Over the last year, I have become a planner. Sure, I still find myself working close to deadlines, but not nearly as often as in the past. I believe the writing I have done on this blog in the last year is a key to my transformation into a planner.
The power of planning posts
Writing the The Help Other Manifesto led me to plan a ColorMetrix user group meeting. It had been more than five years since we last conducted such a meeting and writing the post made me seriously question why. Almost immediately, I began putting a plan in motion to make sure we would have a user group meeting in 2011. We planned it for April 26th, a year to the week after writing this post. We’ll be conducting our sixth ColorMetrix user group meeting on that date.
Planning Pays Big Dividends is a post that focuses on the importance of having a plan and working ahead on the content for a daily blog like this one. Admittedly, I don’t always have the eight-day lead time I’d like to have, but I do almost always have a list of topics and titles for the week’s posts several days in advance.
Owning Your Future Time comes down to making sure tasks with a proven productivity track record get completed first. Working with this focus has allowed me four hours a week to go looking for rabbit holes to run down. This planning for creative free time has greatly improved my personal creative productivity.
Don’t get ahead of yourself takes a look at the importance of working the opportunities right in front of you. If you have a solid plan and work the plan, good things will happen. In my case, our fourth quarter sales benefited greatly from the writing of this post.
Flying by the seat of your pants helped get me focused on finding the team members necessary to make all the big dreams and plans for 2011 become a reality. Soon, I’ll start introducing these folks and some of the cool things we are already making happen this year.
Perhaps the reality of the situation is that, the more creative you are the more important it is to have a plan.
Very nice. PLanning is definitely not a strong suit of mine, but it has been something I’ve been finding a balance with. Not enough planning can slow progress, but too much planning can stop it in its tracks as well. 🙂 Good reminder to pay attention to which side of the balance we are trending.
Cindi, I’m not sure if Translator is using Basecamp but it has been a huge help getting my arms around the multiple projects we have running. It’s just a tool but a good one that is easy to use.
Jim
Jim very nice post! I have always been partial to planning in all aspects of my work – yet blog posts on the other hand is something that usually come pretty spontaneously. I guess that’s the reason I don’t post all that often. I always remember the words from a great leader I had a few years back, he always said the key to success in business is to “plan your work, and work your plan”. I have always tried to live by this statement.
Sharif,
As important as planning is finding tools that work for you. For me it’s turning out to be Basecamp. I’ve always fancied myself a project guy and Basecamp manages project pretty darn well without being cumbersome.
Jim