When you plan the day, you gain control of the day. Here's a simple sequence you can follow to put you in control of your day.

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0:00 Planning the day. 0:01 Now, I don't think many people would argue 0:03 that planning your day is one of the 0:05 most critical things you could do if you 0:08 want to become better organised and more productive. 0:12 But how many of you are actually 0:16 consistently doing this every day, including weekends? 0:22 Now, I know for many people, oh, planning the 0:24 day is just another thing I have to do. 0:27 Well, no, you don't have to do it, but there 0:30 are a few things that occurring during the day that 0:33 really have an impact on whether you are going to 0:36 get important things done or you're going to end up 0:39 doing a lot of busy work. 0:41 Ending the day feeling exhausted and having 0:44 thought, what did I do today? 0:46 One of my favourite movies of all 0:48 time is the movie Apollo 13. 0:51 Houston, we have a problem. 0:53 Now, there is a scene in the movie where, 0:56 where Ken Mattingly, the character Ken Mattingly, played by 1:00 Gary Sinise, is trying to work out a proper 1:04 sequence in order to restart the command service module. 1:11 Look, I know this sequence works, John. 1:14 The sequence looks good. 1:15 We're just over budget on the amperage. 1:17 By how much? 1:18 Three or four amps. 1:20 God damn it, John. 1:21 Is it three or four? Four. Four. 1:25 This is, if you're familiar with the 1:27 Apollo 13 story, it's a true story. 1:30 This is basically where three astronauts 1:32 almost got abandoned in space. 1:34 Now, I'm not going to go into the full 1:36 plot of that movie, but safe to say that 1:38 they were limited by having only 16amps of power 1:44 to restart the command service module before re entry. 1:49 Now, this caused a major headache because 1:52 everybody wanted their features, their systems up 1:56 and running, but they were limited. 1:58 They couldn't do it. 1:59 Well, this is the same for you. 2:01 You also have a limited resource every single day. 2:06 That resource is time. 2:08 You only have 24 hours and I'm pretty sure you don't want 2:12 to be doing 24 hours of work day in, day out. 2:17 So you are limited to the amount of time 2:19 you're willing to put into your work each day. 2:23 So to help you here, I want to introduce 2:25 you to something I call the daily planning sequence. 2:29 Now, the word sequence is very important here 2:31 because you have to follow the sequence. 2:33 You can't rearrange this sequence. 2:36 There is one way to do 2:38 it, and it's really quite simple. 2:40 And it's only going to take you five minutes a 2:43 day, probably less on the quieter days, weekends, for example. 2:48 So the first step in this sequence is to 2:51 look at your calendar for your appointments today. 2:55 That is going to tell you how much time 2:58 you actually have available for doing your tasks. 3:02 If you've Got six hours of meetings. 3:05 That really means, if you're working a typical eight or 3:07 nine hour day, that you've only got two or three 3:11 hours in order to do your tasks today. 3:14 There's nothing more, there's no more time. 3:16 You only have that amount of time. 3:19 This is the first place to look. 3:21 Your calendar is going to tell you how much 3:24 time or power, if we're using the Apollo 13 3:27 analogy, that you have for the day in order 3:31 to complete your tasks, the second step in the 3:34 sequence is to then look at your task manager. 3:38 Now, given that you may only have three or 3:40 four hours of time in order to do your 3:43 tasks, this is what you're looking at. 3:46 How many of these tasks that I feel 3:48 I should do can I get done today? 3:51 Most of us have no idea how 3:53 to estimate how long something will take. 3:56 I have no idea. 3:57 I've been writing blog posts every week for nearly 10 4:00 years and I still cannot estimate or predict with any 4:05 degree of accuracy how long the first draught will take. 4:08 Sometimes it's 45 minutes, other 4:10 times I need 90 minutes. 4:12 It really does depend on my energy levels in the day. 4:16 So being able to predict how much time you can 4:19 spend on a task is a real big challenge. 4:22 But that's for another video. 4:25 So essentially what we've looked at is we've got our 4:27 calendar, it's telling us how much time we have left. 4:29 Now, if you've only got two or three hours and you've 4:32 got 30 tasks on your task list, you've now got an 4:35 impossible day, it's disastrous, it's not going to happen. 4:39 Doesn't matter how you feel in terms 4:42 of what's urgent and what's not urgent. 4:44 If you've got 30 tasks and you think, I've got to do 4:47 them, I've got to do them, I've got to do them. 4:48 But you've only got two or three hours in 4:51 order to do them in, forget it, it's not 4:53 going to happen unless you're willing to take your 4:56 work home and let it interfere with your personal 4:58 life, which I never, ever would recommend. 5:01 So essentially what we need to do is 5:03 we need to take that list and to 5:05 really break it down into a realistic list. 5:09 Now, what we're doing essentially 5:10 is removing the unimportant tasks. 5:13 Now, there is an advantage to this. 5:15 What you'll find is unimportant tasks have a 5:17 habit of sorting themselves out, so you probably 5:20 would never need to do them if you 5:22 actually just delay doing them a few days. 5:25 But what you're looking at is let's say you've 5:27 got two or three hours, that's all you've got. 5:30 That's probably like five or six tasks 5:32 that you can do that day. 5:34 That doesn't include responding to emails, dealing 5:36 with interruptions and anything else that's going 5:38 to come at you that day. 5:40 A realistic list might only be four or five tasks. 5:44 That's fine. 5:45 Because if that's the only time you have, if you've 5:47 only got say two or three hours in order to 5:50 do your task, and perhaps you need to eat in 5:53 that time, maybe that's just going to leave you with 5:55 two hours to do tasks today. Fine. 5:57 All those appointments are in your calendar. 5:59 They're sort of non negotiable. 6:01 So what do you have time for in order to do your task? 6:05 Make that list realistic, reschedule tasks, move 6:08 things around, Just make sure that you've 6:11 got a realistic task list. 6:13 The final step in this process 6:15 is to then prioritise that list. 6:18 Now, I always think of this in terms of 6:20 what are my two must do tasks for today. 6:23 That's really what I'm looking for. 6:25 Occasionally there will be three, but for 6:28 the most part it's generally two. 6:30 I try to limit it to two. 6:32 This means that basically what I need to 6:34 do or can do is bring out the 6:38 probably the best invention ever, the best technological 6:42 invention ever, and that is an A7 notebook. 6:47 Now, what I generally would do, particularly on busy 6:50 days where I need to stay focused, I'm going 6:52 to write those down on this piece of paper 6:55 and I'm going to stick this on my desk. 6:57 Well, just leave it on my desk. 6:59 The reason for this is because this will 7:01 be always in my eyesight throughout the day. 7:04 If I try to leave this in my digital 7:07 task manager, what's going to happen is when I'm 7:09 working on a Word document, a Google sheet, maybe 7:12 I'm trying to create a presentation, I'm not going 7:15 to see my task manager, it disappears. 7:17 Neither am I actually going to see my calendar. 7:19 I don't have multiple screens. 7:21 I work with a maximum of two screens. 7:24 And if I'm building a presentation or writing a 7:28 blog post or doing a report, you know, my 7:31 notes are over on the smaller screen and my 7:33 main screen has my writing tool of choice. 7:37 So I'm now not looking at 7:39 what's, what's most important today. 7:41 So I put them down on a little A7 notebook. 7:45 Now, you don't have to use an 7:46 A7 notebook, you can use anything. 7:48 But what I would suggest is be very careful about 7:50 relying on a Digital to do list simply because it 7:53 will be out of sight for most of the day 7:56 and it's not going to keep that focus for you. 7:59 But that's it. 8:00 The three step process is check your calendar for your 8:04 appointments, then look at your to do list and make 8:07 sure that this is realistic based on the amount of 8:11 time you have left outside of your meetings. 8:13 And finally, prioritise that list. 8:16 Now, I would love to claim this system as my very own. 8:19 It isn't. 8:20 This has been around for a very long time. 8:23 The file back is nearly 1990s to be precise. 8:26 It was in the Franklin planner. 8:28 That was the daily planning process. 8:30 And it is a process, but it's more than that. 8:32 It's actually a sequence that you can 8:34 do every single day to make sure 8:37 that you're focused on the important things. 8:40 And that's it. 8:41 Three steps in a sequence. 8:43 Check your calendar, see how much time you have left 8:46 in order to do your task, then create a realistic 8:50 list based on the time that you have. 8:53 And finally prioritise that list so your most important tasks are 8:57 at the very top or on a piece of paper. 9:01 Now, before I finish on this, there is 9:03 something else that I should mention here. 9:06 When we're looking at our calendar, if we see I've 9:09 got six hours of meetings, that would leave me with 9:11 three hours of time to do my tasks. 9:14 The reality is you've got to 9:16 think of interruptions and disruptions. 9:19 You're going to be asked questions, you're 9:21 going to get phone calls, you're going 9:22 to have urgent emails to deal with. 9:24 You're also going to have slack teams 9:26 or whatever messages coming at you. 9:28 So really you don't actually have those three hours. 9:32 You probably at best have 90 minutes to do your tasks. 9:37 That really does help to get you 9:39 focused on what really matters today. And that's it. 9:42 That's all you need in order to get yourself focused. 9:45 Every day takes five minutes, nothing more. 9:48 And I can promise you, you'll start 9:50 to see some really incredible results. 9:53 Now, if you want to learn more about weekly planning, 9:56 then this video up here will explain the time. 10:01 The weekly planning matrix right here.