tasks!

It’s made me realise that if/when I move back into the personal size, then the best thing for me is an enhanced TM Week per View (as per Philofaxy!). Which of course, has the added bonus of being free and easy to print at home on whatever colour paper I like!

Has anyone else found that a small tweak to their set-up has made a huge difference? What was it?

Poor Ms Aston – I had to intervene…

You see, there were just too many comments on how “stuffed”, “fat”, “round” she was. I know, and you all know that this is how a filofax is meant to be, but, she was starting to get a complex.

“It’s not my fault all the cards make me seem over-filled,” she cried. “I didn’t design that back pocket to be fiddly so that it’s easier to get a note out than to fish around in it for change…”

She has a point.

The reason her rings looked like they were on a “hair-trigger” was partly because the lack of spaces for cards and the design of the card-holder ending up with 4 thicknesses of card right in the middle (not to mention an inability to move on the rings). The zipped pocket is fiddly and I have ended up putting more change in it as it was too hard to get the coins out quickly and easier to break another note.

“So move back to one of us!!” came the voice of the Baroques, from the depths of the desk drawers. “You know you want to…!”

In time, I know I will. I’m still finding having a home-filofax and an everyday-filofax a bit tricky (the home filofax is currently carrying all sorts of things I like to file but don’t need to carry – like lists of things I’ve written about in letters to people, so I don’t repeat myself). I know that at some point I will move back into one of the Baroques (and then I’ll also know where everything is!), but for now, I love my Aston. But she’s getting a weight-complex!

Consequently, I decided to move things around a bit. The cards that are in the card-holder are ones I need to carry, but hardly ever need to look at (car insurance, donor card, some store cards for places that I don’t go to often but if I would be annoyed if I went there and had left the cards behind!). They could move to the zipped pocket if I could move the coins out.

When I flirted with the mini as a wallet, I made a coin-purse from an old freebie I had lying around and an eyelet-punch. Would that fit on the rings of the pocket??

Yes!

Coin-purse ressurected from the mini-Baroque

 

So, coins have moved to the coin purse and the store cards, other cards and stamps etc have moved to the zipped pocket (out of the card-holder and one top-opening envelope). As a consequence, Ms Aston is a bit slimmer (honest!!). I could punch another zip-lock envelope and she would be slimmer still but I like that I can use the coin-purse hack.

She is thinner!! Honest!!

Tweaks to the filofax set-up

Hmm.. I have that feeling that my filofax set-up is not quite right, but I think I know why and since an ice-rink-like pavement has scuppered my plans for a run this morning I suddenly have a load of time I could use in trying to fix it!

What I think is the problem is the month to view, which I added to what had been a good set-up as a way of making my planning ahead easier than flicking through loads of pages of my filofax. But, I have almost missed some important things because I was only looking at the month to view and they weren’t in there. If I had flicked through the four pages of week to view instead of stared at the (evidently not detailed enough) month to view, I would have been fine.

The problem is ‘granularity’. What size of thing goes into the month to view? At the moment, only birthdays and holidays are marked, but then other things obviously needed logging too. The week to view logs pretty much everything. Maybe not fine detail of work because my work filofax does that. But pretty much everything else is in the week to view diary. That of course leaves it too cluttered to use it to plan the day, which is why I use a day per page diary too.

I think I will take out the month to view and chalk it up to experience.

Why else is my filofax irritating me?

It’s the paper.

No, I’m not about to rant (again) about the totally rubbish quality of the filofax paper. This is something entirely my own fault and a natural (but nonetheless annoying) clash of two of my character flaws attributes:

1) I hate waste

2) I have OCD-tendencies.

So, how are these clashing???

Because I am using a heap of paper in my ‘capture/notes’ section, to use it up (because I hate waste) but none of it matches (making my OCD-tendencies begin to squeal) – some of it is graph, some lined, some lined but by a different maker, some of it is old diary sheets turned upside down… you get the picture. Over time I have acquired a heap of such paper and so have a massive box of it to get through before buying new (matching) paper. It’s in the capture/notes section because it’s largely used for scrap – jotting down something in a hurry then transcribing it to a nice bit of paper, filed properly later, and my thriftiness thinks that using ‘proper paper’ for this when I have a box full of other paper is just wasteful. But, the section is right at the front of my filofax and grates on me every time I open it to jot something down.

What I might try though is to just use one type of scrap paper at a time, even if that means there’s only one or two sheets in there, until that particular ‘stock’ is used up, then move to the next one. I can’t imagine that I would need more than a single sheet in a day and I can always replenish when I get home. The fact that they don’t match the rest of my filofax isn’t so horrendous…