PlanPlus Handbook

PlanPlus v.
4 for Outlook User Guide

Copyright 2006 FranklinCovey, Inc. and Agilix Labs, Inc. All rights reserved.
2005 FranklinCovey, Inc. and Agilix Labs, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
COPYRIGHT NOTICE Copyright(c) 2005 FranklinCovey, Inc. and Agilix Labs, Inc. All rights reserved. Licensed software and documentation. Use, copy, and disclosure restricted by license agreement. TRADEMARKS FranklinCovey and the FranklinCovey logo are registered trademarks of FranklinCovey, Inc. Microsoft Outlook is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation. Palm OS is a registered trademark of PalmSource, Inc. Agilix is a trademark of Agilix Labs, Inc. Other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. DISCLAIMER Every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of the features and techniques presented in this publication. However, FranklinCovey, Inc., accepts no responsibility, and offers no warranty whether expressed or implied, for the accuracy of this publication. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording, or otherwise, without the express written permission of FranklinCovey, Inc. The information in this document is subject to change without notice. FranklinCovey, Inc., makes no warranty of any kind in regard to the contents of this document, including, but not limited to, any implied warranties of merchantability quality or fitness for any particular purpose. FranklinCovey, Inc., shall not be liable for errors contained in it or for incidental or consequential damages concerning the furnishing, performance or use of this document.
FranklinCovey, Inc. www.FranklinCovey.com
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Table of Contents
Welcome to PlanPlus for Outlook! ............................................................................................6 Chapter 1. System Requirements & Installation ....................................................................9 System Requirements.............................................................................................................10 Desktop Computer ..............................................................................................................10 Palm OS Devices ................................................................................................................10 Pocket PC ...........................................................................................................................10 Before You Begin ....................................................................................................................11 Handheld Computer Preparation ........................................................................................11 Palm OS Device Preparation ..............................................................................................11 Converting FranklinCovey Planning Software Data ............................................................11 Installing PlanPlus for Outlook ................................................................................................12 Chapter 2. Getting Around in PlanPlus.................................................................................19 The Home Page ......................................................................................................................20 Display the Home Page ......................................................................................................20 Why use PlanPlus Home? ..................................................................................................21 How do I use the PlanPlus Home Page? ............................................................................21 Customize the Home page..................................................................................................21 The Today Page .....................................................................................................................22 Changes from Previous FranklinCovey Tools.........................................................................23 Chapter 3. Organizing Your Schedule with Tasks and Projects.........................................25 What is a Daily Task? .........................................................................................................25 What is a Master Task? ......................................................................................................25 Creating and Editing Tasks .....................................................................................................26 Create a Task......................................................................................................................26 Set Task Priority..................................................................................................................26 Edit a Task ..........................................................................................................................27 Change Task Priority...........................................................................................................27 Assign Action Codes ...........................................................................................................27 Manage Tasks with the "Right Click" Feature .....................................................................28 Using the Calendar .................................................................................................................29 Moving a Task to a Different Date.......................................................................................29 Changing a Task to an Appointment...................................................................................29 Changing an Appointment to a Task...................................................................................29 Auto-Forwarding..................................................................................................................29
PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Quick Prioritize ........................................................................................................................30 Using Quick Prioritize..........................................................................................................30 What is a Project? ...................................................................................................................33 Creating a Project ...................................................................................................................35 Adding Tasks to a Project ...................................................................................................36 Adding Existing Tasks to a Project......................................................................................37 Working with Project Tasks.................................................................................................38 Assigning tasks ...............................................................................................................38 Assigning a Task Deadline..............................................................................................39 Changing the Status of a Task........................................................................................39 Reorganizing Project Tasks ............................................................................................39 Task Branches ....................................................................................................................40 Creating Task Branches..................................................................................................40 Working with Task Branches...........................................................................................41 Project Tools .......................................................................................................................43 Delete a Project...............................................................................................................43 Rename a Project ...........................................................................................................43 Hide a Project..................................................................................................................44 View Hidden Projects ......................................................................................................44 Unhide a Project..............................................................................................................44 Project Notes & Progress Tabs...........................................................................................45 Project Notes...................................................................................................................45 Project Progress..............................................................................................................45 E-mail Report ..................................................................................................................46 Chapter 4. Using the FranklinCovey Planning System .......................................................47 Weekly Planning .....................................................................................................................48 Why Should I Plan Weekly?................................................................................................48 The Weekly Planning Process ............................................................................................48 The Weekly Planning Module .........................................................................................49 Mission and Values .................................................................................................................50 Why should I identify my Mission and Values? ...................................................................50 To Identify Your Mission......................................................................................................51 To Identify Your Values.......................................................................................................52 More Than One Value?...................................................................................................52 Clarify Your Values .........................................................................................................52 Mission and Values FAQ.....................................................................................................53 To Learn More About Missions and Values ....................................................................54 Weekly Planning Step 1: Review Mission ...........................................................................55 Using the Mission and Values Tool.....................................................................................56 Enter a New Mission .......................................................................................................56 Enter a New Value ..........................................................................................................57 The Mission Toolbar........................................................................................................57 Goals.......................................................................................................................................58 Why Should I Set Goals? ....................................................................................................58 How Do I Identify a Goal? ...................................................................................................58 Goals FAQ ..........................................................................................................................59 Weekly Planning Step 2: Schedule Goals...........................................................................60 To Create a New Goal ........................................................................................................61 Weekly Compass ..................................................................................................................63 Why Should I Use the Weekly Compass? ..........................................................................63
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Table of Contents Select Roles ........................................................................................................................63 Identify Your "Big Rocks" ....................................................................................................63 Big Rocks and Quadrant II of the Time Matrix ....................................................................64 Strengthen Relationships ....................................................................................................64 Weekly Compass FAQ........................................................................................................65 Weekly Planning Step 3: Schedule Compass.....................................................................66 To Schedule your Weekly Compass ...................................................................................66 Weekly Planning Step 4: Schedule Tasks ..........................................................................68 Weekly Planning FAQ .........................................................................................................69 Chapter 5. Take Notes and Organize Information................................................................71 Using Daily Notes ...................................................................................................................72 Create a Daily Notes Entry..................................................................................................72 Working with Daily Notes ................................................................................................73 PowerNotes ............................................................................................................................74 Creating a PowerNote.........................................................................................................74 Working with PowerNotes ...................................................................................................75 The PowerNote Toolbar ..................................................................................................75 Entering Text or Ink.........................................................................................................75 Formatting PowerNote Text ............................................................................................76 Working with Objects in PowerNotes ..................................................................................76 Inserting and Using Images ............................................................................................76 Moving and Resizing an Image.......................................................................................77 Align ................................................................................................................................77 Snap to Grid ....................................................................................................................77 Bring to front, send to back .............................................................................................77 Note-Taking Tools...............................................................................................................78 Using the Highlighter.......................................................................................................78 Using the Eraser .............................................................................................................78 Using the Lasso (select) Tool..........................................................................................79 Using the Zoom Tools .....................................................................................................80 Moving and Resizing Text...............................................................................................81 Inserting a Hyperlink .......................................................................................................82 Adding Writing Space to PowerNotes .................................................................................83 Adding Space to the Bottom or Right of a PowerNote ....................................................83 Adding Additional Notes Pages.......................................................................................83 Adding or Removing Space in the Middle of a Note .......................................................84 Converting Ink to Text .....................................................................................................85 Searching your PowerNotes ...............................................................................................86 Sharing PowerNotes .......................................................................................................87 Saving a PowerNote in another format ...........................................................................87 Create PowerNotes folders .....................................................................................................87 Using the eBinder ...................................................................................................................88 Creating an eBinder document ...........................................................................................89 View an eBinder document .................................................................................................90 Modify an eBinder document ..............................................................................................90 Chapter 6. Printing in PlanPlus .............................................................................................91 To Print in PlanPlus.............................................................................................................92 Customizing your Printouts .................................................................................................93 Printouts ..........................................................................................................................93 Customize .......................................................................................................................93
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Printer Setup .................................................................................................................100 Paper Size and Type.....................................................................................................101 Print Preview .....................................................................................................................102 Chapter 7. Support Information...........................................................................................103 Online Support ..................................................................................................................103 Premium Phone Support...................................................................................................104 Appendix A: Sample Mission and Values Statements ........................................................105 Mission Examples .................................................................................................................105 Examples of Personal Mission Statements.......................................................................105 Examples of Team Missions .............................................................................................107 Examples of Organizational Missions ...............................................................................109 Values Examples ..................................................................................................................110 Appendix B: Sample Goals and Intermediate Steps ...........................................................111 Appendix C: Compass Examples..........................................................................................115 Examples of a Weekly Compass (and intermediate steps)...............................................115 Things to Think About when Defining Roles .....................................................................119 Appendix D: PlanPlus for Outlook Frequently Asked Questions....................................122 Daily Tasks........................................................................................................................122 Master Tasks.....................................................................................................................123 Projects .............................................................................................................................123 Calendar and Appointments..............................................................................................123 E-Mail Management ..........................................................................................................124 Information Retrieval .........................................................................................................124 Weekly Planning ...............................................................................................................125 Using the Compass...........................................................................................................125 Using the Mission Feature ................................................................................................126 Using the Goals Feature ...................................................................................................126 Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations............................................................127 Daily Thoughts ......................................................................................................................127 Tasks ....................................................................................................................................149 Questions ..........................................................................................................................149 Thoughts and Quotes........................................................................................................152 Weekly Compass ..................................................................................................................169 Questions ..........................................................................................................................169 Thoughts and Quotes........................................................................................................172 Mission and Values ...............................................................................................................176 Questions ..........................................................................................................................176 Thoughts and Quotes........................................................................................................178 Goals.....................................................................................................................................183 Questions ..........................................................................................................................183 Thoughts and Quotes........................................................................................................186 Appendix F: Articles and Stories ..........................................................................................191 Balance Beams .....................................................................................................................191 Balancing Work and Family ..................................................................................................195 Character First ......................................................................................................................197 Controlling Your Life .............................................................................................................202 First Things First ...................................................................................................................205
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Table of Contents Stop Wasting Time................................................................................................................209 The Perspective of the Week ................................................................................................213 The Power of Goals ..............................................................................................................219 Three Resolutions .................................................................................................................228 Doing More in Less Time ......................................................................................................233 Courage to Change - "My Flower Shop" ...............................................................................237 Nothing Can Stop a Determined Soul ...................................................................................238 Plan Your Day .......................................................................................................................242 Stop Being So Efficient .........................................................................................................245 Appendix G: License Agreement ..........................................................................................249
Introduction
Welcome to PlanPlus for Outlook!

PlanPlus v.4 for Outlook is a set of powerful tools that lets you use Microsoft Outlook to take advantage of the time- and life-management principles taught in FranklinCovey training seminars. PlanPlus also features applications for your Palm OS handheld computer or PocketPC that let you take advantage of FranklinCovey principles "on the go." Whether you are an individual or corporate user, PlanPlus from FranklinCovey will help you use the productivity tools you are already very familiar with to focus your time and energy on your highest priorities. What's Installed with PlanPlus? When you install PlanPlus, your Outlook installation is modified to give you additional options. The following modules and features are installed with PlanPlus: PlanPlus Home You are probably familiar with the Outlook Calendar view, where you can see your calendar and tasks for today. The PlanPlus Home page gives you additional capabilities, displaying not only your calendar and tasks, but also your e-mail messages, PowerNotes, and your Daily Notes. PlanPlus Toolbar The PlanPlus Toolbar gives you one-click access to all PlanPlus modules and features. PowerNotes More than just a text note feature, PowerNotes let you enter text in notes, draw and make other annotations in the note, or even insert a graphic image into the note. PowerNotes also includes an easy-to-use and very powerful Search feature that lets you search text and digital ink in your PowerNotes. Also, you can turn just about any type of electronic document into a PowerNote using eBinder technology, and file them in custom Outlook folders.
Welcome to PlanPlus for Outlook Daily Notes Formerly called the Daily Record of Events, Daily Notes are attached to each date in PlanPlus, where you can enter any text reminders that you desire for that date. Mission/Values The Mission/Values module allows you to enter your Values and Mission. A Wizard is available to step you through the process of discovering your own Values and Mission. Goals In the Goals module, you can enter "dreams with deadlines" based on your Values and Mission. A Wizard is also available to step you through the Goals development process. Weekly Planning The Weekly Planning module gives you "the perspective of the week" in ensuring that you schedule what matters most before lower-priority items. Compass The Compass helps you focus on your key roles and relationships. "Coach Me" Within any PlanPlus module, simply click the Coach Me icon to quickly and easily access Help for that module. PlanPlus Resources Additional Resources, including articles and examples, are included in both this User Guide and the online Help that will help you use PlanPlus to achieve your highest priorities. More Printing Options PlanPlus includes the capability of printing your tasks, appointments, and other PlanPlus information (such as Mission/Values and Goals) on plain paper or FranklinCovey Perf-Fit forms.
Chapter 1
System Requirements & Installation

Not only can you install and use PlanPlus with Outlook on your desktop computer, but you can also install applications on your handheld computer (Palm OS-based or Pocket PC) to take the power of PlanPlus wherever you go. This chapter discusses important information that you should know before installing PlanPlus, then explains how to install PlanPlus on your desktop computer.
PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide
System Requirements
Desktop Computer
To install and use PlanPlus v.4 for Outlook on your desktop computer, your desktop computer hardware and software must meet the following minimum specifications: PC with 400 MHz or higher processor clock speed 128 MB RAM or higher recommended (64 MB minimum supported; may limit performance and features) 120 MB available hard disk space CD-ROM or DVD drive Super VGA (800x600 or higher resolution) with 256 colors Mouse or compatible pointing device Computer speakers for multimedia presentation Tablet PC device required to utilize some digital ink and pen input features in PowerNotes Microsoft Windows 2000 or XP editions Microsoft Outlook 2000, 2002 (XP), or 2003
Palm OS Devices
Palm OS 4.0 or higher required for synchronization with Palm OS handhelds.
Pocket PC
Windows Mobile 5.0 or higher required for synchronization with Pocket PC/Windows Mobile devices (with a touch screen).
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System Requirements & Installation
Before You Begin

Handheld Computer Preparation
Whether you are using a Palm OS device or a Pocket PC, we recommend you synchronize your handheld computer before installing PlanPlus. Failure to do this may result in irregularities during installation of PlanPlus on your handheld computer. After you install PlanPlus for Outlook, you have the option to install support for your Pocket PC device. See the PlanPlus for Pocket PC User Guide for information on installing and using PlanPlus for the Pocket PC.
Palm OS Device Preparation

When you install PlanPlus, you have the option to install support for your Palm OS device. Before installing PlanPlus for Palm OS, you must already have a HotSync connection established between your Palm OS device and Microsoft Outlook, using PocketMirror, Intellisync, Palm Desktop Software, FranklinCovey Planning Software, or another connection. PlanPlus for Palm OS does not install HotSync Manager, but only adds conduits for synchronizing FranklinCovey applications and Daily Notes with Microsoft Outlook. Before installing PlanPlus for Pocket PC applications, you must have already synchronized your Pocket PC with your desktop computer, using ActiveSync 3.1 or higher. See the PlanPlus for Palm OS User Guide for information on installing and using PlanPlus for the Palm OS.
Converting FranklinCovey Planning Software Data

If you are a FranklinCovey Planning Software user (formerly called FranklinPlanner Software for Windows), you will have the opportunity to convert your FranklinCovey Planning Software data during PlanPlus installation. Choose Yes when prompted, and your data will be automatically converted and loaded into Outlook. We recommend you make a backup copy of your FranklinCovey Planning Software data before installing PlanPlus and converting your FranklinCovey Planning Software data.
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Installing PlanPlus for Outlook

Installing PlanPlus for Outlook is a simple process. 1. Insert the PlanPlus CD into your CD-ROM drive. The PlanPlus installation menu will appear.
2. If the Microsoft .NET Framework is not already installed on your system, you should install it prior to installing PlanPlus for Outlook. Select Install Microsoft .NET Framework, and follow the on-screen instructions. (Note: This installation requires an active Internet connection.)
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System Requirements & Installation 3. After you complete the .NET Framework installation, or if the .NET Framework has previously been installed on your system, select Install PlanPlus for Microsoft Outlook. 4. The PlanPlus installation splash screen will briefly appear, followed by the first screen of the Installation wizard.
5. Before you install PlanPlus for Outlook: Synchronize all handheld devices. Disconnect any Pocket PC devices. If you use Microsoft Exchange Server, you must be connected to your network prior to installation. 6. When you are ready to continue, click Next.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide The License Agreement will appear.
7. Select I accept the terms in the license agreement and click Next to continue. The Customer Information screen appears.
8. Enter your User Name and Organization in the fields provided, and click Next.
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System Requirements & Installation The Setup Type screen appears.
9. Select Complete, and click Next, if you wish to install all program features in their default location. OR Select Custom, and click Next, if you wish to customize the installation. On the following screen, you will be given the options to install all or a portion of PlanPlus, as well as to change the directory where the files will be located. 10. Make your selection(s) and click Next.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide The Startup Folder screen will appear.
11. This screen allows you to select which of your Outlook folders you wish to open by default when PlanPlus is launched. Note: If you are connected to an Exchange server via modem, you should not select the "PlanPlus Today" folder. Make your selection, and click Next to continue.
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System Requirements & Installation The Ready to Install the Program screen appears.
12. Click Next to begin the installation. 13. The Installing FranklinCovey PlanPlus for Microsoft Outlook screen will appear, and will display a status bar indicating the progress of the installation. 14. When the installation is complete, the InstallShield Wizard Completed screen will appear. Click Finish to close the Wizard.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide PlanPlus for Outlook installation is now complete. Notice that the options for installing PlanPlus for Palm OS and Pocket PC devices are now enabled. You may select either of these options as desired.
15. When you are finished installing PlanPlus for Outlook components, click Exit to close the installation screen.
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Chapter 2
Getting Around in PlanPlus

PlanPlus v.4 for Outlook is full-featured planning application that works inside of Microsoft Outlook, and takes advantage of the many capabilities of the Outlook software. You're already familiar with the time management capabilities of Microsoft Outlook, such as creating and editing tasks and projects, scheduling meetings and events for yourself and others, and keeping track of different types of information with the Notes and Journal. In short, if you are familiar with Outlook, you'll be able to get around easily in PlanPlus. PlanPlus adds to the capabilities of Outlook by featuring powerful tools to aid you in scheduling your time by the week and by the day, ensuring that you plan and accomplish your highest priorities. This chapter provides you with a few tips about how to get around using the extra features installed with PlanPlus.
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The Home Page

After you install PlanPlus and start Outlook for the first time, select the PlanPlus Home page. You will notice a number of changes in your basic Outlook layout. Although Outlook navigation will vary depending on the version you are using, the PlanPlus Home page looks much the same whether you are working in Outlook 2000 or Outlook 2003, with a few differences that reflect the added navigation capabilities of Outlook 2003.
Display the Home Page

To display the PlanPlus Home page: Click the PlanPlus Home button from the toolbar: OR From the menu, select PlanPlus | PlanPlus Home. An example of the Home Page in Outlook 2003 is shown below. With the exception of a few navigation features, the same features are also available when using PlanPlus with Outlook 2000
Menu option Toolbar
Planning & Projects menu
Tasks list Mini Calendar Calendar view Toolbar
Selected folder & preview area
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Why use PlanPlus Home?

The PlanPlus Home page gives you one place to focus on all of the important things relative to your day. By "living" in the customizable PlanPlus Home view, you simultaneously have access to: Your Calendar (today's schedule and monthly calendars) Your Email Your Daily Notes Your Task List, including Daily Tasks and Master Tasks Part of the Act portion of the What Matters Most process is planning your day. When you "live" in the PlanPlus Home view, you can easily sketch out what you want to accomplish each day, and track your progress.
How do I use the PlanPlus Home Page?

You already know how to use most of the features of the PlanPlus Home page, as they work just like the features in Outlook. And PlanPlus features are designed to look and feel much like Outlook, so you should be able to quickly become proficient in using them. Following is a brief description of the elements of the PlanPlus Home page. Menu option The PlanPlus option on the Outlook menu bar allows you to access many PlanPlus features. Toolbar Most PlanPlus functions can be accessed through the buttons on the PlanPlus toolbar. Planning & Projects menu Options on the Planning & Projects menu launch the Project planning and Weekly Planning tools. Tasks list The tasks list keeps your task list available for quick reference. You can choose to display either your Daily or Master Tasks by clicking the appropriate button. Mini-Calendar The mini-calendar allows you to jump to a different day or month. Calendar view You can choose to display the daily, weekly, work-week, or monthly view of the calendar in this window. By default, the current date is shown; however, selecting a different date in the mini-calendar displays the new period in the calendar view you have selected. Toolbar The toolbar lets you work with items in the current folder, or open the PowerNotes or Daily Notes tools. You can choose to view either your Inbox, the PowerNotes module, or another Outlook folder at the bottom of the screen by clicking the appropriate item from the toolbar. Selected folder & message view this area displays the content of the selected folder. When an Outlook folder or PowerNotes is selected, you have the option of viewing a preview of the selected message/note in the right-hand panel. If you are creating a Daily Note, this area acts as your notepad.
Customize the Home page

By clicking and dragging the bars that separate portions of the PlanPlus Home page, you can resize the various portions to fit your needs, or even hide them completely. For more information about Outlook-specific features of the PlanPlus Home page, see your Outlook Help system or user manual.
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The Today Page

The Today Page gives you a "snapshot" of your schedule and tasks for the day. While the appearance of the Today page may vary, depending on whether you are using Outlook 2000 or Outlook 2003, both versions display the same basic information: Calendar Your appointments for the current day are listed. Compass Your Weekly Compass is also shown, for a quick reminder of what matters most to you. Messages The number of messages in your Inbox, Drafts folder, and Outbox are listed. Daily Tasks Your Daily Tasks are listed here. Jump-Starter The "weekly jump-starter" is a little something to "get you going" for the day.
Message
Tasks
Calendar Jump-starter Compass
To display the PlanPlus Today page, from the menu select PlanPlus | PlanPlus Today.
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Changes from Previous FranklinCovey Tools

If you're a veteran FranklinCovey user, you should know that PlanPlus handles values, missions, goals, and roles a little differently than what you're accustomed to. Values and Mission Values and Mission are now entered in the Mission/Values module rather than separate Governing Values and Personal Mission Statements. We recommend you create an item called Values in the Mission/Values module, and enter your governing values (with clarifying statements) at that location. Goals The Long-Range Goals module of FranklinCovey Planning Software for Windows and Outlook has been replaced by the Goals module in PlanPlus. See How do I identify a Goal? for information on how to use the new feature. Roles There is no longer a separate Roles module in PlanPlus, as there was in FranklinCovey Planning Software for Windows and Outlook. However, you can still enter your Roles on your Compass.
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Chapter 3
Organizing Your Schedule with Tasks and Projects

What is a Daily Task?
Daily Tasks are those tasks that you want to accomplish on a particular day. In PlanPlus, you create a Daily Task by assigning a Start Date to the task. When you create a task from the Daily Tasks tab in the PlanPlus Home page, the current date is automatically assigned as the Start Date, and the task will appear on the Daily Tasks tab after it is saved.
What is a Master Task?

Master Tasks are tasks that are not assigned to a particular day. In PlanPlus, you create a Master Task by creating a task without a Start Date. When you create a task from the Master Tasks tab in the PlanPlus Home page, the task is created without a Start Date, and will appear on the Master Tasks tab after it is saved.
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Creating and Editing Tasks

PlanPlus Tasks are created, edited, and deleted the same way tasks are created, edited, and deleted in Outlook. However, PlanPlus includes additional features that give you greater control over your tasks.
Create a Task
From the PlanPlus Home page, navigate to the Daily Tasks list and click in the New Task row. OR Create the task in the Outlook task screen following Outlook instructions.
Set Task Priority

1. From the Task List, select the Priority drop-down for the task you wish to prioritize. 2. Select the desired Priority from the list. Note: PlanPlus priorities (with multiple levels) do not correspond to Outlook priorities (High/Medium/Low only). When working with Tasks in PlanPlus, you should assign Priority only through the Task List view.
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Edit a Task
1. From either the PlanPlus Home page or the Outlook Tasks screen, double-click the task you wish to edit. The Task details screen will appear. 2. Make changes as you normally would in an Outlook task. Note: Changes to the Priority and Rank of the task can only be made from the PlanPlus Task List view. 3. Click Save and Close when finished.
Change Task Priority

Select a new Priority level from the Priority drop-down list for the desired item. OR 1. Click the task you wish to move, and hold the mouse button. 2. Drag the task to the desired priority on the Task List, and release the mouse button.
Assign Action Codes

You can use the standard FranklinCovey "action codes" to mark the status of tasks by simply clicking on the Task Status portion of the task. You can choose from any of the standard FranklinCovey action codes with this option: Normal This option leaves the status field blank. Completed Choose this option when the task has been completed. Forward Choose this option to forward the task to a future date. Delete Choose this option to remove the task from the list. Delegate Choose this option to indicate that you have delegated the task to someone else. In Process Choose this option to indicate that you have begun the task, but have not yet completed it.
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Manage Tasks with the "Right Click" Feature

You can manage your Tasks by right-clicking on a task and choosing from several options. 1. Move your mouse pointer over a task on your PlanPlus Task List, then right-click your mouse. 2. The right-click menu appears. 3. Click the desired option. New Task Create a new task. Open Opens the Task Details box, where you may make changes to the task. Print Print the task details. Assign Task To assign this task to another person, click Assign Task. This option forwards the task to the other person via e-mail, and creates a link between the task on your list and the task on their list, automatically updating the status of the task on your list as they change the task status on their own list. Cut, Copy, Paste, Delete Text These editing options allow you to copy and paste portions of the task description into a new task, or remove task information from the current task. Undo Reverses the last change made to the task description. Select All Selects all text in the task description. Delete. To delete the selected task, simply click Delete from the right-click menu. Field Chooser Opens the Field Chooser dialog, allowing you to select the information fields you wish to display in the Task List. Simply drag and drop fields from the Field Chooser dialog onto the Task List, or drag and drop fields from the Task List to the Field Chooser dialog to remove them from your active display. For example, if you wish to view the due dates for all of your tasks at a glance, you may choose to add that field to the Task List. Or, if you want to see the tasks, but do not need the list of task owners (such as when you own all the tasks and have not assigned any to another person), you may wish to drag the Task Owner field off of the Task List.
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Using the Calendar

If you are familiar with entering, editing, and managing tasks and appointments in Outlook, you already know how to do the same in PlanPlus. PlanPlus uses the drag-and-drop capabilities of Microsoft Outlook to allow you to change tasks to appointments, appointments to tasks, and change the priority and rank of tasks in the PlanPlus Home page. In addition to scheduling your tasks, as you use the Weekly Planning and Compass features of PlanPlus, you will learn to use the Calendar to create tasks and set appointments that will help you in achieving what matters most to you.
Moving a Task to a Different Date

You can move a task to a different day using any of the following methods: From the PlanPlus Home page, click on the task you wish to move, and drag it to the new date on the mini-calendar. Open the Task Detail window and change the Start Date. Use the Quick Prioritize feature to drag-and-drop a task to a new date
Changing a Task to an Appointment

Changing a task to an appointment is as simple as dragging the task to the desired time on the Appointment Schedule. 1. From the PlanPlus Home page, click the desired task. 2. Drag the task to the calendar. 3. The Appointment Details screen appears. Make adjustments to the appointment details, as necessary, then click Save and Close. A copy of the task appears on your calendar as an appointment, while the original remains on your Task List.
Changing an Appointment to a Task

It is also simple to change an appointment to a task. 1. Click the desired appointment. 2. Drag the appointment to the Task List. 3. The appointment is converted to a task, and appears on your Task List.
Auto-Forwarding
In PlanPlus, since it works with Microsoft Outlook, a task not marked Complete on the day it is due will automatically appear on the following day's list. This auto-forwarding will continue until you mark the task complete or reschedule it for a different day.
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Quick Prioritize
Quick Prioritize is a tool to help you quickly prioritize and rank your daily tasks, using the drag-and-drop capabilities of Outlook to assign or change task dates. Quick Prioritize has three main functions: Prioritize Tasks You can easily drag-and-drop a task to automatically change its priority. Rank Tasks You can drag-and-drop a task up or down a priority section (A, B, or C) in order to automatically change its rank (1, 2, 3 and so forth). Move Tasks You can also drag-and-drop a task to any date on the mini-calendars to move the task to that date.
Using Quick Prioritize

1. Launch Quick Prioritize using either of the following methods: To open the Quick Prioritize tool, from the PlanPlus Home page Planning and Projects menu, click the Quick Prioritize button. OR From the Outlook menu, select PlanPlus | Quick Prioritize.
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Organizing Your Schedule with Tasks and Projects The Quick Prioritize screen will appear.
The current date is circled in red on the Quick Prioritize mini-calendar at the top of the screen. By default, Daily Tasks for the current date are listed in the columns below the mini calendars Tasks are color coded: "A" level tasks are brown. "B" level tasks are blue. "C" level tasks are green. Overdue tasks are red. To view tasks for a different day, select that date (it will appear shaded on the minicalendar when selected). To view Master Tasks, select the Master Tasks tab at the bottom of the screen.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide 2. Quick Prioritize recommends three steps for organizing your tasks: Prioritize tasks Click and drag tasks to the most suitable priority column. Rank tasks Click and drag tasks to the most suitable rank within a priority (you must have Auto-Ranking turned on to do this). Create a realistic plan Click and drag tasks to a different day on the mini-calendar. Alternatively, you may wish to move some tasks to the Master Tasks list. Select the task, and click Move to Master Tasks. Note: If you are working on the Master Tasks tab, and wish to move a task to the Daily Tasks list, simply click and drag the task to the desired date. The task will be moved to the Daily Tasks list for that date. 3. If desired, turn on Auto-Ranking. If your tasks were not previously assigned a rank, Auto-Ranking automatically assigns a rank to your tasks when you open the Quick Prioritize feature. When Auto-Ranking is on (the check box is marked), you can drag-and-drop tasks up and down their Priority categories, or drag-and-drop them between categories, and they will automatically reranked as they are added to the new category. When Auto-Ranking is off (the check box is blank), your task rankings are not automatically adjusted as you move them between categories. Ranking may be manually adjusted through the Task List. 4. When you are finished working in Quick Prioritize, click the Save and Close button. Notice that the next time you view your Tasks List, your tasks have the new priorities you selected for them in Quick Prioritize.
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What is a Project?
A project is a record of those tasks that you have to accomplish. Some projects are simple, and others are complex. For example, you might have a project that involves several steps: Get sales figures from Josh. Insert Maria's data into report. Import Sales template from main database. Write up analysis. Get sales analysis from Maria Print and distribute report. With the Projects feature, you can create a project called "Write Sales Report." Then you can break down that project into its component steps. In this example, you'd create one project with six different steps, as illustrated below.
The projects section of the home page lets you view your projects, add new tasks to an existing project, and choose which project's tasks you want to see. You can view every project you set up here, and you can change the status of a task (for instance, you can change a task's status from Normal to Completed). With the Projects feature, you can understand and break down your complex projects into manageable pieces. You can see the entire project at a glance and plan how best to get it done. The Projects feature lets you keep track of the status of any given project and see that status at a glance. You can assign various project tasks to someone else and link tasks to deadlines, complete with reminder pop-ups. The Projects feature is a powerful tool to help you manage all your projects no matter how complicated.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide PlanPlus for Outlook provides two methods of accessing your Project information, each with similar, but slightly different features:
A PlanPlus Project shown in the Projects window, and in the PlanPlus Home Page window
Select the Project from the Project Tab or the drop-down list
Home Page Projects View View each of your projects by selecting them from the drop-down list Create new projects Create tasks for your projects
Projects Main Page View each of your projects by selecting them from the tabs at the bottom of the page. Create new projects Create tasks for your projects Add tasks from your master or daily task list Move tasks around within projects Create "task branches" by using the indent and outdent features to define parent tasks and subtasks Assign tasks to someone else Give tasks a deadline Change the status of a given task
Create "task branches" using tabs to indent subtasks Assign tasks to someone else Give tasks a deadline Change the status of a given task Prioritize and/or assign flags to project tasks
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Creating a Project
You can create a new project using any of the following methods: 1. Open the Projects page: From the PlanPlus toolbar, clicking the Project button. From the Planning and Projects Menu, select Projects. From the Outlook menu, select PlanPlus | Projects. 2. From the Projects page, select Project Tools | Create New Project. 1. From the PlanPlus Home page, navigate to the Task List toolbar, and select the View Active Projects button.
2. Select <Create Project> from the dropdown list.
3. A window appears, asking you to name the project.
4. Give the project a brief, descriptive name, and click OK. Once the project has been created, the project name appears on a tab along the bottom of the Projects window, and is also listed in the Active Projects drop-down list on the PlanPlus Home page.
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Adding Tasks to a Project

Typically, you will add a list of tasks to a project, and then go back and work with the tasks, to assign them to the appropriate individuals, set deadlines, and so forth. 1. To add a task to a new project, click anywhere in the project window. To add a task to an existing project, place your cursor on the task line just above where you want to enter the new task, and press Enter. A blank task line will appear where you can enter a brief description of the task. 2. Your new task is automatically given Normal status.
3. To add the next task, click Enter at the end of the task line, and a new, blank task line appears. You can add as many tasks as you wish. Note: You have to enter some text in a task line before you can add another task. In other words, the PlanPlus will not display more than one blank task line at a time.
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Adding Existing Tasks to a Project

Let's say that you realize that you need to call the local print store about printing the sales report, and the task "Call print store" is already on your daily task list. You can easily add that task to your project. 1. From the Project Tools popup menu, select Add Existing Tasks to Project. A list of all your existing tasks appears.
2. Choose the task(s) you want to add (you can also choose to clear all the tasks or select them all) to the project and click Add. The task is added to your project.
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Working with Project Tasks

Once you've created a project and created the tasks associated with it, you can: Assign the task Give a task a deadline Change the status of the task Create "task branches" Change the status bar next to a "parent" task Move tasks within the project
Assigning tasks 1. In the Project window, highlight the task you want to delegate. Right-click on the task, and from the popup menu that appears, select Assign Task. A normal Outlook task window is displayed, with the task information. 2. Click the To button at the top of the window to choose the person being assigned to this task. 3. Enter any other helpful information, if necessary, in the task notes field. 4. If you wish to keep an updated copy of the task on your own task list, or to receive a status report when the task is complete, leave these options checked. 5. Click Send to send the task.
TIP:
As a reminder that you've delegated this task, you can change the task's status to "Delegate." A circle will appear next to the task to remind you that it's no longer yours.
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Assigning a Task Deadline 1. Click in the Date column for the task that you want to assign to a deadline: 2. Click the arrow in the Date column to display a calendar: 3. Select the date you want to assign to the task. The date displays next to the task in the Date column. 4. Project tasks with deadlines will appear in your Daily Tasks list on their assigned date. You will also receive a reminder about the task deadline.
Changing the Status of a Task 1. In the Project window, click the square next to the task with the status you want to change. A list of status options appears. 2. Highlight the status you want to assign to that task and click. The task's status is reassigned and the "Normal" square changes to the symbol corresponding to the new status.
Reorganizing Project Tasks 1. In the Project window, highlight the task you want to move. 2. From the Project toolbar, click the Up or Down arrows to move the task to a higher or lower position in the list.
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Task Branches
A project may include tasks which are more easily broken into a set of sub-tasks indicating that the task itself is not complete until all of its sub-tasks have been completed. These groupings are known in PlanPlus as "task branches." For example, the "Write Sales Report" sample includes the task "Print and distribute report." This task is actually composed of a number of sub-tasks. Listing those sub-tasks in your Project will help to ensure that all are completed. Creating Task Branches 1. Create the sub-tasks as though they were normal tasks 2. Select the task you want to subordinate to another task. For example, you want to show that "Call print store" is a part of the task "Print and distribute report," so you would select "Call print store." 3. Click the right arrow on the Projects toolbar. The task is indented, so that it is now subordinate (a "child") to the task above it (the "parent"). 4. Repeat this process for each of the tasks that are subordinate to another task. As the following illustration indicates, a single "parent" task can have many "children."
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Working with Task Branches Depending on the complexity of your Project, you may have many task branches, or none at all. A particularly complex Project, may contain multiple task branches within parent task branches. PlanPlus allows you the flexibility to design your Project in the way that best helps you organize your tasks. You can move task branches within the project. Select the "parent" task, and use the Up or Down arrows to move it to a new position. You can add task branches to the depth you desire. Select the subordinate task and use the Right arrow to indent the task (and its subtasks) to the desired level. You can remove task branches. Select the branch you wish to move out, and use the Left arrow to "outdent" the task (and any subtasks it may have) to the desired level.
Task Branch Status By default, "parent" tasks display a progress gauge, indicating the percentage of the branch that is complete.
For example, in the illustration above, three of the four "child" tasks of this "parent" are completed. As a result, the status bar is 75% full. When the final "child" task is completed, the status bar will be 100% full. Note: You can choose to hide the Status bar. Simply click on it, and select Show as Heading. The gauge will be replaced with a line, indicating that this is a parent task. You can show the Status bar again at any time by clicking on the parent task line and selecting Show as Gauge.
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Expanding/Collapsing Task Branches In a complex Project, with many task branches, you may wish to reduce the list length for convenience in reviewing the Project status. For example, you may choose to display only the "parent" tasks that are currently being worked on. To collapse a task branch, click on the outline indicator to the left of the "parent" task's status icon. The branch will collapse, and the outline indicator will change to a "+" symbol, indicating that this is a collapsed "parent" task. To expand a collapsed task branch, click on the "+" symbol. The branch will open, displaying all "child" tasks contained in the branch.
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Project Tools
Clicking Project Tools from the Projects page displays the Project Tools pop-up menu which allows you to perform a variety of project management tasks. This menu is also available by right-clicking on the Project Tabs at the bottom of the Projects page Delete a Project 1. With the desired project selected, open the Project Tools menu. 2. Select Delete Project. 3. A dialog box will appear asking you to confirm the deletion. Click Yes to delete the project and all its tasks, or Cancel to abort the deletion.
Rename a Project 1. With the desired project selected, open the Project Tools menu. 2. Select Rename Project. 3. A dialog will appear, displaying the original name of the project. Enter the new name for the project and click OK. 4. The project will be renamed. The new name will be listed in the project tab, and in the Project drop-down list.
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Hide a Project 1. To hide a project, point your mouse over the desired Project tab (it is not necessary to select the tab). 2. Right-click on the project tab, and select Hide Project. 3. The project tab will disappear from the list of tabs at the bottom of the window. Hidden projects will not appear in the PlanPlus Home page Projects drop-down list.
View Hidden Projects 1. To view hidden projects, point your mouse over any Project tab, and right-click. 2. From the pop-up menu, select Show Hidden Projects. 3. Tabs for any projects you have hidden will now appear. However, these projects will not be listed in the PlanPlus Home page Projects drop-down list.
Unhide a Project 1. To show a hidden project, point your mouse over the desired Project tab and right-click. 2. If it is a hidden project, selecting Unhide Project will restore the Project. The project will now be visible (even if Show Hidden Projects is disabled) in both the Project tabs list and in the PlanPlus Home page Projects drop-down list.
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Project Notes & Progress Tabs

The Project Notes and Progress tabs (to the left of the Project view, in the Projects page) provide a place for you to record and view detailed information about the Project.
Project Notes Project Notes are similar to other PlanPlus Notes. You may use them to record details about the project. Project Notes are directly associated with the specific Project Task selected at the time the note was recorded, and are displayed in the Project Notes tab.
Project Progress The Project Progress tab displays the status of the selected Project Task. If the Task is a "parent" task, with associated "child" tasks, additional information about the sub-tasks is provided in the Task Status area. If desired, you may email a copy of this report by clicking the E-mail Report button.
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E-mail Report Clicking the E-mail Report button opens a dialog, allowing you to choose the specifications for the report you wish to e-mail. 1. Select whether you wish to generate a report for the selected task only, or for the entire project. 2. Select whether you wish to generate a Summary or a Detail report. 3. After you have made your selections, click OK to generate the report. 4. An email message will be created, containing the report. Select a recipient and enter a subject line as usual. When you are finished, click Send to e-mail the report.
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Chapter 4
Using the FranklinCovey Planning System

PlanPlus v.4 for Outlook includes FranklinCovey Planning System modules to help you discover and achieve your highest priorities. In this section, you will find information on how to use the following FranklinCovey Planning System modules: Weekly Planning Mission and Values Goals Weekly Compass The FranklinCovey Planning System does not simply make you more efficient, it makes you more effective.
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Weekly Planning
There are four steps in the Weekly Planning process. Although it is not mandatory to do all four every single week, we recommend doing them all for best effect.
Why Should I Plan Weekly?

Perhaps the metaphor of being unable to see the forest for the trees is useful here. Weekly planning gets you thinking about tomorrow, and the next day, and the next week, rather than just living from day to day. By planning weekly, you can make sure that you get your Big Rocks into your schedule first. By taking twenty minutes at the start of each week to plan your week, you will experience a significant increase in productivity.
The Weekly Planning Process

The process of weekly planning is a very straightforward process of connecting with what matters most to you, then putting first things first by scheduling the Big Rocks that will help toward your goals and that will help you strengthen your relationships. This section shows you how to use the Weekly Planning feature to do your own weekly planning. Weekly Planning is accomplished in a simple, four-step process. Review Mission This beginning step encourages you to access the deep burning yes! created by the awareness of first things in your life, the yes! that generates passion and energy and makes it possible for you to say no with confidence and peace to the less important. Schedule Goals This step enables you to set principle-based goals that will create quality-of-life results. This step provides a medium for breaking these goals into smaller, achievable steps with deadlines, and then schedule them into your weekly plan. Schedule Compass This step enables you to focus on roles and relationships through which you can achieve balance. The Compass empowers you to put your Big Rocks your important Quadrant II goals into your schedule first and schedule other things around them. Schedule Tasks This final step allows you to review all the other things that you need to do and schedule them on appropriate days throughout the week. Throughout each step of the Weekly Planning process, you are encouraged to evaluate your progress toward your goals from the previous week.
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The Weekly Planning Module To create your weekly plan in PlanPlus, start by displaying the Weekly Planning module, using any of the following methods: From the PlanPlus Toolbar, click the Weekly Planning button. From the PlanPlus Home page, navigate to the Planning & Projects toolbar and click Weekly Planning. From the Outlook toolbar, select PlanPlus | Weekly Planning. Throughout the rest of this chapter, we will follow the steps outlined in the Weekly Planning Module to help you identify and review your mission and values, set and schedule goals, identify roles and big rocks and fit them into your schedule, and schedule your remaining tasks.
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Mission and Values

What makes the FranklinCovey Planning System uniquely powerful is its ability to help you integrate your highest priorities into your planning. The starting point in discovering what matters most to you is identifying your Values and discovering your Mission.
Why should I identify my Mission and Values?

By identifying your Mission and Values, you discover your highest priorities. Discover is a useful word here because you are simply taking a bit of time to discover what you probably already know about yourself. Understanding your highest priorities has two components discovering your Values and discovering your Mission. Nothing spectacular here you are simply thinking about what you care about, what motivates you to action, the foundation for how you make decisions. If you have already identified your Values and Mission, so much the better, but if this is something you have not really thought of before, a small investment in time will pay big dividends. Missions and Values, whether for individuals or organizations, are highly personal. There is no right way to create a Mission or a Value, no right way to express yourself or to formulate a Mission or Values for your organization. What is most important is that your Mission and Values be meaningful for you.
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To Identify Your Mission

By identifying your Mission, you create a powerful document that expresses your sense of purpose and meaning in life. Your Mission can act as a governing constitution by which you evaluate decisions and choose behaviors. It focuses on what you want to be and what you want to do, and also focuses on the values or principles upon which being and doing are based. Missions are also vital to successful teams and organizations. A Mission creates a frame of reference in the hearts and minds of individuals, a set of criteria or guidelines by which they will govern themselves and make choices each day. Considerations Here are some things to consider as you think about your unique Mission: Your personal Mission will be unlike anyone elses. It will be customized to your unique talents, gifts, and contributions. Your personal Mission may be written and it may be five words or five pages long but not all Missions are written. To help you begin thinking about your Mission, ask yourself some questions: What are my greatest moments of happiness and fulfillment? What are the activities of most worth to me in my personal life? What are the activities of most worth to me in my professional life? What are my natural gifts, talents, strengths, and abilities? What am I motivated by, fascinated with, passionate about? How can I best contribute to my community? Try the fast write Armed with this summary, you can then formulate your own Mission. We recommend a fast write exercise as a means of formulating an initial draft of your Mission. Find someplace where you will be free from distractions. Put on some music that inspires you. Start with a pen or pencil and a clean sheet of paper, or a blank document with your favorite word processor. Think about the above questions. Then, just write. Do not worry about spelling, or grammar, or punctuation. You are simply trying to take what is milling about in your head and dump it where you can see it. Write for about five minutes. If you go a little long or short, do not worry about it. Then take a look at what you have written. You may well have the beginnings of your personal Mission. Appendix A: Sample Mission and Values Statements contains samples of actual Missions related by individuals and organizations. You may wish to review these and see how they work, but the point isnt to pick one and use it. Make your Mission and Values your own.
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To Identify Your Values

So, what is important to you? Integrity? Fidelity to your friends? Loyalty to a job, your family, or a defined set of principles? Use the Mission and Values module to record the values you identify. More Than One Value? You probably have more than one Value, but your list of Values need not be tremendously long. And you do not have to be the perfect exemplar of your Values. Part of the reason you want to identify your Values is to identify those areas where you want to improve. Clarify Your Values As you identify each Value, you should also clarify it. For example, if you value Integrity, what does that mean to you? Does it mean I never tell lies or does it mean I am honest and trustworthy in my personal and business dealings? Or does it mean something else? By clarifying your values, they become more real to you. You may have already given this subject a good deal of thought, or you may not have thought about it at all. In any case, by looking inside at what is most important to you and identifying and clarifying these things as Values, you will have taken a giant step toward understanding what truly matters most to you. Appendix A: Sample Mission and Values Statements contains several sample Values with some sample clarifying statements. These are provided primarily to give you ideas for creating your own clarifying statements. If these samples work for you, great, but the point isnt to pick from this list of Values to make your own list. Your Values should reflect what matters most to you, not what matters most to someone else.
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Mission and Values FAQ

What types of things should I include in my mission? The authors of the book First Things First write that the mission statements people find most empowering share the following characteristics: represents the deepest and best within you is the fulfillment of your own unique gifts is transcendentbased on principles or contribution and purpose higher than self addresses and integrates all four fundamental human needs and capacities is based on principles that produce quality-of-life results deals with both vision and principle-based values deals with all the significant roles in your life is written to inspire you How long should my mission statement be? Mission statements range from a few words to several pages. Some are expressed in music, poetry, and art. Because each persons personal vision is unique, each persons mission will be unique. Can my mission change? To be empowering, a mission statement has to become a living document that, like life, can be evaluated and changed. How often should I review/revise my mission? Weekly planning allows time each week to review, or reconnect, to your mission. Revising your mission is something that will take place far less frequently, perhaps annually.
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To Learn More About Missions and Values There are a number of resources you can use to help you better understand how and why to identify your Mission and Values, either for yourself or for your organization. Many of these resources are available on the World Wide Web, so you will need Internet access in order to take advantage of them. Three Resolutions by Stephen R. Covey from Priorities magazine http://www.franklincovey.com/ez/library/three.html Character First an interview with Stephen R. Covey from Priorities magazine http://www.franklincovey.com/ez/library/char.html Finding Purpose from WomenToday.com http://www.womentodaymagazine.com/selfesteem/purpose.html?a=515p Mission Possible from BusinessWeek.com http://www.businessweek.com/archives/1999/b3642034.arc.htm?$sap In addition, Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations contains several thoughts, quotes, and questions that may be useful to you in formulating your own Mission and Values. Appendix F: Articles and Stories contains a collection of articles and stories that you may find inspirational and educational.
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Weekly Planning Step 1: Review Mission
In the Review Mission step, you review your Mission and any Values that you have entered in the Mission module. Note: The first time you use the Weekly Planning Module, you will begin by creating your Mission and Values statements. 1. Select the Mission you wish to review. 2. If you want to modify or add information to the Mission module, you can do it from here by clicking New Mission, or highlighting the item you want to change and editing the name or content of the item. The Review Mission step is intended to re-connect you with your highest priorities. Even if you do not make any changes or additions to your Mission and Values information, you should still review it to refresh your mind as to what you think is truly important in your life. 3. When you have finished reviewing your Mission statement and other information, click Schedule Goals.
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Using the Mission and Values Tool

To enter a new mission in PlanPlus, or to list your values, start by displaying the Mission and Values page, using any of the following methods: From the PlanPlus Toolbar, click the Mission/Values button. From the PlanPlus Home page, navigate to the Planning & Projects toolbar and click Weekly Planning. From the Outlook toolbar, select PlanPlus | Mission/Values.
Enter a New Mission 1. From the Mission/Values screen, click New Mission/Values. 2. Enter a description of the new mission (such as Personal Mission Statement). 3. Click in the detail area, and type in the particulars of your new mission statement.
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Enter a New Value 1. From the Mission/Values screen, click New Mission/Values. 2. Enter a description of the new value.
3. Click in the detail area, and type in the particulars of your new value statement. TIP: If you use the Mission/Values feature to list your values, we recommend you preface your values with a standard word to make them easily distinguishable on the list (such as "Value - Integrity" and so forth).
The Mission Toolbar When you are creating a mission, the mission toolbar is displayed.
New Mission/Value create a new mission or value statement. Delete Item delete the selected mission. Cut cut the selected text (also places the text on the Windows clipboard). Copy copy the selected text to the Windows clipboard. Paste paste the text from the Clipboard to the selected location.
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Goals
Goals are the critical link between discovering what matters most to you and acting on what matters most to you. You begin to bring your daily activities in line with what matters most by setting long range goals, then subdividing those goals into manageable chunks. So, with what matters most to you firmly in mind, set some goals.
Why Should I Set Goals?

The most valuable goals are connected to your inner passion. When a goal is in alignment with your principles and mission, you will find it gives you energy and that seeing it through is easier. Goals give you a way to move forward with a greater sense of purpose. To achieve challenging yet realistic goals, you must clarify them in two areas: Why? Why would you want to achieve it? What purpose does it serve to you, or to others? How? That is, how would you achieve it? What steps would you have to take to actually see it through? Finally, break each goal into smaller, achievable steps with deadlines and work them into your weekly plan accordingly.
How Do I Identify a Goal?

When you realize that Goal is a dream with a deadline rather than just something you think you might get around to someday, using PlanPlus Goals feature becomes quite simple. First, you create a goal by entering it in the Goals module, and entering the description of the goal. Then, you create intermediate steps (either Tasks or Appointments) by clicking the Add Intermediate Step button. You then enter the details of the intermediate step. When you finish entering the intermediate step, one or more new Tasks or Appointments will appear on your schedule. During the Weekly Planning process, you can also drag-and-drop intermediate steps directly onto your Task List. Finally, you act on the intermediate steps. PlanPlus cannot cure you of a tendency to procrastinate, of course, but it does provide you with a simple and effective method of planning that lets you focus on what is most important to you, without overloading yourself. When you have identified the goal and intermediate steps, you can begin to plug in the intermediate steps to your Daily and Master Tasks lists. Appendix B: Sample Goals and Intermediate Steps contains some examples of goals set by other individuals.
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Goals FAQ
How can I use Long-Range Goals for projects at work? While PlanPlus is not project management software, creating projects as long-range goals is sufficient for many people for entering goals (or projects), breaking them down into intermediate steps, time-activating them by creating appointments or tasks, and tracking the goal to completion. Can I put long-range goals on my master task list? You can put long-range goals on your master task list; however, you may find the long-range goals section of PlanPlus makes goal planning and goal tracking easier. How many intermediate steps should I have for each long-range goal? This really depends on the scope and timeline of the goal. Ideally, your list of intermediate steps should reflect all the tasks that must be completed in order to accomplish the goal. How can I make sure I work on my long-range goals each week? The second step in weekly planning is Schedule Goals. This is a great opportunity to review your long-range goals and intermediate steps, and schedule what needs action in the coming week. When should I review my long-range goals? Long-range goals are reviewed weekly during weekly planning and can also be reviewed as intermediate steps are scheduled on the calendar or task list.
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Weekly Planning Step 2: Schedule Goals
The Schedule Goals portion of the Weekly Planning process helps you take your long range Goals and make them a reality by integrating them into your weekly plan. When you click Schedule Goals, the screen changes to show you your schedule, your task list, and all the Goals you have already created. From the Schedule Goals screen, you can put existing Goals and Intermediate Steps into your schedule, or you can create new Goals and Intermediate Steps to put into your schedule. IMPORTANT When you schedule tasks in the Weekly Planning module, it is vitally important to use the Add Intermediate Step or Schedule Task options in the Weekly Planning module to schedule your task. If you choose File | New | Task from the Outlook menu bar, or click the New button from the Outlook toolbar, the task you create will not appear on your FranklinCovey Task List.
Remember, Goals are overarching statements of something you wish to accomplish, while Intermediate Steps are the steps you will take to accomplish your goal. Intermediate steps should be easily converted to an Appointment or Task. If one cannot, the Intermediate Step is probably too general.
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To Create a New Goal

1. To enter a new Goal in PlanPlus, start by displaying the Goals page, using any of the following methods: From the PlanPlus Toolbar, click the Goals button. From the PlanPlus Home page, navigate to the Planning & Projects toolbar and click Weekly Planning, and then click the Schedule Goals button. From the Outlook toolbar, select PlanPlus | Goals. 2. Click the New Goal button. 3. Enter the description of the new goal, and the deadline. 4. You can use a Date dialog box to choose the deadline date by clicking in the Deadline box, then clicking the down arrow symbol that appears. 5. To add Intermediate Steps to your goal, click to select the desired goal, then click Add Intermediate Step. When you have finished adding intermediate steps, all intermediate steps will appear below the goal. 6. If you wish to create a task or an appointment from a goal step, select the step and drag it to the calendar or task list OR Click on the down arrow that appears to the left of the desired step. A pop-up menu appears. You may choose one of the following options: Mark Completed This option allows you to mark a step Completed. Schedule Appointment When you choose this option, a standard Appointment box will appear to let you create an appointment from the step. Schedule Task When you choose this option, a standard Task box will appear to let you create a Daily or Master task from the step. Delete Intermediate Step This option allows you to delete the selected step.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide When you are creating a mission, the mission toolbar is displayed.
New Goal create a new goal. Add Intermediate Step create a new step under an existing goal. Delete Item delete the selected mission. Cut cut the selected text (also places the text on the Windows clipboard). Copy copy the selected text to the Windows clipboard. Paste paste the text from the Clipboard to the selected location.
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Weekly Compass
The Compass is a powerful method of helping you focus on your key roles and relationships, setting goals to help you strengthen those relationships over the course of a week. This section tells you how to use the Weekly Compass module in PlanPlus to create a Compass.
Why Should I Use the Weekly Compass?

With the Compass, you review your key Roles and relationships and create Big Rocks to strengthen those roles and relationships. You may wish to focus on a particular role for the week, or you may set goals for several or all of your roles.
Select Roles
As you create your Weekly Compass, we recommend you identify a maximum of seven roles that you want to focus on, then ask yourself a simple question: What is the one thing I can do this week that will have the most significant impact on this role? As you answer this question, you will identify the goals that belong on your Weekly Compass.
Identify Your "Big Rocks"

A good way to think of the Tasks and Appointments that support your highest priorities is to think of them as Big Rocks. Your Big Rocks are the most important things you want to accomplish this week. All the other things on your list can be represented by little rocks things that still must get done but which are not as important. It's like filling a bucket with rocks. If you fill the bucket with little rocks first, you may not have enough room left in the bucket to fit in all the Big Rocks. But, if you start with the Big Rocks, the little rocks can be poured into the remaining space. By putting the Big Rocks into the bucket first, even if all the rocks do not fit, at the least the most important ones are in. Your weekly schedule is very similar to the bucket it has limited space (time) which must be filled with both important activities (Big Rocks) and non-essential activities (little rocks). If you put your Big Rocks into your weekly schedule first, you can fill in the gaps in the rest of the available time with your little rocks.
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Big Rocks and Quadrant II of the Time Matrix

If you remember the Time Matrix, you will know that Quadrant II activities are those activities that are very important, though not particularly urgent at the moment. For this discussion, it is enough to say that the Big Rocks that you want in your schedule will often be Quadrant II activities activities that may not be urgent (meaning they may not be screaming for attention right now) but are extremely important. Quadrant II activities include planning, prevention, and relationshipbuilding.
Quadrant I Very Important Urgent Less Important Urgent Quadrant III Quadrant II Very Important Not Urgent Less Important Not Urgent Quadrant IV
Of course, some of your Big Rocks may well be Quadrant I activities, both urgent and important. Thats okay, but do not let the urgency of an activity fool you. Something that is screaming for your attention right now may be both urgent and important, or it may be simply urgent, and not very important at all.
Strengthen Relationships
The Weekly Compass is not intended to reduce the people you care most about to simple Tasks and Appointments. It is simply a method of keeping the needs of the people you care about continually in mind. For example, perhaps your old friend Joan has been much on your mind these days. She recently moved to another city, and you really feel like you should keep in touch. So, in your role of Friend, you might set a goal for the week of Write a letter to Joan. It can be that simple. Similarly, your Big Rocks can also be simple or complex. You may create Big Rocks for all your roles, or just a few, Or just one. What is most important is that you create Big Rocks that strengthen the relationships defined by your roles.
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Weekly Compass FAQ

What is the maximum number of roles I should have? We recommend no more than seven roles, representative of both your personal and professional life. Do I have to work on a goal each week for each role? No, but we recommend you have some compass goals each week (perhaps in other roles) to reinforce your key priorities. What is Quadrant II? QII or Quadrant II refers to the Important, "Not Urgent" section of the Time Management Matrix used in many Franklin Covey workshops. Its in this Quadrant of Quality we do our long-range planning, anticipate and prevent problems, empower others, broaden our minds and increase our skills through reading and continuous professional development, prepare for important meetings and presentations, or invest in relationships through deep, honest listening. It is the quadrant of personal leadership. Is the Weekly Compass in PlanPlus only for my professional life? The Weekly Compass is an excellent tool for your whole lifepersonal and professional. What do I do with Sharpen the Saw? The term sharpen the saw is a metaphor that describes the energy we invest in increasing our personal capacity in the four fundamental areasphysical, social/emotional, mental and spiritual. Many people use their sharpen the saw role for organizing weekly investment activities like daily exercise or personal reading. Its really a matter of making sure none of the four areas is neglected and scheduling what works best for you. How do I create a Weekly Compass? You can create a Weekly Compass in PlanPlus from the Schedule Compass portion of the Weekly Planning module.
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Weekly Planning Step 3: Schedule Compass
With Intermediate Steps from your Goals placed on your schedule, the next step is to put your Big Rocks into your weekly schedule. These Big Rocks comprise what you want to do this week to strengthen your relationships. You will begin by scheduling your "Sharpen the Saw" goals. Sharpen the Saw Big Rocks address renewing your most important resource yourself. We recommend a Big Rock for each of the four areas in Sharpen the Saw: Physical Mental Social/Emotional Spiritual Review each of the goals you have listed in the "Sharpen the Saw" category, to determine if it will best fit into your week as a Task or as an Appointment. To place your goals onto your schedule, simply drag-and-drop the goal onto your schedule,
To Schedule your Weekly Compass

1. To schedule your Weekly Compass in PlanPlus, start by displaying the Weekly Compass page, using any of the following methods: From the PlanPlus Toolbar, click the Compass button. From the PlanPlus Home page, navigate to the Planning & Projects toolbar and click Weekly Planning, and then click the Schedule Compass button. From the Outlook toolbar, select PlanPlus | Weekly Compass. 2. Fill in your Big Rocks for the Sharpen the Saw area of the Weekly Compass. 3. Identify the other Roles you want to focus on this week. We recommend listing no more than seven roles. 4. Add the Big Rocks for each of the Roles you have identified for the week. Right-click on the new role, and choose Add Big Rock from the popup menu. OR Select the desired Role and click the Add Big Rock button from the Compass Toolbar 5. Enter the description of the Big Rock.
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Using the FranklinCovey Planning System 6. You can now schedule your Big Rocks as either tasks or appointments, if desired. Select a Big Rock and right click. The pop-up menu that appears gives you the following options: Mark Complete Use this option to mark an existing Big Rock, task, or appointment as completed. Schedule Appointment If you choose this option, a standard Appointment dialog box will appear. Enter your appointment details, then click Save and Close. Schedule Task If you choose this option, a standard Task dialog will appear. Enter your task details, then click Save and Close. Delete Big Rock This option allows you to delete the Big Rock.
When you have finished, most, if not all of your Big Rocks will be on your schedule as Tasks or Appointments.
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Weekly Planning Step 4: Schedule Tasks
The final stage in Weekly Planning is to fill in your additional Tasks and Appointments around your Big Rocks. When you choose Schedule Tasks in the Weekly Planning module, you will see a screen containing your Daily Tasks for the week (listed by day), your appointments for the week (in a calendar view), and your Master Tasks (in a separate list).
Schedule any Master Tasks you desire by clicking the task and dragging it to the desired date and time (to create an appointment) or to the desired date in Daily Tasks (to turn the Master Task into a Daily Task). When you add a new task from the Schedule Tasks portion of Weekly Planning, you create a Master Task. Click in the "Click here to add a new Task" box and type in a description for the task. Daily Tasks can be converted into Master Tasks, or either type of task into an appointment, or an appointment into a Daily or Master Task, by clicking and dragging the item to the new location. When you have completed scheduling your Tasks, your Weekly Planning is complete, and your schedule is now ready for you to begin your week. You can review your Mission, Goals, Compass, and Task list at any time during the week, as well as add additional Tasks and Appointments as they arise.
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Weekly Planning FAQ

When is the best time to do my weekly planning? Some people prefer to organize on Friday afternoon before they leave the office. Others prefer Sunday morning or first thing Monday morning. The important thing is to find a regular time each week when you can be alone for 20-30 minutes to evaluate the past week and plan the next. What are the most important steps in weekly planning? The four steps in the weekly planning process are: Review Mission Schedule Goals Schedule Compass, and Schedule Tasks While the process isnt sequential or linear, we recommend you do each of the steps every week in the order listed. Each step provides a different benefit and all are equally important. How long should it take? The average weekly planning session probably lasts 20-30 minutes. However, there may be some weeks where you will spend much more time and others when you may spend far less. Should I look at my Compass every day? The Compass is a tool to help you stay on course with what matters most. So, its valuable to look at your Compass at least once every day and assess whether youre focusing on whats important to you. How can I make sure my big rocks get done? Scheduling your big rocks, by making them tasks or appointments, is an important first step toward making sure you accomplish the things that matter most. Once on the calendar or task list, you can take advantage of automatic reminders (set in detail view) to keep you on track.
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Chapter 5
Take Notes and Organize Information

As you organize your time and carry on your daily activities, you certainly create lists of tasks and appointments ... but that's not all you do. You take notes. This section includes instructions on using the Daily Notes and PowerNotes features of PlanPlus to take notes more efficiently and effectively, and to retrieve information from your notes where and when you need it.
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Working with Daily Notes You can view and edit Daily Notes for the current date, or any date your specify Use the forward/back arrows to scroll through your Daily Notes one day at a time, or select a specific date from the Daily Notes drop-down calendar. The Daily Notes toolbar provides basic formatting functions select the text you wish to format, and click the appropriate button (font, bold, italic, underline, bullets, indenting, etc.). Information in Daily Notes can be time-stamped Place your cursor in the Note at the point where you want the time stamp to be added and click the Time Stamp button on the Daily Notes toolbar. You can change font colors in Daily Notes Select the desired text, click the Color button on the Daily Notes toolbar, and select the desired color from the popup color palette. Alternatively, place your cursor where you plan to enter text, select the desired color, and begin typing.
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PowerNotes
Daily Notes are very useful if you want to arrange notes by day. However, if you simply want to "jot down" just about anything that comes into your head, and easily access those notes at any time, the PowerNotes feature is designed especially for you. PlanPlus lets you "jot down" just about anything you would like using PowerNotes. With PowerNotes, you can: Enter text, either with a keyboard or digital ink (using a Tablet PC). Format your text (change the font, change the point size, make it bold or italic or plain). Insert or delete space on the PowerNote page. Insert manipulate images (such as move, resize, and so on). Create sketches with digital ink (if your computer supports digital ink). Add a hyperlink. Use the Search feature to quickly locate the information you need from any of your notes. "Grow" note pages to have as much space as you need (both length and width).
Creating a PowerNote 1. From the Outlook menu, select PlanPlus | PowerNote. OR From the PlanPlus Home page, navigate to the Folder and Preview area in the lower portion of the page, and select the New PowerNote button from the toolbar. 2. A PowerNote dialog box will appear. You may move or resize this dialog as you like. 3. Place your cursor in the Title area, and enter a title for the Note. (This is not required, but if you should save the Note without a title, it may be difficult to locate later.) 4. Enter your Note text. To enter text with the keyboard, simply click in the Note area where you wish to begin making your note, and type the desired text. To enter text with digital ink, simply write in the Note area with your digital pen. Your information is automatically saved as you enter it.
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Working with PowerNotes
The PowerNote Toolbar By default, the PowerNote toolbar displays only a portion of the buttons available for your use in working with your PowerNotes. You may customize the toolbar to display the tools you use most frequently, by displaying the toolbars you use most, and selecting/deselecting the various buttons, as desired. 1. From the PowerNote menu, select View | Toolbars. 2. Select the Toolbars you wish to display, or deselect those you wish to hide. 3. Scan the PowerNote toolbar. At various points along the toolbar: "slider marks" indicate points where a portion of the toolbar may be repositioned. "double-right arrows" indicate points where additional buttons and menu options are available. "down arrows" indicate that there are additional buttons or selections available.
double-right arrows
slider marks
down arrows
4. Make your selection from the toolbar menu and select the button(s) you wish to display.
Entering Text or Ink You can enter text in any PowerNote with a keyboard or digital ink. To enter text, simply click or tap where you wish to begin making your PowerNote, and enter the desired text. Your note is automatically saved as you add information. It is strongly recommended that you give PowerNotes a title when you create them. This is the title they will be saved with. If you leave the titles blank, your PowerNotes will be saved without titles and it will be more difficult to locate specific notes the next time you wish to view them. Note: If you change from text to digital ink, you can switch back to text by selecting the Text button from the toolbar, or Edit | Pen Acts As | Text from the PowerNote menu.
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Formatting PowerNote Text You can easily apply formatting attributes to your PowerNote text. 1. Select the text or ink you wish to format. 2. Apply the desired formatting attributes from the Formatting toolbar or the Format option on the menu bar. You can align text in your Note with left, center, or right justification. You can change the typed font, font size, bullet the text, number the text, indent the text, and change the font color and style (bold, italicize, underline). You can add highlighting to any text. In addition to bold, italics and color, when using a pen, you may also customize the pen thickness, style (point or chisel), and pressure sensitivity settings.
Working with Objects in PowerNotes

You can insert pictures or other graphical objects into your PowerNote. PlanPlus provides several tools to help you use objects effectively.
Inserting and Using Images You can insert images into a PowerNote, and adjust the image size. 1. Create your PowerNote. 2. With the new Note on screen, place your cursor where you want to insert the image in the Note, then right-click and choose Insert Image. OR Place your cursor where you want to insert the image in the Note, and choose Insert | Image from the menu bar. 3. Navigate to the location of the image you wish to insert, select it, and choose Open.
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Moving and Resizing an Image You can adjust the size of the image in your Note, and even move it around on the page. 1. Click to select the image. 2. Adjust the size of the image by clicking and dragging the anchor points. 3. Adjust the position of the image by clicking and dragging the cross-hairs.
Crosshairs
Anchor points
Align The alignment buttons allow you to select multiple objects (such as images) and align them as desired in your PowerNote page. 1. Select the objects you wish to align. 2. From the PowerNotes toolbar, select the desired alignment style.
Snap to Grid Clicking or tapping the Snap to Grid button allows you to align multiple selected objects or blocks of text to a predefined grid. This grid is not visible in your note; however, when this tool is turned on, all objects in your note are aligned by the points of the grid.
Bring to front, send to back Clicking or tapping the Bring to Front or Send to Back buttons allow you to layer objects. Bring to Front places the selected object in front of other objects. Send to Back places the selected object behind other objects.
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Note-Taking Tools
PlanPlus includes several tools to make your note-taking easier. Note: The Highlighter, Eraser, and Lasso (select) tool can be used with your mouse on a laptop, or on a Tablet PC with Windows XP Tablet PC edition.
Using the Highlighter 1. Click to select the Highlighter tool .
2. Click and drag over the text or ink you wish to highlight. Note: This does not select the text for an action. It only highlights the text visually on the page.
Using the Eraser Note: If your digital pen has an eraser end, you can simply use the eraser end to erase, without selecting the Eraser tool. 1. Click the Eraser button to select the desired Eraser tool. OR From the PowerNote menu, select Edit | Pen Acts As | Eraser, and select the desired size from the list. 2. Click and drag over the ink you wish to erase. In stroke eraser mode, entire segments of Ink are erased simultaneously. In the other three modes, only pieces of segments are erased.
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Using the Lasso (select) Tool 1. Open the Note page and locate the text, picture, or ink you wish to move. 2. Choose the Lasso (select) button from the toolbar.
3. Using your mouse or digital pen, draw a circle around the desired item(s). You can select text, flags, shapes, or other digital ink images. Make sure that your start and end points of the circle overlap. When done, notice the selected item(s) are contained within a box.
You can now work with the selection as desired. You can move, resize, copy, cut, paste, delete, or drag/drop, change text/object colors, text styles and fonts, convert ink to text, and so forth. The following illustrations show a few examples of working with the text that was selected above.
Text color changed to bright green and purple
Text enlarged
Ink converted to typed text
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Using the Zoom Tools You can use the Zoom tools to magnify or reduce note pages.
Displaying the Zoom toolbar The Zoom toolbar is hidden by default, but can be displayed by simply right-clicking on the PlanPlus toolbar, and selecting it from the list of options. You may select the desired Zoom option from the toolbar. OR Choose View | Zoom from the menu bar, and then select the desired Zoom toolbar option. You can use the Zoom buttons as needed whenever a PowerNotes page is displayed on your screen,
Button Image Button Name Zoom In / Zoom Out Zoom (percent) Description Increases (Zoom In) or decreases (Zoom Out) the zoom by a preset factor. Allows you to adjust the size of the display by selecting from a preset list of percentages. Adjusts the display to fit on your screen, even if you resize the window. Fit Page zooms to display the full page. Fit Width fits the page to the width of the program window. Fit Height fits the page to the height of the program window.
Fit Page / Fit Width / Fit Height
Zoom settings return to the default setting (Fit to width) when you leave the current Note.
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Moving and Resizing Text When you move your mouse pointer over a section of text, a bubble and a gripper bar appear.
Paragraph bubble Gripper bar
Sizing handle
Rearranged paragraphs
These tools allow you to perform a variety of actions: Move an entire text section by clicking on the gripper bar and dragging the section to a new location. Move a paragraph by clicking on the paragraph bubble and dragging the paragraph to a new location. Move a text selection by selecting the text you want to move, clicking on the selected text, and dragging the text to a new location. Automatically position a text selection by turning on the Snap to Grid option, and dragging the selected text selection near the grid position you want it to snap to. Resize a text section by clicking the sizing handle, moving the mouse left or right, and letting go of the mouse button.
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Inserting a Hyperlink You can insert a hyperlink to a URL within a Note, as well. 1. Click or tap in the Note at the point where you wish to insert the hyperlink. 2. Choose Insert | Hyperlink from the menu bar. OR Press Ctrl + K. The Hyperlink window appears. 3. Enter the text you wish the hyperlink to display. 4. Enter the URL of the website. 5. Click OK. The hyperlink will be added to your note. If you are connected to the Internet, you may click on the link to open the URL.
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Adding Writing Space to PowerNotes

Imagine sitting in a meeting, rapidly writing down every word being said, only to discover that you are about to run out of paper. Rather than frantically scrambling to find another scrap of paper on which to continue taking your meeting notes, PlanPlus allows you to quickly and easily expand your note-taking area. With PlanPlus, you will never run out of virtual notepaper.
Adding Space to the Bottom or Right of a PowerNote If you need additional space to the right or at the bottom of your note, clicking the Add Space buttons at the bottom of your note expands your note-taking area. These buttons allow you to expand your note page to the right, or add additional lines at the bottom of the page, as desired.
Adding Additional Notes Pages To add another page to the current PowerNote, click the New Page button at the bottom of the PowerNote page. You can add pages only when the current page contains data There is no limit to the number of pages you may add, as long as each preceding page contains data. As you add pages, numbered tabs for each page are displayed at the bottom of the PowerNote screen, allowing you to quickly move between pages. PowerNotes are automatically saved as you add information.
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Adding or Removing Space in the Middle of a Note If you are working with digital ink on a Tablet PC, you can insert or remove space in the middle of a note by using the Insert/Remove Space button. Note: This feature is not available with text notes. 1. Tap on the Insert/Remove Space button (or select Insert | Insert/Remove Space from the menu). 2. Move the cursor to the place where you want to insert the space, and place the stylus on the screen. The cursor will change shape to an up/down arrow, and a horizontal line will cross the note page indicating the point at which the space will be inserted or removed. 3. To insert space, drag the cursor down until you have created the desired amount of space, and lift the stylus from the screen.
4. To remove space, repeat steps 1 and 2, and drag the cursor up until you have removed the desired amount of space, and lift the stylus from the screen.
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Converting Ink to Text Note: You can use digital ink (and thus convert ink to text) only when using a Tablet PC with Windows XP Tablet PC edition. See Error! Reference source not found.. For details on working with digital ink, consult your operating system user materials. In addition to using ink, you may convert any ink you enter to text. 4. Use your digital pen to write new information. OR Use the Lasso (select) button to select previously written ink you wish to convert. .
5. Click or tap the Convert to Text button
The ink will be converted to text and displayed on the page. To correct mistranslations, select the word, click the Mouse button to switch to keyboard mode, and use your keyboard to make corrections. Note: Ink may also be converted to text immediately after writing by clicking the Convert to Text button as soon as you are finished writing.
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Searching your PowerNotes Whether your PowerNotes are created with text or with digital ink, you can search for information in your PowerNotes. Note: If you have created PowerNotes with digital ink, but have not converted the ink to text, you can still use the Search feature. During the search, PlanPlus evaluates the digital ink as if it were typed text. Search in PowerNotes 1. From the PlanPlus Home page, navigate to the Folder and Preview area in the lower portion of the page, and select the Search button from the toolbar. 2. The Advanced Find dialog box appears on the screen. Notice that PowerNotes is selected as the Search In field. 3. Type the text you wish to search for, and click Find Now. A list of PowerNotes containing the specified text is then displayed.
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Sharing PowerNotes You can send a PowerNote to someone else as an email attachment, whether or not that person uses PlanPlus. 1. Open a PowerNote. 2. Choose File | Send To from the menu bar, then choose the Email Recipient. 3. Select the desired format for the email attachment, and click OK. 4. A blank email message appears, with the PowerNote attached in the selected format. 5. Depending on whether the recipient uses PlanPlus or not, you may choose different formats. You can send the PowerNote in PowerNote format viewable in PlanPlus or in FranklinCovey TabletPlanner, or as a Web page viewable in Outlook, or as a graphic image (.tif format). 6. Enter the recipient's email address and other information as desired, then send the message normally.
Saving a PowerNote in another format You can save a PowerNote in one of three formats for later use. 1. Open a PowerNote. 2. Choose File | Send To from the menu bar, then choose File. 3. In the window that appears, choose the desired file format from the Save as type: drop-down list, enter a name for the file, then click Save.
Create PowerNotes folders You can create additional Outlook folders for filing your PowerNotes. You can even create them "hierarchically" with subfolders under main folders. The only difference between creating a PowerNote folder and creating a "standard" Outlook folder is that you must take an extra step to specify a new folder as a PowerNote folder. 1. Create an Outlook folder using standard steps. Specify Notes as the data type for the folder. 2. From the Outlook menu bar, choose Tools | Options, then click the PlanPlus tab. 3. At the bottom of the PlanPlus options screen, click the PowerNotes folders button. 4. Scroll down the list of folders until you find the folder you just created. Click to check the box next to the folder name - this specifies the folder as a PowerNotes folder. 5. Click OK to close the PowerNotes Folders window, and OK a second time to close the Options box.
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Using the eBinder

PowerNotes let you jot down just about anything you want in a note with your keyboard or digital ink, add and resize images, make annotations on the note ... and easily catalog your PowerNotes in the PowerNotes folder. The eBinder feature of PlanPlus lets you make a PowerNote out of just about any sort of document or information you wish. For example, suppose you'd like to "take a snapshot" of a Web page to show to a client. And you'd like to make a few annotations on it, maybe highlight a few parts of the page, add a couple of handwritten notes. Or, perhaps you'd like to do the same thing with a Microsoft Word document ... or a few slides of a PowerPoint presentation ... or maybe you simply want to keep a few pages of an electronic handbook readily available. With PlanPlus, you now have the ability to "bind" information from these and just about any other software application into Outlook folders, and view them and make notes on them from inside PlanPlus. What can you bind? With eBinder, it's a simple matter to bind all kinds of important information that you might want to have at your fingertips in Outlook and PlanPlus, such as: Word-processor documents Spreadsheets Presentation slides Graphic images
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Creating an eBinder document Creating an eBinder document is as simple as printing a document from a software application. The only difference is that the document does not come out of a printer, but appears in your PowerNotes folder. 1. Open the software application. For example, if you want to bind a Web page, open your browser and navigate to that page. Similarly, if you want to bind one or more pages from a Microsoft Word document, a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation, or other applications, open that application. 2. Open the file or document, or go to the Web page, that contains the desired information. 3. Access the Print feature as you normally would from that application. With most software applications, you choose File | Print from the menu bar. 4. When the Printer dialog box appears, choose FranklinCovey PlanPlus as your printer, set other print options, and then print the document.
IMPORTANT:
In order to choose FranklinCovey PlanPlus as your printer name, you must have already installed PlanPlus.
5. eBinder sends the page(s) you printed to the PowerNotes folder in PlanPlus as a single document.
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View an eBinder document You view eBinder documents by opening the PowerNotes folder in PlanPlus, then selecting the document. 1. Select the PowerNotes folder from the Outlook shortcut bar, or by displaying PowerNotes from the PlanPlus Home page, then select the document. 2. Double-click the document to view it in a PowerNotes window.
Modify an eBinder document Since an eBinder document is a PowerNote, you can do anything with the document that you can do with a PowerNote. For example, you can make typed or digital ink annotations on the document, add other graphics to the document, or share it with others. See Formatting PowerNotes for information on how to make annotations on an eBinder document.
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Chapter 6
Printing in PlanPlus
PlanPlus lets you print your vital information in a variety of formats and on a variety of paper sizes, including plain paper or FranklinCovey Perf-Fit forms, and in popular planner sizes, including Monarch, Classic, Compact, and Pocket sizes. You can print the following PlanPlus information: Daily Pages These are the "standard" left-and-right facing pages, familiar to veteran users of the Franklin Planner. Appointments and Daily Tasks appear on the left page, and the Daily Record appears on the right page. Master Task List PlanPlus lets you print the complete list of tasks that you don't want to forget but that you haven't yet assigned to a particular day. Mission The entire contents of the Mission module is printed, whether you use the Mission module for Mission and Values, or for your Mission alone. Goals A Goals Planning form is printed for each goal. You can choose to print all goals or a specified goal. Weekly Compass Each role you have added to your Weekly Compass is printed, along with the goals you have set for those roles. Weekly Calendar You can print your weekly calendar in either portrait or landscape mode, and can include both appointments and tasks, if desired. Monthly Calendar The monthly calendar can be printed in either portrait or landscape mode, showing appointments and/or tasks, and with various display options. Contacts You can print the contents of your Contacts list, and apply filters to limit the output if you like.
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To Print in PlanPlus You can print any item in PlanPlus at any time that you are working in Microsoft Outlook. 1. From the FranklinCovey toolbar, click the PlanPlus Print button. OR From the Outlook menu bar, select PlanPlus | Print. 2. The Print dialog box appears.
3. The What to Print tab is selected by default. From this tab, you can define many of your printing options: Select the desired printout style from the Printouts list. Click the Customize button to set additional options for the selected printout style. Click the Printer Setup button to define printer options. If applicable, select the desired Date Range. 4. Select the Paper Size and Type tab. Select the Binder Size and Paper Type you will be using. Select the Page Range, and the number of Copies you wish to make. 5. Click Print Preview if you wish to see a sample of your printout prior to sending it to the printer. 6. When you are finished making your selections, click Print to print your pages.
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Customizing your Printouts

PlanPlus provides several options for you to customize your printouts, although the available options for each type of printout will vary depending on the Paper Size and Paper Type you select. You may wish to test various combinations to find those that best suit your needs
Printouts You can print the following types of documents from PlanPlus: Daily Pages Master Tasks Goals Weekly Compass Mission / Values Contacts Projects Weekly Calendar (Portrait) Weekly Calendar (Landscape) Monthly Calendar (Portrait) Monthly Calendar (Landscape)
Customize Options on the Customize screen will vary, depending on the printout type you have selected. The following pages provide details about each of the various Customize screen tabbed pages presented in alphabetical order for your reference. Appointments Tab Select Print Appointments if you want your appointments to appear on the Daily Pages. Appointment Notes will print on the Daily Record page select Print note reference number to show a reference symbol next to the appointment. If there are too many appointments to fit on your Daily Pages, you can choose to truncate the remaining entries or continue them on the next page Click the Edit Appointment Range button to define the range of your appointment printout and select to print appointment sequentially (with no time gaps between them) or in 15- or 30-minute increments.
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Compasses Tab Indicate whether or not you want to print a line between each role. Indicate whether or not you want to print the date in the title bar of the Compass.
Contacts Tab Select the type of listing (Detailed or Summary) from the drop-down list. Click the Choose Fields button to specify the Contacts fields you want to print. The Edit Format box will appear, allowing you to select the fields you want to include or exclude. Select how you want your selections sorted by choosing from the dropdown list. Choose the range of entries you wish to print by selecting options from the From and To drop-down lists. Mark whether you want to start a new page for each letter of the alphabet, print a line between contacts, and/or print Contact Notes.
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Daily Record Tab Mark the items you want to print on your Daily Record page. Mark Print Daily Record as linedpaper if you wish to print the record like a ruled page. Indicate whether or not you wish to print a line between the Daily Record and Notes entries. Indicate if you wish to print the Daily Record page even if it is blank. Indicate the number of lines to skip before printing the first task, if desired. Mark Set as default if you wish to save the selected options as the default.
Daily Tasks Tab Mark Print Tasks if you want your Tasks to appear on the Daily Pages. Task notes will print on the Daily Record page - mark Print note reference number to show the reference number next to the task. Mark Print in color if you want your tasks to print in different colors according to priority. If you have too many tasks to fit on your Daily Pages, you can choose to truncate remaining entries, indicate the number of unprinted tasks, or continue the list on the next page. Indicate the number of lines to skip before printing the first task, if desired. Mark Set as default if you wish to save the selected options as the default.
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Format Tab Indicate whether you want your printout to begin on the Left or Right. Indicate the Font you want to use for your printout.
Goals Tab Indicate whether or not you wish to print your Goals on a ruled page. Indicate whether or not you wish to use the advanced Goal form. Indicate whether or not you want a line printed between Goals. Indicate whether or not you want to print Goals Notes. Indicate whether or not you want to print the notes you've attached to your Intermediate Steps. In the Goal Planning Form area, indicate whether you want to Print only the selected Goal (and choose it from the drop-down list) or Print all Goals.
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Master Tasks Tab Choose the Category of Master Tasks to print. Choose whether to print Master Task Notes, and/or the Date they were created. Mark Print notes symbol dividing line if you want your notes to be divided by a line. Task notes will print on the Daily Record page - mark Print note reference number to show the reference number next to the task. Mark Print in color if you want your tasks to print in different colors according to priority. If you have too many tasks to fit on your Daily Pages, you can choose to truncate remaining entries, indicate the number of unprinted tasks, or continue the list on the next page.
Missions Tab Indicate whether or not you wish to print your Missions on a ruled page. Mark Print a line between each Mission if you want your mission statements to be divided by a line. Choose whether to print the Date each Mission statement was created. In the Selection area, indicate whether you want to Print only the selected Mission (and choose it from the drop-down list) or Print all Missions. Indicate whether or not you want to start each mission on a new page.
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Monthly Calendar Tab In the Include section, mark the elements you wish to print on your Monthly Calendar. In the Priority section, mark which items should be printed first on each day of the calendar In the Format section, choose whether the days of the week should be printed as columns or as a stack. In the Layout section, you can choose whether to print your Monthly Calendar on one or two pages.
Projects Tab Indicate whether you want to Print only the selected Project (and choose it from the drop-down list) or Print all Projects. Indicate whether or not you wish to print your Projects on a ruled page. Indicate whether or not you wish to print Project Notes. Project notes will print on the Daily Record page - mark Print note reference number to show the reference number next to the task. Mark Print notes symbol dividing line if you want your Project Notes to be divided by a line. Mark Print in color if you want your Project Tasks to print in different colors according to priority.
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Weekly Calendar Tab In the Include section, mark the elements you wish to print on your Weekly Calendar. In the Priority section, mark which items should be printed first on each day of the calendar In the Format section, choose whether the days of the week should be printed as columns or as a stack. In the Layout section, you can choose whether to print your Weekly Calendar on one or two pages.
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Printer Setup Clicking Printer Setup allows you to define settings specific to your printer. Specific details will vary, based on your printer. For more information, consult your printer's product documentation. 1. From the Print dialog box, click the Printer Setup button. 2. The Printer Setup dialog box appears.
3. Select the desired options: Printer Accept the Default Printer selection, or choose a different printer (if available) by selecting Specific Printer and choosing the desired printer from the drop-down list Paper Source Accept the default source ("Auto") or select a specific location (if available) from the drop down list if you wish to specify where the printer should "look" for paper. Two-sided Printing If you can change this option, you can define whether to print twosided like a book, or like a tablet ("head to toe"). Margin Offset You can choose to move the upper left corner of the printed area on your page by adjusting the margins at this point. You can only adjust the top and left margins, and the printout will shift on the page depending on how you set the offset. 4. Clicking the Options button will display printer options specific to your printer. 5. When you are finished making your selection, click OK to continue, or Cancel to close this dialog without saving your changes.
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Paper Size and Type The options on this tab allow you to select the desired paper size, and type:
Binder Size Select the "binder size" you will be using for your printed pages: Monarch standard 8.5 x 11 page Compact 4.25 x 6.75 Classic "standard half sheet" size, 5.5 x 8.5 Pocket 3.5 x 6 Paper Type Choose the paper type you will print to. Plain. Perf-Fit. Note: Classic, Compact, and Pocket sizes can be printed on either Plain paper or Perf-Fit forms. Monarch can only be printed on Plain paper. Choose the Page Range you wish to print by clicking the appropriate radio button. All When you click the All radio button, all pages for that information type and date range will be printed, no matter how many there are. Page(s) Choose this option and select the page range to print (From: and To:) if you don't want to print every page. Set the number of Copies you wish to print by clicking the up and down arrows.
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Print Preview The Preview screen shows you how the page will look when printed. This useful tool allows you to adjust your printing options without wasting paper. From the Print dialog box, click Preview. The Preview screen appears. The following illustrations show some sample previews of various PlanPlus pages.
To see the previous page of the printout, click Previous. To see the next page of the printout, click Next. To zoom in closer, click Zoom. To close the Preview window without printing, click Close. To print directly from the Preview window, click Print.
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Chapter 7
Support Information
If you encounter any problem with PlanPlus for Outlook, you can refer to the following technical support resources: IMPORTANT: The technical support options listed below supersede any previous or existing policies. Technical support pricing and policy are subject to change at any time and without notice
Online Support
http://www.franklincovey.com/support There is no fee for these services. Common Questions Look over a list of common questions specific to your product for the answer you need. This area includes installation assistance, fixes to error messages, and tips on synchronization. Searchable Knowledgebase Through simple keyword or phrase searches you can also find answers on almost any issue. We have made available the same database used by our technical support staff. Updates Page Check our Updates page to ensure you have the latest version of your software. Many of our updates include bug fixes as well as feature enhancements. E-mail Support Send an e-mail to our support staff (support@franklincovey.com) and expect a response within 24 business hours (weekends and holidays excluded). Live Chat Support If you need help setting up PlanPlus, or for help with any issue you may encounter, please log on to our technical support live chat. Technicians are available Monday through Friday, 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Mountain Standard time.
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Premium Phone Support

(800) 418-1492 (Toll-free access is available only in the United States.) If your support request requires phone assistance, please call us toll-free to speak directly with a FranklinCovey representative. Technicians are available Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mountain Standard time. This is a fee-based service, payable by credit card only.
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Appendix A
Appendix A: Sample Mission and Values Statements

Mission Examples
Examples of Personal Mission Statements

Succeed at home first. Seek and merit divine help. Never compromise with honesty. Remember the people involved. Hear both sides before judging. Obtain counsel of others. Defend those who are absent. Be sincere yet decisive. Develop one new proficiency a year. Plan tomorrow's work today. Hustle while you wait. Maintain a positive attitude. Keep a sense of humor. Be orderly in person and in work. Do not fear mistakes-fear only the absence of creative, constructive, and corrective responses to those mistakes. Facilitate the success of subordinates. Listen twice as much as you speak.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Concentrate all abilities and efforts on the task at hand, not worrying about the next job or promotion. I will always be aware of what matters most in my life and do everything I can to keep those things at the forefront of my daily living. I will be honest and forthright in my dealings with others. I will find joy in the world around me and share that joy with others. I will laugh daily and encourage others to do so as well. I will work hard and play hard. I will support and believe in those I love, even if I don't always agree with choices they make. I will be the best wife, mother, and grandmother I know how to be, learning and growing in those roles every day. I will live my life with integrity and the hope that when I am gone, I will be remembered as a person who lived by my values daily. To value every day as a new beginning; to live every day to its fullest; to take the leap of faith; to celebrate the best in others. I lead my life centered around principles of excellence, empowerment, growth and humility. I remember what's important in life, recognize my own and others' strengths, and consistently work toward becoming my best balanced self-for the benefit of myself and those around me. Live, love, laugh I live to serve my talents as a communicator, artist and independent businesswoman. I create balance in work, play, community and inspiration and pass this on to those I interact with.
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Examples of Team Missions

Charis Web Design Department Mission Statement: Our mission is to produce the finest expert website design through constant innovation and inspiration. For us - nothing is more important than delighting our clients through delivering exceptional website design solutions. We seek to: Serve the client Create inspired design Research, apply, and develop expert web technology Our Business Values: We have profound respect for our clients and each other We deliver We understand We care We innovate We do web (not print, not ads - just web!) We enjoy the process! Our Design Values: It must be inspired It must be user-centered Consider every click Creativity stretches the limits. But form follows function Is this is the best way? Create superb customer experience Can it be faster? Kodak Canada Image Check Mission Statement: We are an association of independent imaging experts who best satisfy customer needs in Canada by providing leading edge diversified imaging solutions and services in a way that delivers total customer satisfaction and enhanced revenue opportunities for Members so that we are fully committed, other retailers want to join and customers want to come back.
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Princeton University Purchasing Department Mission: To obtain all goods and services necessary for the students, faculty, and staff in the most cost-effective and efficient manner. To provide value-added service to support the teaching and research consistent with the mission of the institution. To maintain a commitment to excellence through professional ethics and best business practices. To ensure compliance with all state and federal regulations. To encourage open competition among vendors through fair negotiation, competitive bidding and contract buying. We are bound by our profession to continuously strive to seek innovative and effective processes that do not impede but rather facilitate the acquisition process. We can assist you by: Listening to your needs Finding the best value Identifying new and custom sources Obtaining and reviewing quotes Negotiating terms and conditions Placing orders and resolving issues Limiting liability and maximizing compliance. Maintaining quality and standards Providing timely and value-added services Durango Georgia Paper Company Customer Service Mission Statement Customer Service works as a liaison between our Customers, Sales, and Manufacturing to provide accurate and timely information. Working as teams with other departments allows us to satisfy the needs and surpass the expectations of our most valuable asset, our customers.
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Examples of Organizational Missions

Nike Corporate Citizenship Mission Statement: To lead in corporate citizenship through proactive programs that reflect caring for the world family of Nike, our teammates, our consumers, and those who provide services to Nike. "Commerce Network" by forging strategic alliances and partnerships with key old & new economy B2B organizations. ECeurope.com Helping small and medium-sized enterprises worldwide locate a new business partners and drive their export sales. ECeurope.com was conceived so that trade opportunity notices in the business-tobusiness sector are made accessible to small and medium-sized enterprises across Europe and around the world, regardless of economic status or geographic location. ECeurope.com has three key aims in relation to international trade: Increase international awareness of modern information technologies; Enable effective application of information technologies; Promote the use of our electronic marketplace in order to reduce the procedural costs of companies active in international trade. ECeurope.com will consolidate its position as the largest business-to-business electronic marketplace in Europe for small and medium-sized enterprises. Ultimately, ECeurope.com will aim to become the leading global [text missing here] SAIC Mission: SAIC is a company of people dedicated to delivering best-value services and solutions based on innovative applications of science and technology. We commit to exceeding our customers' expectations for quality, responsiveness, and professional excellence while delivering within the agreed price and schedule. We maintain the highest standards of ethical behavior and professional integrity. We employ people of exceptional creativity, expertise, and determination who work closely with one another and with our customers. We pursue technical growth and market diversification to increase value for our customers and opportunity for our employees. We motivate and reward outstanding performance through our employee ownership system. We foster a working environment that encourages technical objectivity, professional and financial growth, and entrepreneurial freedom.
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Values Examples
Following are a few sample values with some sample clarifying statements. These are provided primarily to give you ideas on how you will do your own clarifying statements. If these samples work for you, great ... but the point isn't to pick from this list of values to make your own list. Your values reflect what matters most to you ... not what matters most to the person who wrote this manual. Authenticity I hide behind no mask - I put up no faade. My life is an open book for any to read, whether they wish to benefit from my mistakes or find fault with them. I am aware of my shortcomings, strive to overcome them, and make no effort to flaunt them - but neither do I hide them and try to give the appearance of being someone I am not. Beauty Let no one look at me and say "It's a nice makeup job, but I don't care for what's beneath the surface." Career I am an honest and faithful employee, a concerned and caring manager, and a breadwinner for those I love. Not necessarily in that order. Contribution I have been given much, far more than I can ever repay. I can, however, pay it forward. Courage I understand the difference between physical courage and foolhardiness. I also understand the difference between moral courage and obstinacy. Financial Security We no longer have debtor's prisons, but there are plenty of other ways for debt to restrain freedom. I will pay all my just debts, and strive to stay free of debt after that. It seems foolish to pay interest to another when I have so much else I could do with that interest. Fitness There is so much I want to do, and so many influences to keep me from doing it. Let not my body be one of the limiting factors. Humility I have seen honor and integrity go unrewarded - I certainly cannot exalt myself simply because I have been relatively well rewarded.
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Appendix B
Appendix B: Sample Goals and Intermediate Steps

First Example In our first example, suppose you would like to learn a second language, either as a student, for business reasons, or simply because you want to be better able to communicate with the people around you. Following is an example goal for learning a second language, broken down into intermediate steps with associated deadlines. From here, you can begin to "plug in" intermediate steps to your Daily and Master Tasks lists.
Goal: Steps: Become fluent in Spanish to help me in my career. Locate a roommate who speaks Spanish Check company newsletters ad section Post a message in company cafeteria and break room boards Call Carlos to see if he has any friends looking for roommates Select & register for courses to complete Spanish Minor Conversational Spanish, Spanish 101, 102. (Spring 2003) Spanish Reading and Grammar 202, 203 (Summer 2003) Spanish Literature 350, (Fall 2003) Spanish Phonetics 370 (Spring 2004) Advanced Reading and Grammar 310 (Summer 2004) Advanced Reading and Grammar 410. Spanish for Business 415 (Fall 2004) Latin American History 320, Chicano/Mexican American Cultures (Spring 2005) Practice regularly Take as many Spanish-speaking Customer Service 5/20/2009 9/1/2006 [date] [date] [date] 12/20/2006 4/10/2007 8/10/2007 12/18/2007 4/20/2008 8/11/2008 12/21/2008
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calls as poss. Go to Spanish Roundtable Discussion each Thursday Read out loud to practice pronunciation - 30 min. each Tue. & Wed.
Second Example A goal should be challenging ... and there are as many different kinds of challenges as there are different people. In this example, a busy executive decides to set a challenging goal designed to test his capabilities, strengthen his relationship with his wife, and improve the skills of his coworkers. Naturally, these intermediate steps can become Daily and Master Tasks.
Goal: Steps: Sail across the Atlantic to France with my wife Complete plan mentor Mike and others to take on more responsibility in the company. Ensure that I can take off for three months without any adverse effects to the magazine. Research international sailing protocol. Buy a new boat. Sign up for advanced sailing technique training. Get Chloe enthusiastic about the experience. Procure hotel and land excursions in Europe 4/1/2009 8/1/2006 1/1/2007 3/1/2007 5/30/2007 4/1/2008 9/1/2008 12/31/2008
Third Example This one might a little closer to home for some. This is a goal for some long-desired home improvements.
Goal: Steps: Landscape the side and back yards at home Continue saving money for the project each payday set aside 10% of check Get recommendations Work with Brad on design each wknd until we are satisfied Get estimates Prioritize the work 5/15/2007
9/15/2006 10/1/2006 10/15/2006 10/30/2006
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Appendix B: Sample Goals and Intermediate Steps
Fourth Example Personal and home improvement are worthy goals, but you can also apply the Goals process to your business responsibilities
Goal: Steps: Have "Tolerance Project" demo complete and fully-funded in order to move forward--create entire piece! Research grant options Apply for at least two grants (government/online creative organization) Verbal backing? Inquire about current Internet availability for students. What level are they? Plans for next five years Talk with Teigh about Geffen connection ($$$) What will she need to see? How can we anticipate his team's concerns/needs? Ask Bryce about possible Universal interest/connection Go over demo script with Glenn (revisions/edit?) Layout entire project (scripting, deadline, etc.) with Lainie Meet with Jose, Project Manager How long to create a schedule/milestones Create varying schedules/deadlines based on $ amounts Create demo budget based on three proposed amounts Confirm exact team for demo Check with Oliver to see if he's still on board (telecommute?) Post ad at the university for interns/research positions Schedule team kick-off meeting 2/28/2004 6/30/2003 9/1/2003 12/31/2003 8/1/2003 7/14/2003
7/14/2003 10/1/2003
11/1/2003 11/15/2003 12/1/2003 2/1/2004
Fifth Example When you set goals, it becomes second nature to think of all aspects of the goal. What does it really take to achieve 110% of your sales quota for next quarter?
Goal: Steps: Achieve 110% of sales quota for next quarter. Sort account list into hot, warm and cold prospects Meet with assistant regarding other leads/opportunities Make at five cold calls per day based on last quarter's prospect research Creating marketing piece on sales promotion Generate mailing list for marketing piece Promotional mailing Call all hot and warm prospects regarding promotion Schedule appointments with all hot prospects regarding promotion Follow-up calls/appointments Close sales 2/28/2004 12/3/2003 12/4/2003 12/4/2003 12/5/2003 12/8/2003 12/8/2003 12/12/2003 12/31/2003 2/20/2003 2/20/2004
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Sixth Example Personal improvement, home improvement, business improvement ... how about applying the Goals process to community improvement?
Goal: Steps: Find non-profit organization I can help out, lend my business sales talents to; improve their systems Ask Joelle about her kids organization Find out if she knows how to find other organizations (lists?) How do I know the right group to hook up with? What kind of hierarchy/organization is typical? Write up idea for non-profit business plan with Kaufman slant Estimate implementation scenario What kind of support would be needed? Find at least five organizations I am interested in Figure out who I need to talk with at each organization Interview organizations to figure out what/if they need Make selection & hold kickoff meeting 6/1/2004 3/7/2004 3/21/2004
4/7/2004 4/14/2004 5/14/2004 6/1/2004
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Appendix C
Appendix C: Compass Examples

Examples of a Weekly Compass (and intermediate steps)
Following are several examples of Weekly Compasses. They show goals for the Sharpen the Saw role (that is, your "role to yourself"), as well as examples of goals set for other roles. Role: Sharpen the Saw Physical Treadmill 20 minutes a day Social Host neighborhood cookout Mental Read Shakespeare nightly Spiritual Attend mass; 1 hour scripture study Role: Managing Editor Review new cover photo shoot proofs Interview with Entrepreneur of the Year Role: Husband Include Kari in help preparing for cookout Dinner/movie Thursday night Role: Mentor Talk w/ Mike re: working up to Feature Editor Interview internally to consider promotions Role: Sailor Check out new boats Advanced training w/ Chris at the harbor Role: Citizen Attend Rotary club meeting
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Participate in neighborhood cleanup ### Role: Sharpen the Saw Physical Lift weights 5 days Social Attend Big Brother activity night Mental Spiritual Role: Student Finish rough draft for lit research paper One on one discussion with Prof. Hartman Role: Big Brother Help Kenny with resume Role: DJ Talk to Alisa about updating sound system Listen to 3 new CD's Phil mentioned Role: Boyfriend Take Rachel to movie Buy concert tickets & surprise Rachel ### Role: Sharpen the Saw Physical Drink more water Social Dinner with Zuke & Mary Sunday Mental Spiritual Continue reading the Tao te Ching Role: Wife Date night with Lauren on Monday Role: Mother/ Stepmother Touch base with each of the kids by phone Help Elaine learn how to style new haircut Role: Grandma Call Kazeley to tell her about Nutcracker tix Role: Project Leader Finish Business Plan for modular project Prepare Creative Brief for new process Role: Costume Designer Set up appt. to go through racks @ shop ###
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Appendix C: Compass Examples Role: Sharpen the Saw Physical Yoga 3x (2 at very least) Social Get in touch with David - dinner! Mental Finish Brand You chapter by Sunday Spiritual Garden - tomatoes for Mom Role: Writer Prioritize current projects & tasks for week Clean up this hard drive- backup to network Role: Consultant Follow up with Glenn on web project status Invoices to Michael, Janelle, Deb Role: Artist Draw at least once Pick up pottery & glaze on Thursday Role: Community Activist Park/Garden Committee meeting Wed @ 7 Role: Girlfriend Schedule Friday with Bryce Surprise with a sweet homemade card Role: Daughter Sunday brunch at Mom's (take tomatoes) ### Role: Sharpen the Saw Physical Saturday basketball w/ Brian & Kaz Social Mental Sunday afternoon chill - R&R time! Spiritual Read that book Ally recommended Role: Salesman Talk to Lynn about potential new regions At least 4 new lead calls Role: Manager Team meeting - bring up new structure idea Take Darren to lunch to discuss comp Role: Brother Role: Volunteer MFSI - coral tanks after work Wednesday ###
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Role: Sharpen the Saw Physical Schedule doctor's appt Social Write Tracy Mental Read two chapters Spiritual 1 hour meditation Role: Team Lead List current strengths of all team members Leave work by 7 pm each night - show trust Role: Mentor Meet with Tom re: leading marketing initiative Listen. Role: Sister Schedule vacation to attend Vicki's wedding Call Vicky about shower Role: Future Yoga Instructor Call school about completing license req. Role: Neighbor Lunch with Amy this weekend
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Appendix C: Compass Examples
Things to Think About when Defining Roles

Are there any roles I feel uncomfortable with or concerned about? Are there any roles in which I feel I have spent too much or too little time? Are there any roles I have neglected in the recent past? Are these roles still important to me? Are there future roles I could be gradually working on now? All there things I value and am doing for which I have no role? Do I need to establish a new role? Am I clear about my roles? Am I spending adequate time in each of them? Are there too many? Did any of my big rocks last week evolve from my long-range goals? Which intermediate goal steps this week could be part of my Weekly Compass? Did I meet my physical renewal goals this week? If not, why not? Can I establish more realistic goals this week? Did I use my roles to prioritize or emphasize certain goals last week? Did I get enough sleep last week? What unimportant activities can I eliminate this week that will allow time to rejuvenate my body? Do I maintain my most important relationships - including my relationship with myself? Do my roles work together for me? Do they combine to help me accomplish my purpose in life? Do I have more than seven roles? Maybe I should combine functions or examine if perhaps all are valid roles for me. Do they provide me energy or drain it? Does one of my roles dominate my life at the expense of others? Have any of my roles changed or evolved? Have I forgotten or neglected any relationships within any of my roles? Have I overemphasized focus in any of my roles? Should I break these down into separate roles to make sure I give enough attention to each relationship? Have I repeatedly neglected any of my roles in the recent past? Should I reconsider whether these roles are important to me? Have I considered taking myself out on a date? How can I spend more time in Quadrant II this week to reduce time in Quadrant I? How can I strengthen my relationship this week with a significant other? How many of my tasks originated from my big rocks? Could it help me to schedule my big rocks as tasks or appointments? How much of my time last week did I spend in Quadrants III and IV? How can I convert that time to Quadrant I and II activities?
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide How much of my time last week was spent "living above the line" in Quadrants I and II? If I could build my very own retreat, what would it look like? How would I use it? Can I incorporate any of its elements into my self-renewal plan this week? If I could choose two things to do outside work to nourish my soul, what would they be? Should I consider making them big rocks this week? Last week, did I exercise integrity in accomplishing what matters most to me? Last week, did I explore new ways of renewing myself in a spiritual sense? Last week, did I focus on the truly important and say no to the unimportant? How will I accomplish that this week? Last week, did I renew myself physically? Last week, did I take time for renewal, reflection, and recommitment? Last week, did I take time to Sharpen the Saw mentally? Last week, what were some of the barriers I encountered to spending time in Quadrant II? what are some things I could do to eliminate those barriers? What big rocks did I not accomplish last week that I should carry into the coming week? What can I learn from last week as a whole? What can I do less of? What should I do more of? What can I do to live a more balanced life? What challenges did I encounter in accomplishing my big rocks? How did I overcome them? What gets in the way of accomplishing my big rocks? What can I do to live a more balanced life? What challenges did I encounter in accomplishing my big rocks? How did I overcome them? What gets in the way of accomplishing my big rocks? What gives my spirit, mind, heart, and body energy? Is that reflected in my Weekly Compass entries this week? What is cluttering my life? How can I steer my focus away from those activities, allowing time for more important ones? What is one thing I could have said no to in Quadrant III last week that would have given me more time for Quadrant II activities? What is the most important thing I can do in each role this week to have the greatest positive impact? What makes life worth living? Did my choices last week reflect that? What memories can I pass on to my children about my ancestors? What am I doing so that my family remembers me? What result do I want at the end of my week? What is the one thing I could do in each role to create that result?
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Appendix C: Compass Examples What social/emotional, self-renewal activities can I combine with other roles? What's the single most important thing I can do this week considering all of my roles? When was the last time I reevaluated the importance of each of my roles? should I schedule time to do that this week? When was the last time I kept a journal? Read a nonfiction book? Continued my education either formally or informally? Which of my relationships needs improving? What action could I take this week to work toward that improvement? Who did I focus most of my time on last week? Are there any other relationships I would like to focus on in the coming week? Would I be more successful in accomplishing my big rocks if I moved them to my calendar? How about moving them to my task list?
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Appendix D: PlanPlus for Outlook Frequently Asked Questions

Daily Tasks
How many tasks should I have on my list each day? This question is probably best answered by reviewing your own task lists. At the end of the day, how many tasks do you plan forward? If its consistently more than one or two, chances are youre putting too many tasks on your list. How is a daily task list different from a to-do list? A to-do list typically lists all to-dos that need to be done, regardless of start or due dates. A daily task list lists only those tasks that need attention that day. How do I know if there are any overdue tasks that I need to complete? Overdue tasks appear in red on your daily task list. How do I move incomplete tasks to today? At the bottom of the task list display is an icon to activate the task forwarding tool. This tool will bring all previously incomplete tasks forward to the current day. You can also move a previously incomplete task by double-clicking on it and changing the start date to the current day. Can I use my daily task list to assign dates to tasks in the future? Yes. Simply click in the navigational calendar on the date you want the task to appear and enter the task on that days list.
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Appendix D: PlanPlus for Outlook Frequently Asked Questions How do I keep other peoples crises, requests, and changes from making a mess of my prioritized task list? Over time, you will see more of those important things stick if you continue to exercise integrity in the moment of choice. Other people will start to become aware of you trying to keep the most important things on your schedule. This does not mean you shouldnt be flexible when needs arise, but learn to say no when appropriate.
Master Tasks
Where is my master task list? The task list has two tabsdaily and master. To see your master task list, click on the master tab. What types of things do I put on the master task list? Put things that you will perhaps do on the master task list. In other words, enter tasks that you may complete someday. In addition, put tasks that are coming up in later in the month, year, and so on that currently have no specific date. This may include things like organizing your file cabinet, getting your cars oil changed, or shopping for an anniversary six months from now. When is it time to move master tasks to my daily task list? The fourth step in weekly planning is to schedule tasks. This is a good opportunity to review your master task list and decide if any master tasks should be scheduled in the coming week.
Projects
What are Projects? New to PlanPlus is a project planning feature. Here, you can create projects, add tasks, and manage the completion of those tasks. How can I view different projects from this window? When you click the View Active Projects button, you can choose the project you want to see from the drop-down list.
Calendar and Appointments

How can I make sure I avoid overscheduling myself? The key to not overscheduling yourself begins with a heightened awareness of how your day is currently spent. If you spend much of it dealing with unscheduled interruptions, then you must allow time in the day to handle the unexpected. While every job is different, leaving 30-40% of your day open or flexible is a good guideline, and a good start. Should I schedule every task I need to get done? Unless you require a time log for your tasks, scheduling every task you need to get done is not recommended. Not only will it require additional time during weekly and daily planning, but it creates a very rigid, often unrealistic schedule for anyone who has to deal with the unexpected. Should I keep separate calendars for my home and work activities? Unless you must separate them, we recommend keeping one calendar for your whole life personal and professional. PlanPlus doesnt have a monthly index. How can I schedule something for later in the month? Click on the date of the future appointment in the monthly navigational calendar. Then, enter the appointment in the calendar by double-clicking on the start time and typing the details. How can I set reminders for appointments?
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Unless youve turned off this feature, Outlook automatically sets a reminder for all new appointments. To reset the reminder default, click on Tools/Options. In the Calendar section of the Preferences tab, check the box next to Default Reminder. To set a reminder for an individual appointment, double-click on the appointment in the calendar view to display the appointment details. Check the box next to reminder and then Save and Close the appointment.
E-Mail Management
How many times a day should I check/answer email? Unless immediate response to email is mission-critical to your job, you will be most productive if you create a schedule to check and answer email. For some people, once a day is sufficient and, by todays business standards, the minimum. For others, checking at the beginning and end of each day is an ideal solution. Still others require three or four email appointments each day to effectively do their jobs. The key is to make checking and answering email a proactive activity, versus a reactive one. How can I avoid being spammed on a regular basis? Like junk mail that arrives via the US Post Office, spam (electronic junk mail) is a near-daily reality. To minimize the amount of junk mail you receive, use Outlooks junk mail feature (Inbox, Organize, Junk Mail) to automatically delete junk mail or move it to a designated folder. For spam missed by the feature, right-click on the message in the Inbox list and choose Junk Mail/Add to List. Then, delete the message. Finally, dont open spam. It often lets the sender know youre there and likely to open his/her next mailing. How often should I clean up my Inbox? Many company systems impose restrictions on the amount of Outlook data you can store. This may determine the frequency of your clean up schedule. Generally speaking, a weekly Inbox cleanup should be more than sufficient to keep your system organized and running smoothly.
Information Retrieval
How can I organize my e-mail messages so theyre easy to retrieve later? Folders are a great way to organize your Inbox. To create a new Inbox folder, go to the inbox and click on File/New/Folder. Give the folder a name and choose whether to add a folder shortcut to the Outlook Bar. Once the folders are created, you can add email messages to them by simply dragging and dropping. Keep in mind that while a few folders will enhance your inbox organization, too many folders could make finding items more difficult. How can I keep track of messages, ideas, etc. I get during the day? The Daily Record is an ideal repository for messages, ideas and notes you need to jot down during the day. Once on the Daily Record, you have a dated log of incoming information, as well as a convenient process to cut or copy and paste the information to other sections of PlanPlus or other files.
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Appendix D: PlanPlus for Outlook Frequently Asked Questions
Weekly Planning
When is the best time to do my weekly planning? Some people prefer to organize on Friday afternoon before they leave the office. Others prefer Sunday morning or first thing Monday morning. The important thing is to find a regular time each week when you can be alone for 20-30 minutes to evaluate the past week and plan the next. What are the most important steps in weekly planning? The four steps in the weekly planning process are: Review Mission, Schedule Goals, Schedule Compass, and Schedule Tasks. While the process isnt sequential or linear, we recommend you do each of the steps every week in the order listed. Each step provides a different benefit and all are equally important. How long should it take? The average weekly planning session probably lasts 20-30 minutes. However, there may be some weeks where you will spend much more time and others when you may spend far less. Should I look at my Compass every day? The Compass is a tool to help you stay on course with what matters most. So, its valuable to look at your Compass at least once every day and assess whether youre focusing on whats important to you. How can I make sure my big rocks get done? Scheduling your big rocks, by making them tasks or appointments, is an important first step toward making sure you accomplish the things that matter most. Once on the calendar or task list, you can take advantage of automatic reminders (set in detail view) to keep you on track.
Using the Compass

What is the maximum number of roles I should have on my Weekly Compass? We recommend no more than seven roles, representative of both your personal and professional life. Do I have to work on a goal each week for each role? No, but we recommend you have some compass goals each week (perhaps in other roles) to reinforce your key priorities. What is QII? QII or Quadrant II refers to the Important, Not Urgent section of the Time Management Matrix used in many Franklin Covey workshops. Its in this Quadrant of Quality we do our long-range planning, anticipate and prevent problems, empower others, broaden our minds and increase our skills through reading and continuous professional development, prepare for important meetings and presentations, or invest in relationships through deep, honest listening. It is the quadrant of personal leadership. Is the Weekly Compass in PlanPlus just for my professional life? The Weekly Compass is an excellent tool for your whole lifepersonal and professional. What do I do with Sharpen the Saw? The term sharpen the saw is a metaphor that describes the energy we invest in increasing our personal capacity in the four fundamental areasphysical, social/emotional, mental and spiritual. Many people use their sharpen the saw role for organizing weekly investment activities like
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide daily exercise or personal reading. Its really a matter of making sure none of the four areas is neglected and scheduling what works best for you.
Using the Mission Feature

What types of things should I include in my mission? The authors of the book First Things First write that the mission statements people find most empowering share the following characteristics: represents the deepest and best within you is the fulfillment of your own unique gifts is transcendentbased on principles or contribution and purpose higher than self addresses and integrates all four fundamental human needs and capacities is based on principles that produce quality-of-life results deals with both vision and principle-based values deals with all the significant roles in your life is written to inspire you How long should my mission statement be? Mission statements range from a few words to several pages. Some are expressed in music, poetry, and art. Because each persons personal vision is unique, each persons mission will be unique. Can my mission change? To be empowering, a mission statement has to become a living document that, like life, can be evaluated and changed. How often should I look at reviewing/revising my mission? Weekly planning allows time each week to review, or reconnect, to your mission. Revising your mission is something that will take place far less frequently, perhaps annually.
Using the Goals Feature

Can I put long-range goals on my master task list? You can put long-range goals on your master task list; however, you may find the long-range goals section of PlanPlus makes goal planning and goal tracking easier. How many intermediate steps should I have for each long-range goal? This really depends on the scope and timeline of the goal. Ideally, your list of intermediate steps should reflect all the tasks that must be completed in order to accomplish the goal. How can I make sure I work on my long-range goals each week? The second step in weekly planning is Schedule Goals. This is a great opportunity to review your long-range goals and intermediate steps, and schedule what needs action in the coming week. When should I review my long-range goals? Long-range goals are reviewed weekly during weekly planning and can also be reviewed as intermediate steps are scheduled on the calendar or task list.
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Appendix E
Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations

Daily Thoughts
Following are some thoughts and questions on life leadership and scheduling your daily tasks. Life Leadership An assortment of thoughts and quotes on the subject of leading your life.
5-Minute Stress Buster: Take an aerobic minute. Take a vigorous 2-to 5-minute walk outside, up or down stairs anyplace will do. A balancing act is different from living in balance. Anonymous A life of reaction is a life of slavery, intellectually and spiritually. One must fight for a life of action, not reaction. Rita Mae Brown A man always has two reasons for what he does a good one, and the real one. John Pierpont Morgan A man without ambition is dead. A man with ambition but no love is dead. A man with ambition and love for his blessings here on earth is ever so alive. Pearl Bailey A musician must make music, and artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself. What a man can be, he must be. Abraham Harold Maslow
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A plan is a list of actions arranged in whatever sequence is thought likely to achieve an objective. John Argetti A study done in January and February of 2001 by Radcliffe Public Policy Center in New York City showed that nearly one in five men and women said they worked more than 50 hours a week and in 40 percent of couples, one or both worked more than 40 hours a week. Is there something wrong with that picture? A successful life does not result from chance, nor is it determined by fate or good fortune - but rather, through a succession of successful days. Ari Kiev According to Information Week (Sept. 6, 1993), the annual productivity loss by US Businesses due to employees playing computer games is an estimated $100 Billion which works out to 2% of the Gross Domestic Product. According to experts, the average American, in his or her lifetime, spends: three years in meetings, eight months opening junk mail, two years on the telephone and one year looking for misplaced items. Achieving goals by themselves will never make us happy in the long term: it's who you become, as you overcome the obstacles necessary to achieve your goals, that can give you the deepest sense and most long-lasting sense of fulfillment. Tony Robbins Adversity causes some men to break; others to break records. William Arthur Ward All the evolution we know of proceeds from the vague to the definite.... Charles Sanders Pierce All the women I know feel a little like outlaws. Marilyn French All those who wander are not lost. J.R.R. Tolkein And if not now, when? Talmud And long we try in vain to speak and act Our hidden self, and what we say and do Is eloquent, is well but 'tis not true.
Matthew Arnold Are you able to distinguish between what is truly important (regardless of its urgency) and what is not important at all but appears urgent?
Are you always on the move? You may be a kinesthetic learner. Make sure you always incorporate movement into your learning. Get up and move around in discussions. You may need to take more breaks in meetings than others. Incorporate such things as role playing and physical models in your personal and professional study habits. Are you on auto-pilot? Ugh. Get up earlier. Walk to work. Take a bus. A different route? How about a picnic at lunchtime? Take an hour off, just for you. Ask yourself, What's the most important thing I can do right now, considering all the things I have on my plate? Asking for permission is asking to be told no. Bob Knowling At the age of six I wanted to be a cook. At seven I wanted to be Napoleon. And my ambition has been growing steadily ever since. Salvador Dali AVOID BEING A PERFECTIONIST. In the Malaysian culture, only the gods are considered capable of producing anything perfect. Whenever something is made, a flaw is left on purpose so the gods will not be offended. Yes, some things need to be closer to perfect than others, but perfectionism, paying unnecessary attention to detail, can be a form of procrastination. Avoid energy stealers. Do you know people who sap your energy or individuals with attitudes that literally suck the life out of you?
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations Make it a practice to avoid excessive contact with negative people. Balance is about maintaining harmony among the many interacting roles you play. Focus daily on what matters most to you and proceed accordingly. Balance is about sustaining harmony among many interacting roles and needs throughout a lifetime. Balance isn't either/or; it's and. Stephen R. Covey Balance takes planning. It requires choice, being deliberate and prioritization. You can manage it all, if you want to. Be creative and courageous. Add to your system any new, wonderful, harebrained, thought-provoking, risk-taking ideas that have occurred to you. Be strong in the hard moments. When you've scheduled time with a family member, make that your first priority and don't change it just because someone asks you to do something else. No is one of the first words we ever learn to say! Why do so many of us forget how to say it when we need to say it most? Big ideas are so hard to recognize, so fragile, so easy to kill. Don't forget that, all of you who don't have them. John Elliot, Jr. Break the monotony, learn something new! In two months time, I will know more about these two things: ________ & ________. Brooding on God, I may become a man. Pain wanders through my bones like a lost fire; What burns me now? Desire, desire, desire. Theodore Roethke Business trips where Mom or Dad takes the kids have jumped 200 percent in the last 10 years and the trend is expected to continue. Cooperation can be spelled with two letters: WE. Create a slogan for yourself. Think of key words that represent your expertise and connect them. Make it fun! Just do it! Curious people ask questions. Determined people find the answers. Anonymous Did you know that the Family Medical Leave Act gives men the right to take a 12-week unpaid maternity leave? Did you realize that you can create folders in your inbox to help you keep track of what matters most? Go to FILE and then select FOLDER from the drop down menu and then name the folder. Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody has thought. Albert von Szent-Gyorgyi Divide your day into tasks under the following three categories: Vital, Important &Optional. Schedule them accordingly. Do not commit the error common among the young, of assuming that if you cannot save the whole of mankind you have failed.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Jan De Hartog Do or do not. There is no try. Yoda Do you find yourself being efficient but not terribly effective? Sounds like you might be following someone else's plan. Do you have your own set of happy words? Sometimes a good word can make tough changes easier. Try using, I am facing this challenge, in place of I have this problem. Do you learn best when you can see a picture of what you are studying? You may be a visual learner. Consider incorporating maps, diagrams, colors and graphics into your personal and professional study habits. If you learn best through hearing, not reading, you may be an auditory learner. Try incorporating such things as discussions or music into your personal and professional study habits. Ask a lot of questions of others if you don't understand something. When you hear it, you'll know it! Do you often think, Someday, Ill be able to do what I really want to? Why not turn someday into today? Does what I do matter? What do I stand for? Am I making a difference? Only you know. Don't be afraid of the space between your dreams and reality. If you can dream it, you can make it so. Belva Davis Don't compromise yourself, honey. You're all you've got. Janis Joplin Don't drift with the tide. Row. Holly Steil Don't prioritize your schedule, schedule your priorities! Don't try to reinvent the wheel. If someone else always seems to be ahead of the game, watch and learn. If someone else has a speedier way of doing something, copy it. If you're having trouble getting specific jobs done, ask others how they organize and execute the task; perhaps you've overlooked some short cuts. Double the value of your time. Go on a vacation where you can also learn something new. Dreams come true; without that possibility, nature would not incite us to have them.... John Updike E-mail Tip: Get to the point. Keep it short and simple. Don't drone on and on for several paragraphs...or pages. People want information quickly and clearly. E-mail Tip: State your emotional state. If you are communicating while angry, depressed or jovial - say so. Don't leave the recipient guessing when interpreting your remarks. E-mail Tip: The subject is the headline. Write a succinct subject "headline" - three to five words. Your subject determines whether your email gets read or not. Establishing good working relationships can help us secure the cooperation of the people we need to accomplish our tasks. If we delay building good relationships until we really need them, it will be too late.
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations Lois P. Frankel Evaluate your days work. Did it give you energy? Fuel you? Inspire you? Are you scheduling what matters most to you? Even if you have no external deadline for a project, give yourself an internal one. It will motivate you to get it done! Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there. Will Rogers Even though it may seem like a very difficult thing to do, letting your boss know that there are certain times you are unable to work late because of a standing personal commitment to a family member may be one of the best things you could do for your boss! Knowing that employees make time for what matters most and that they stick by it can raise the level of respect and understanding between employer and employee. It may even give the boss something to think about in relation to his or her own personal life! Ever tried telling one of your employees to get a life? Actually having a life outside of work increases work productivity and effectiveness. Encourage work/life balance and everyone wins. Everybody gets so much information all day long that they lose their common sense. Gertrude Stein Everyone is a house with four rooms: physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. Unless we go into every room every day, even if only to keep it aired, we are not a complete person. Rumer Godden Everyone spoke of an information overload, but what there was in fact was a non-... information overload. Richard Saul Wurman Excellent companies focus on only a few key business values . . . The focus on a few key values lets everyone know what's important. Thomas J. Peters & Robert H. Waterman, Jr. Executive coach, bestselling author, and noted executive organizer Stephanie Winston says TRAF is the secret to taming the paper tiger - Toss, Refer, Act or File. Failure is impossible. Susan B. Anthony Feast or famine? What can you do in downtime to create value? Contacts lurk everywhere, sometimes in the most unexpected places ... follow your impulses! Feel the fear, and do it anyway. Susan Jeffers Feeling like you just don't have enough time for everything? Pretend your work week has been cut in half. Now list the tasks you absolutely must do. Then consider delegating the rest. You'll have time for more important work, your team will feel empowered and be far more versatile than they were before! Five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes. Five hundred thousand moments so dear. Five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes. How do you measure, measure a year. Rent
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Follow your heart. Any other path leads to someone else's dream. Lyn Christian For a change of pace at work, make all your C priorities your A priorities. For fast-acting relief, try slowing down.... Lily Tomlin For me, music and life are all about style... Miles Davis Form a group of friends in the same predicament as you - discuss fears, hopes, wants. What it would be like if you lived the life you chose? Freelance potpourri: Pick a name of someone interesting that you've lost contact with and make a lunch date. Contact, contacts, contacts! Future shock ... Future shock; the shattering stress and disorientation that we induce in individuals by subjecting them to too much change in too short a time. Alvin Tofler Get back to some of the things that made memories with your own mom. Bake a cookie, draw a picture, take a walk, go to a concert, or just plain old talk to each other! Give a man a horse he can ride, Give a man a boat he can sail.... James Thompson Have powerful reasons. With a strong enough reason you can and will find the how and the wherewithal to achieve your reward. Reasons plus belief keep you motivated. Have you done anything this week to challenge your mind? Were not suggesting that your work isn't challenging, just the fact that routines can be mind numbing. Exercise your brain! Write some poetry, read a book you've been putting off, take up a new hobby. Is there something you've always been curious about? Do it! Have you ever found yourself keeping busy with something that's not important but has been labeled urgent? Urgency can be very deceptive! Have you ever thought about volunteering your time and talents? There are tons of youth, elderly and relief organizations that could use your help. Make it a goal this week to select one and then try it out! He who has health has hope, and he who has hope has everything.... Arabian Proverb Hello, is there anybody in there Pink Floyd, Lily Tomlin Gravitation cannot be held responsible for people falling in love. Albert Einstein Happy people treat others well. Stephen C. Kundin, Harry Paul & John Christensen
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations How are you spending your time? Make two lists: Who I Am? & Who I am Not? Take one days events and categorize them under either category. How can your point of view change a normally dreary task into something cool? Is there an opportunity to approaching something old in a new way? How do you get things accomplished? How do you use your own resources effectively? How does change work? Try finishing this statement: By this time next year, I would like to be known for _________________. How frequently do you check email during work hours? 33.1%-Each time a notification ... comes through, 20.3%-Every half hour, 21.4%-Every hour, 22.5%-3 to 5 times per day, 2.7%-1 to 2 times per day MASIE Center Survey, 2001 How many e-mails do you get on an average business day? 0 to 10-8%, 11 to 20-22%, 21 to 35-26%, 36 to 50- 25%, 51 to 100-15%, 101 to 500-4%. MASIE Center Survey, 2001 How many post-its and scraps of paper are scattered all over your desk? Wouldn't it... be I don't want to get to the end of my life and find that I lived just the length of it. I want to have lived the width of it as well. Diane Ackerman I am extraordinarily patient provided I get my own way in the end.... Margaret Thatcher I can tell that I've hit the wall at work, and that I need to recalibrate my life, when I can no longer empathize with others, when I'm focused only on results, when I ignore other peoples goals, and when I become frustrated with life's interruptions. Or when my daughter has to tell me, It'll be all right, Kirby. Kirby Dyess, Intel cool if they were all recorded in one place? Do it now or schedule a time to do it. How thin can you spread yourself before you are no longer there? Anonymous How would your life be different if you had more balance? What would it look and feel like? Take some time to actually ponder this ... see it! I always wanted to be somebody, but I should have been more specific Lily Tomlin I am addicted to email. Is there a support group for people like me Sound familiar? I am Charley's aunt from Brazil, where the nuts come from. Brandon Thomas
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I don't waste time thinking, Am I doing it right? I ask, Am I doing it? Georgette Mosbacher I dream in my dream all the dreams of the other dreamers, And I become the other dreamers. Walt Whitman I have the same goal I've had ever since I was a girl. I want to rule the world. Madonna Louise Ciccone I made the most of my ability and I did my best with my title. Joe Louis I merely took the energy it takes to pout and wrote some blues. Duke Ellington I really don't think life is about the I-couldhave-beens. Life is only about the I-tried-to-... do. I don't mind the failure but I can't imagine that I'd forgive myself if I didn't try. Nikki Giovanni I refuse to accept the idea that the is-ness of man's present nature makes him morally incapable of reaching up for the ought-ness that forever confronts him. Martin Luther King, Jr. I shall be telling this with a sigh... Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and II took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. Robert Frost
I think it's the end of progress if you stand still and think about what you've done in the past. I keep on. Leslie Caron I wanted to use what I was, to be what I was born to be - not to have a career, but to be that straightforward obvious unmistakable animal, a writer. Cynthia Ozick If a man hasn't discovered something that he will die for, he isn't fit to live. Martin Luther King, Jr. If opportunity doesn't knock, build a door. Milton Berle If the decisions you made yesterday are in line with your values, don't go back and second guess yourself. Stick with it, move on, and trust yourself. If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always gotten. Anonymous If you could choose FIVE things to do outside of work to nourish your soul, what would ... they be? If you could do anything in the whole world, what would it be? Okay, now tell 10 about it this week. Try it, see what happens! people If you don't take control of your life, don't complain when others do. Beth Mende Conny
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If you feel like you have no life, go home and find one!... Anonymous If you get too wrapped up in all of the stuff coming at you, you lose your ability to respond appropriately and effectively. Remember, you're the one who creates speed, because you're the one who allows stuff to enter your life. David Allen If you had all the time and money in the world, how would your day be different? For fun, plan a day based on that if. If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them. Henry David Thoreau If you think you can do a thing or think you cant do a thing, you're right. Henry Ford If you treat an individual as he is, he will remain as he is. But if you treat him as if he were what he ought to be and could be, he will become what he ought to be and could be. Goethe If you want small changes, work on your behavior; if you want quantum-leap changes, work on your paradigms. Stephen R. Covey If you want a quality life, you have to plan and work for the results. Careful, consistent... planning and action can provide renewal.
If you were a car, what car would you be? Why? Does your current life reflect these attributes? Why? Better yet, why not? If your job feels like nothing but you keep hanging on because it's all you got ... That's pretty easy math: Job + All you got = Nothing. If your life were more balanced, what would other see you do or hear you say?... If you're a smart person, you can see what's smart about the next guy. If you're secretly afraid you're a moron, okay, then to you everybody's a moron. Taxi Driver Wisdom Only in men's imagination does every truth find an effective and undeniable existence. Imagination, not invention, is the supreme master of art as of life. Joseph Conrad Improvements in equipment and facilities result in 2530% productivity improvements, whereas human resource enhancements can result in up to 70% productivity improvement. justthebasics.com In 20% of the time you spend on any task you'll get 80% of the work done. In my life's chain of events, nothing was accidental. Hannah Senesh In the end, the secret to learning is so simple: Think only about whatever you love. Follow it, do it, dream about it...and it will hit you:
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide learning was there all the time, happening by itself. Grace Llewellyn Information Overload ... Company computer networks are overwhelmed with e-mail. Reports say workers... spend an average of 49 minutes a day reading the stuff. According to a USA Today article, here's what some companies are doing to battle the deluge. Intel recently started classes on how to manage e-mail. Lessons include putting short messages in the subject line so the e-mails don't have to be opened, sparingly use graphics and attachments, and they advise users to get off unnecessary distribution lists. IBM is increasingly using instant messaging instead of e-mail. It's less taxing on networks because messages aren't usually saved. Instead of e-mailing large files to individuals, Computer Associates is asking employees to place files on internal networks where many can view them. The company also offers email training. Is the way you're working today sustainable over the next 15 years? Think about it and really listen to your answer. It always comes back to the same necessity: go deep enough and there is a bedrock of truth, however hard. May Sarton It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things. Elinor Smith It's not a question of your talent or brilliance. The question is what are you doing in every moment to support or destroy it?
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It has become too easy for others to expect me to respond and keep up digitally. Request from others take time and interrupt the work I had planned on doing for the day. Sound familiar? It is a bad plan that admits of no modification. Publilius Syrus It is a mistake to look too far ahead. Only one link of the chain of destiny can be handled at a time. Sir Winston Churchill It is almost as if you were frantically constructing another world while the world that you live in dissolves beneath your feet, and that your survival depends on completing this construction at least one second before the old habitation collapses. Tennessee Williams It is found again. What? Eternity. It is the sea Gone with the sun. Arthur Rimbaud It isn't where you came from, it's where you're going that counts. Ella Fitzgerald It takes time to save time. Joe Taylor It is a sobering thought that when Mozart was my age, he had been dead for two years. Thomas Andrew Lehrer
Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations Diana Castle It's not so much how busy you are, but why are you busy? The bee is praised. The mosquito is swatted. Mary O'Connor It's your life. Why should other people decide how you live? Air Force Advertisement I've learned that the great challenge of life is to decide what's important and to disregard everything else. Anonymous Join a mailing list that deals with your area of expertise. Mailing lists are an invaluable source for jobs, contacts, new friends broaden your network! Katharine Graham, CEO of the Washington Post Company avoids interruptions by paying visits to those who work for her. Keep in mind always the present you are constructing. It should be the future you want. Alice Walker Killing time takes practice. Karen Elizabeth Gordon Know when to stop. There's a virtue in knowing when to quit work for maximum productivity the next day. Stop on a high note or on a note of accomplishment. Labor disgraces no man; unfortunately you occasionally find men disgrace labor. Life is to be lived. If you have to support yourself, you had bloody well better find some way that is going to be interesting. And you don't do that by sitting around wondering about yourself. Katherine Hepburn Life shrinks or expands in proportion to ones courage. Anais Nin Ulysses S. Grant Learn to get in touch with the silence within yourself and know that everything in this life has a purpose. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards. Soren Kierkegaard Life is a book and you are its author. You determine its plot and pace and you - only you - turn its pages. Beth Mende Conny Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. To keep our faces toward change and behave like free spirits in the presence of fate is strength undefeatable. Helen Keller Life is not orderly. No matter how we try to make life so, right in the middle of it we die, lose a leg, fall in love, drop a jar of applesauce. Natalie Goldberg
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Life's like a play: it's not the length, but the excellence of the acting that matters. Seneca Like an ability or a muscle, hearing your inner wisdom is strengthened by doing it. Robbie Gass Live. Love. Learn. Leave a legacy. Look at your calendar for one week. Examine it. What does it say about you? Which events will you remember in a years time? Look at your day yesterday. What is the one thing you can do differently today in order to improve your productivity? Go for it! Look into getting some health insurance coverage if you don't already have it. Even if you're young, you never know when you might need it. Check with your Human Resource department to see if it is offered. It'll give you some extra peace of mind. Look up, look down, look all around! Have you considered a departmental change? A lateral, even a downward move? What's out there for YOU? Love may not make the world go round, but I must admit that it makes the ride worthwhile. Sean Connery Luck is a matter of preparation meeting opportunity. Oprah Winfrey Make a decision to begin planning events that are important to you and not urgent. Make a list of ten people you admire. Be clear about what it is they do you admire. Now ask, How can my life be more like theirs? Make a list of the top three things you always wanted to do but never got to. How can you make at least one happen? Commit to it! Make a lunch date with the single most successful independent contractor you know. Your goal? Find out what they feel is the secret to their success. Make a plan of action. To achieve and stay focused upon your objective, create an action plan. What are the steps you will take to get you from where you are to where you want to be? Make two lists: Work & Play. Take one weeks activities and classify them under one of these two categories. How's it look? Make visible what, without you, might perhaps never have been seen. Robert Bresson Many people procrastinate because they fear the pain of doing the action more than the pleasure of completing the action. Realize that a high percentage of the time, the fear you feel is not real, but is fear you created yourself, and only you can destroy it. Meaning is not something you stumble across. Meaning is something you build into your life. John Gardner Create value by making a date with what's important and sticking to it!
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations Once I decide to do something, I cant have people telling me I cant. If there is a roadblock, you jump over it, walk around it, crawl under it. Kitty Kelly Once the mind has been stretched by a new idea, it will never again return to its original size. Oliver Wendall Holmes One cannot have wisdom without living life. No trumpets sound when the important decisions in our life are made. Destiny is made known silently. Agnes DeMille No wind serves him who addresses his voyage to no certain port. Montaigne Nobody gives you power, you just take it. Roseanne Now Denial: To tell oneself that the only time worth living in is the past and that the only time that may ever be interesting again is the future. Douglas Coupland Of all the hats you wear, do one or two dominate the others? How can you create a plan so you have choice over which hat you'll wear and when? Okay, there will always be things you can't control, but you can always control your response to them! How about the path of least resistance? Dorothy McCall One of the greatest pains to human nature is the pain of a new idea. Walter Bagehot One ship drives east and another drives west With the selfsame winds that blow. 'Tis the set of sails and not the gales Which tells us the way to go. Ella Wheeler Wilcox Option Paralysis: The tendency, when given unlimited choices, to make none. Douglas Coupland Other people can talk about how to expand the destiny of mankind. I just want to talk about how to fix a motorcycle. I think that what I have to say has more lasting value. Robert Maynard Pirsig Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read. Groucho Marx
Most of the stress that people feel doesn't come from having too much to do. It comes from not keeping agreements they've made with themselves. David Allen My parents always told me I could do anything but never told me how long it would take. Rita Rudner
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Overbooked? Stressed? Learning to say, no can help to balance some of that out. Learn to say a hard word (no) in a soft way. Ozmosis: the inability of ones job to live up to ones self-image. Douglas Coupland People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they cant find them, make them. George Bernard Shaw Perhaps the most valuable result of all education is the ability to make yourself do the thing you have to do, when it ought to be done, whether you like it or not. Walter Bagehot Perpetual devotion to what a man calls his business, is only to be sustained by perpetual neglect of many other things. Robert Louis Stevenson Plan, execute and evaluate one step at a time. If at anytime you feel overwhelmed, stop and find out what needs to be adjusted. Planning is nothing more than choosing to manage your time instead of having time manage you. Practice the Do It Now policy. When you get an idea or have an impulse, immediately act on it or schedule a time to do so now! PRACTICE THE ART OF INTELLIGENT NEGLECT. Eliminate from your life trivial Rediscover the lost art of the thank-you note. Schedule some time and hand-write a thank you to someone who has been kind to you during the past week and then send it via snail mail. Regularly scheduling time for personal and professional reflection is a great way to stay focused on whether you are living by your values. Take time to think about the following questions: Where am I going? How do I get there? What must I do? Why am I doing it? When should I do it? Remember, a daily schedule is a mere road map for how you would like your day to go. Be flexible and realistic, there's always tomorrow! Remember to schedule time NOT to work! Create boundaries. Without the 9 to 5 tasks or those tasks which do not have longterm consequences for you. Can you delegate or eliminate any of your task list? Work on those tasks which you alone can do. Procrastination naturally occurs when faced with events that are unpleasant, complex, lengthy, or uninteresting regardless of the priority. Productivity Tip: Know when to drop activities and which ones to drop when you begin to feel overwhelmed. Productivity Tip: Say no to some things in order to say yes to others. Rather than focusing on when you need to finish something, focus on when you should be starting. Then start when you need to.
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations structure it's easy to work 24/7, but not very fun! Renewal is a gift we give ourselves, not an imposition. Renewal is the process that strengthens us and gives us increased personal power to move up the spiral of continuous improvement - physically, socially/emotionally, mentally and spiritually. Requisites for a Team Member to be an authentic one: Appreciate others. Be flexible. Create a team. Develop others. Involve others. Lighten up. Generation X REWARD YOURSELF. Even for small successes, celebrate achievement of goals. Promise yourself a reward for completing each task, or finishing the total job. Then keep your promise to yourself and indulge in your reward. Doing so will help you maintain the necessary balance in life between work and play. Rushing, frantic, panic it took me a long time to realize that these are not necessarily the way life is. Anonymous Schedule - like an appointment - routine breaks in your day for private moments. Reflect, rest physically and emotionally, talk with someone important to you. Schedule all of the big stuff first. (Psst! big = important) Once the big stuff is set, let everything else fall into place around it. Schedule an outrageous day of activities pack it! Cool things just for you. Now, schedule two of them into next week as major priorities! Schedule fun time - yes, at work. It's not a waste of time at all. Having fun with your coworkers strengthens bonds of friendship and ultimately increases professionalism. There's no reason why work shouldn't be fun! Schedule some downtime every day. Recognize that not doing it all is OK even important. Schedule time to make new contacts! Set aside an hour to make phone calls to out-oftouch contacts or even try some cold-calls you never know what's out there! Self is the only prison that can ever bind the soul. Henry Van Dyke Show up and choose to be PRESENT. Slow down and enjoy life. It's not the only the scenery you miss by going to fast - you also miss the sense of where you are going and why. Eddie Cantor Slump? I ain't in no slump. I just ain't hitting. Yogi Berra So little done - so much to do. Cecil Rhodes (Last Words)
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide So, just what is important? Ask, Does this add value to my life? Does this support what I am going after? Sometimes you just need to leap and build your wings on the way down Anonymous Start your day by working on one of your A1 tasks. Even if your day ends up being completely Quadrant I, you will feel a sense of accomplishment knowing you worked on one of your priorities. Statisticians estimate lost time in traffic could cost American businesses up to 100 billion dollars per year. Success follows doing what you want to do. There is no other way to be successful. Malcolm Forbes Success is leading your life forward according to those things that are most important to you. Success is simple. Do what's right, the right way, at the right time. Anonymous Success story: My email has decreased significantly since I use several accounts for my business and personal correspondence. I also use rules to route list mail to folders and keep it out of my personal inbox. Take a day and see how many activities you can label both: unimportant and not urgent. How much time did you spend on them? Revealing, no? Task management can be broken down into four concepts: prioritize, track, capture and retrieve. Tell me to what you pay attention, and I will tell you who you are. Jose Ortega y Gasset The ancient Romans had a tradition: whenever one of their engineers constructed an arch, as the capstone was hoisted into place, the engineer assumed accountability for his work in the most profound way possible: he stood under the arch. Michael Armstrong The architecture of our future is not only unfinished; the scaffolding has hardly gone up. George Lemming The best way to increase your authority is to delegate it. Paul Meyer The decisions you make during the day help or hinder the accomplishment of your larger goals. Keep this in mind when creating today's schedule. The enemy of the best is good. Anonymous Take baby steps. It takes years to get your life out of balance. You can't fix it in a few days. Focus on improving one role at a time. Taking time for yourself isn't selfish, and don't ever let anyone tell you it is!
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams. Eleanor Roosevelt The great end in life is not knowledge but action.... Thomas Huxley The greatest happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved - loved for ourselves, or rather, loved in spite of ourselves. Victor Hugo The key is not to prioritize your schedule but to schedule your priorities. Stephen R. Covey The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing. Stephen R. Covey The MBAs made the internet trivial. They dreamed small dreams and most of those weren't realized. Seth Godwin The more important your responsibilities, the more reflection time you should take. Four hours a week for a middle manager, and eight hours for a senior executive is not too much to aim for. The investment will pay off in the form of improved results. The need for challenge bulldozed a road down the center of my mind. Maya Angelou The past is a ghost, the future a dream, and all we ever have is now. There is always choice: love what you do till you do what you love! The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet. Aristotle The times they are a changin'. Bob Dylan There are two tragedies in life. One is to lose your heart's desire. The other is to gain it. George Bernard Shaw There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it. Edith Wharton The principle behind weekly planning is to schedule your priorities, not to prioritize your schedule. The problems of the world cannot possibly be solved by skeptics or cynics whose horizons are limited by the obvious realities. We need men who can dream of things that never were. John F. Kennedy The ripest peach is highest on the tree. James Whitcomb Riley Bill Cosby The person who makes a success of living is the one who sees his goal steadily and aims for it unswervingly. That is dedication. Cecil B. DeMille
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Three keys to getting all your information into one system use one system, have a mobile device, file. Time is the scarcest resource and unless it's managed, nothing else can be managed. Peter Drucker To be sensual, I think, is to respect and rejoice in the force of life, of life itself, and to be present in all that one does, from the effort of loving to the making of bread. James Baldwin To change ones life: Start immediately. Do it flamboyantly. No exceptions. William James There's only now, there's only here. Give into love, or live in fear. No other path, no other way, no day but today. Rent Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least. Goethe This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; the being a force of nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. George Bernard Shaw Those who are blessed with the most talent don't necessarily outperform everyone else. It's the people with follow-through who excel. Mary Kay Ash Undoubtedly, we become what we envisage.
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There is more credit and satisfaction in being a first-rate truck driver than a tenth-rate executive. B.C. Forbes There's no need to stand behind anyone when there's so much room to walk. Taxi Driver Wisdom There's obviously no easy answer to the question of balance. You have to work at it. You've got to be as determined in your personal life as you are in your professional life. Rahm Emanuel
To live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong. Joseph Clinton Pearce Too much sanity may be madness. And maddest of all, to see life as it is and not as it should be! Miguel de Cervantes Touch each piece of information only once. Trust that still, small voice that says, This might work and Ill try it. Diane Mariechild Ultimately . . . it's not the stories that determine our choices, but the stories that we continue to choose. Sylvia Boorstein
Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations Claude M. Bristol Urgency does not equal importance. USA Today Snapshot: Workers take happiness over money. What Americans value most about work: Job Satisfaction 65%, Being paid well 34%, Having an important title 1%. 2001 Gallup Poll Use the Rules option to help you filter incoming e-mail. Go to TOOLS and then choose RULES from the drop down menu. Select ADD rule and then specify what to do with messages from specific sources. You can automatically move e-mails to specific folders, forward them, and delete them. Vacationing helps you reset your mind. Even though the mind is a mystery, we do know that it can get tired. Mental fatigue. Getting away on a regular basis helps reset the mind to its peak condition. Every brain needs a good rest. Chris Widener Visualizing something organizes ones ability to accomplish it. Stephen R. Covey We all do 'do, re, mi,' but you have got to find the other notes yourself. Louis Armstrong We are the choices we make. Meryl Streep What are you ultimately trying to accomplish? Is your day full of tasks that will help move We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then is not an act, but a habit. Aristotle We become what we do. Chiang Kai-Shek We boil at different degrees. Ralph Waldo Emerson We have been taught to believe that negative equals realistic and positive equals unrealistic. Susan Jeffries We know what happens to people who stay in the middle of the road. They get run over. Aneurin Bevan We're drowning in information, but starved for knowledge. John Naisbitt What am I? What do I stand for? How do I stand out? Tom Peters We are responsible for our own effectiveness, for our own happiness, and ultimately, I would say, for most of our circumstances . . . Knowing that we are responsible -response-able - is fundamental to effectiveness and to every other habit of effectiveness. Stephen R. Covey
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide that objective forward? Better yet, take note of the ones that don't! What do you want to do that you cannot do now because you lack the power? How could you use the power you have more effectively? Geoffrey M. Bellmans Getting Things Done When You Are Not in Charge What I fear more about stress is not that it kills, but that it prevents one from savoring life. Jean-Louis Sevan-Schreiber What if someone was looking for YOU? How would they describe your strengths & experience? What if your work could be reinvented to better suit who you are? What would it look like? What would change? Be specific! What is cluttering your life? What is important to you but not urgent? Do you give these things the time they deserve? Time spent on these things brings perspective to everything else. What is it costing you to be out of balance? What is time? The shadow on the dial, the striking of the clock, the running of the sand, day and night, summer and winter, months, years, centuries these are but arbitrary and outward signs, the measure of Time, not Time itself. Time is the Life of the soul. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow What makes life worth living? What we play is life! Louis Armstrong What would a bumper sticker that describes you say? What would a truly cool job look and feel like? Shoot for the stars! Hey, what have you got to lose? What would the ultimate classifieds ad look like for your perfect job? Write it! What would your ideal, ultimate To Do list look like? Write it! When did you last schedule time to do something just for you? A burned out YOU is no good to anyone, least of all you. When I was young I observed that nine out of every ten things I did were failures, so I did ten times more work. George Bernard Shaw When scheduling time to work on projects or tasks, shoot for blocks of time of two hours or less. Most people are at their best for no longer than two hours at a time. Arnold Glasgow When studied in 1999, the average length of a business lunch was 36 minutes. When was the last time you saw a tombstone with SAT scores inscribed on it? Edward B. Fiske
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations When was the last time you asked, What do I really want to be? When was the last time you had a complete physical? If you haven't seen the doctor for a while, schedule a time this month to have a routine checkup. Even if you feel great, there are some disorders and diseases that can only be detected through medical examinations. When was the last time you read a really good book or any book at all? When was the last time you really checked in with yourself? When was the last time you really listened and took interest in another person? When was the last time you wrote a letter or sent a card instead of making a phone call? When you are drowning in numbers, you need a system to separate the wheat from the chaff. Anthony Adams When you are planning your week and day cushion your actual task time by 10-20%. Most people typically under-estimate the time it takes to actually complete a task. When you come to a fork in the road, take it. Yogi Berra When you say yes to too many things you overdose on stress. It's an addiction that's hard to shake. Maybe you fear offending a friend or colleague or are simply a hard core over-achiever. Did you ever consider that Whether you are the mom or the dad, balancing kids, partners, stepkids, grandkids, parents, siblings, work, play, school, and community is hard. And it is about time. Don't ever let anyone tell you otherwise. But it seems that most times, the people you love the most understand and see how hard you try to make time for it all. As long as a bit of that time is for them and them alone, even if it's only a half-hour, it's appreciated and noticed. Don't give up! It's all worth it in the end! Whether you believe you can or whether you believe you cant, you're right. Henry Ford saying no to some things actually means saying yes to others? When you schedule every minute of your workday, you do not have time to put out the small fires that come up all day long . . . Solution: Only schedule 40 to 50 percent of your day. Roger Browner When your workload seems overwhelming, stop for a few minutes and ask yourself the following questions before going on: Which are the two or three most important things to do today? What if it wasn't done at all? Could someone else do it? Whenever I have to choose between two evils, I always like to try the one I haven't tried before. Mae West Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information? T.S. Eliot
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Who is the C.E.O. of your life? Will you commit to accomplishing your goals step by step, day by day and week by week? The choice is yours. Work expands to fill the time available for its completion. C. Northcote Parkinson Work has to include our deepest values and passions and feelings and commitments, or it's not work, it's just a job. Matthew Fox Work is no longer a place. Jarma Allila, Chairman and CEO of Nokia Work like you don't need money, love like you've never been hurt, sing as if no one can hear you, and dance like no ones watching. Anonymous You can observe a lot by watching. Yogi Berra You cannot motivate ... You cannot motivate anyone but yourself. To enhance or cause action in another person, you must create an atmosphere around them wherein they will want to motivate themselves. Hyrum Smith You can't depend on your judgment when your imagination is out of focus. Mark Twain You must have things you care about, otherwise you are empty. Taxi Driver Wisdom
You need to claim the events of your life to make yourself yours. Anne-Wilson Shaef You say what you like to hear. Taxi Driver Wisdom You take people as far as they will go, not as far as you would like them to go. Jeanette Rankin You will do some foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm. Colette You will never find time for anything. If you want time you must make it. Charles Buxton You win not by chance, but by preparation. Roger Maris
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Tasks
As you consider your Tasks and how they affect what you do every day, here are some questions, thoughts, and quotes to keep in mind.
Questions
The following Daily Task Questions may be useful to you. Am I allowing time in my schedule for changes and interruptions? Am I making appointments for my personal life, or for my professional life only? What can I do to balance my appointments? Are most of my tasks important to only me, or also important to someone else? Are there any items on my master task list that I could move to my daily task list this week? Are there any tasks I can delegate? Are there certain times of day I tend to be more productive? Have I considered blocking out some of this time to accomplish tasks? Am I letting somebody else define my tasks and appointments, or am I determining them for myself? By looking at my master and daily task lists, what would a stranger say I value? Am I satisfied with what's there? By looking at my tasks and calendar for last week, would someone else be able to ascertain what my goals are? Did any of my appointments last week originate from intermediate steps to long-range goals? Should I schedule more this week? Did I complete all of my "A" tasks last week? Am I setting realistic expectations? Did I schedule any appointments with myself last week to review and work on my goals? Do I want to schedule time to work on my goals this week? Did my tasks last week include Quadrant II activities? Will some of this week's tasks provide renewal? Did I schedule uninterrupted time with myself last week to complete tasks? Might that help me complete tasks this week? Do all of my "C"-priority tasks really need to be done this week? Should I eliminate some in order to help me focus on what's really important? Do I have too many overdue tasks? Should I rethink how I schedule my tasks so that I am able to finish them on time? Do I continually have an abundance of forwarded tasks? Have I tried assigning them to specific days? Do I feel like I'm running in circles, or did I schedule my big rocks first?
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Do I list all of my tasks in one tool, or do I have notes everywhere? Could I be more effective by using a single task list? Do I use Quick Prioritize to determine "A," "B," and "C" tasks? Could this tool help me accomplish my tasks each day? Does my task list and calendar from last week make me say, "I did what was truly important to me?" Have I repeatedly procrastinated on any particular tasks? Why? How many hours did I spend in meetings last week? Did the time spent in meetings help or prohibit me from accomplishing what matters most to me? How many of my appointments last week originated from my big rocks? Should I schedule more this week? How many of my tasks are "A"-priority tasks? How many are "Bs"? "Cs"? Did I set realistic expectations last week? How many of my tasks last week were actually intermediate steps from the goals I'm working on? How many of my tasks last week were Quadrant III (urgent but not important)? Can I say no to avoid someone else's urgencies this week? How many of the meetings I attended last week were a good use of my time? How will I ensure that my time is not wasted this week? How many of the tasks I accomplished last week were actually big rocks from my Weekly Compass? How many of my "A" tasks last week were Quadrant I? How many were Quadrant II? Should more of my Quadrant II tasks be "A"-priority? How many of my tasks did I complete last week? What prohibited me from completing the rest? How many of my tasks last week contributed to "living above the line" in Quadrants I and II? How many of my tasks last week were urgent? Are there measures I can take to minimize the impact of urgent tasks this week? How many tasks on my task list are more than a week old? more than two weeks old? Are they really important? How much time did I spend in Quadrants III and IV last week? How can I convert that time to Quadrants I and II? How much time did I spend checking and responding to e-mail last week? Can I schedule blocks of time for e-mail this week? How much time did I spend checking and responding to voice mail last week? Can I schedule blocks of time to focus on voice mail this week? Last week, did I schedule an appointment with myself to review and work on my mission? Do I want to take time to focus on my mission this week? Last week, did I create appointments with myself for planning, preparation, and prevention?
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations Last week, was I realistic with my daily plans or did I tend to overschedule myself? Did the tasks I accomplished last week move me in the direction I want to be moving in? As I look at the tasks I accomplished last week, does what's listed there indicate what I really value? Looking at my appointments from last week, with whom am I spending significant amounts of time? Is this reflected in my Weekly Compass? In reviewing my calendar from last week, do I seem to be neglecting any important relationships? Have I filled out my Weekly Compass to regain focus? Regarding my calendar, what would an outsider say I value? Does this summary reflect my mission? Should I schedule time this week to refine and reevaluate my mission statement? What barriers to completing tasks did I encounter last week? How did I overcome them? What can I learn from last week as a whole? Were any of my "A" tasks directly related to my mission? What is one thing I could have said no to in Quadrant III last week that would have given me more time for Quadrant II? What tasks and appointments led me to default to Quadrant IV last week? How can I minimize Quadrant IV time this week? When was the last time I reviewed my master task list? When was the last time I used my task list for activities I perform after I leave the office? Which of my tasks reflect my mission? Should more of my tasks somehow reflect my purpose?
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Thoughts and Quotes

Adept at Adapting "If anything can go wrong, it will." Mr. Murphy! Just where is your silver lining? We're not into peddling pessimism, but a healthy dose of reality comes in handy now and again. The proverbial "wrench in the system" can strike anywhere, anytime. Unexpected change - it's the law. Expect it. Change happens. It's one of the few constants in society. Commonly associated with negative circumstances and outcomes, unexpected change often gets a bad rap. Yet, unexpected change can be exhilarating and extremely positive. I feel a Paradigm Shift coming on! Plan on it. Rule of thumb: "Plan weekly, adapt daily." When reviewing your daily activities, factor in time for unexpected changes-things that throw your schedule off whack. You'll feel less frustrated and more in control. Be prepared. Go with it. Kicking and screaming will only get you so far. Change is good. Adapting, adjusting, and making modifications to changing circumstances will yield new opportunities, new ideas, and new perspectives. Unexpected change - your friend indeed! What else did you expect?
All Shook Up E-mail, voice mail, snail mail. It's always on my mind! Is there ever enough time to take care of it all? You really can do this information thing. It's now or never! Here are some tips: Make a daily personal appointment in your planning devices to deal with your different sources of information. Be selective when disclosing your e-mail address. If you have already been "spammed," start fresh with a new address and consider getting a free secondary account like Hotmail. Use it when you don't want to risk your primary e-mail address. Give FAD a chance. We're not talking Blue Suede Shoes, but rather FILE-ACT-DELETE. This method filters information based on importance and urgency. If it's urgent and important, ACT on it. If it's important but not urgent, FILE it and address it later. If it's not important and not urgent, DELETE it, or in other words, get rid of it. If you do this, you'll touch each piece of information only once. We promise you'll be singing a different tune!
And the Winner Is& "I'd like to thank you, and you. Oh, and you." Working effectively with others really is an art. Being in the limelight appeals to almost everyone, but cooperation, not competition, is at the heart of win-win relationships. Win-win means agreements or solutions benefit and satisfy all parties-not your way or my way, but a better way. See if these tips can help you get a better angle on win-win:
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations Solid performance. When the camera's not rolling, does your walk and talk reflect what matters most to you? If you know what a win is for you, others will also. Integrity of character establishes trust. Balance. Win-win requires maturity-a balance between courage and consideration. You express your feelings and ideas with courage, but also share the stage and allow others to do the same. Plenty for all. With win-win, you develop an Abundance Mentality and realize that everyone can have a piece of the pie. Sharing prestige and recognition opens the doors for greater options, alternatives, and creativity. Mutually beneficial solutions - what could be more rewarding?
B2 or Not B2? What a Question! Have you had those weeks that seem like much ado about nothing? Constantly being upstaged by other players' demands, your performance weakens and you lose focus. It's a tragedy in the making. Time to act! Adding value and order to your daily tasks will give you direction. Here are a few pointers: Enter value. Decide how important each task is. It's as easy as A-B-C. "A" tasks are vital. Not accomplishing them today will significantly reduce their value. "B" tasks are important. They can wait a day without losing a lot of value. "C" tasks are optional. If you don't get them done today, tomorrow, or even next week, don't sweat it. Cross to order. It's important to decide when you will get things done. In your planning system, assign a number to each task in your different value groups. Example: A1, A2; B1, B2, B3; C1. Exit stress. Cue off of these ideas for greater personal effectiveness. You'll bring down the house!
Back to the Future 2050: the moon is colonized. We travel at the speed of light. No more long lines at the DMV. Imagine that! It's important to have a vision of yourself and your future. Personal vision affects what you do and how you spend your time. Just what do you want to be when you grow up? It's all in your head. Creative imagination is key to personal vision. You create and invent what does not yet exist. Visualize a wonderful celebration several years from now where friends and loved ones come to honor you. What would these people say about you, your character, and your contributions? Passion. When you "see" the unique contributions you are capable of making, you will be impassioned to perform beyond your resources. It is the fire that will fuel your decisions. Warp speed. With a personal vision, you'll have the capacity to live out of your imagination and not just your memory. You'll move forward with greater confidence and determination. The best way to predict your future is to create it!
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Be proactive and avoid information overload! On the Home Page of PlanPlus, you can view your calendar, Prioritized Task List, and e-mail simultaneously on the same screen. This enhanced view makes it simple to access all of today's important information in one place. "Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?" -T.S. Eliot "We're drowning in information, but starved for knowledge." -John Naisbitt
Captivating Speech Ever feel confined, like you just can't do or be what you want? Hostage crisis! Your speech may be holding you captive, restraining you from doing and being your best. See if these tips can help you break free from your current situation: Reactive language. "I have to go." "I can't do it." "That makes me so mad." "If only." With reactive language, you blame outside forces (like other people and circumstances) for your situation. Essentially, what you're saying is that you're not free to choose your own actions. Proactive language. "I choose to." "I will." "I prefer to." Now you're talkin'! With proactive language, you and only you are responsible for your actions. Self-fulfilling prophecy. Over time, reactive language will have you feeling victimized and believing you are out of control, while proactive language puts you in the driver's seat. Remember, you are what you speak!
Change Gang Gandhi. Martin Luther King, Jr. Mother Teresa. Pretty powerful lineup, eh? Their accomplishments are remarkable; their stories familiar. Gandhi said, "I claim to be no more than an average man with below average capabilities." Sound like a lot of people you know? So, what set them apart? They made change happen! Join the gang and be a change agent in your own life. Choose change. If you don't choose change, it'll choose you! As a change agent, you become a link between the past and the future. We all can choose to stop the cycle of our bad habits, even if those habits or problems go back for generations. See change. What is your life about? How are you going about it? What do you want to do differently? How do you see yourself doing it? It's important to have a personal vision of what you will become as a result of your decisions, and set goals to achieve the change. Do change. Now make it happen! As you choose to be proactive, you will begin making ripples and, eventually, waves. Some people mistake a can-do attitude for pushy or aggressive. Actually, as you choose, see, and do change, you'll be courageous, persistent, and smart. Choosing change - it's your choice!
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations Feedback - Feast on It! Today's special - feedback. Sound good? Asking for and receiving feedback requires a generous portion of humility. Although it's hard to swallow sometimes, feedback tells you as much about the people from whom you receive it as it does about yourself. Hungry for more? Here are some ideas to chew on: Large selection. Concentrate on your roles in your family, work, or community where you feel additional perspective would be helpful. For example, parents could get feedback from children, a spouse, or other parents. Different tastes. Feedback can be formal or informal, anonymous or face-to-face. You can use a questionnaire or just chat on the phone. You know what's best for you. Ingredients. Be careful not to judge each other's character. Feedback should be objective, and given against performance and effectiveness criteria. Dish it out. As soon as you receive feedback, analyze it and feed it back! Involve others in creating an action plan based on their feedback. Remember your manners and always say, "Thanks." Come on, try it. You'll like it!
File Survival Navigating through your filing system can be a real adventure. Once-familiar terrain can turn hostile, causing frustration and discouragement. Disorder and the inability to locate information can leave you feeling isolated. Need some counsel? Desert your old practices and follow this trail to a better filing system: Name game. Use broad, generic, noun-based headings that can absorb a large quantity of information (e.g., Vendors, Music Project). Files with very specific names and tons of adjectives are hard to find. You'll get your tribe's votes when files are easy to locate in your absence. Find a pattern. Name folders in a recognizable pattern (e.g., alphabetical, categorical, colorcoded, etc.). Not only does this make it easier to navigate and locate files, but it also facilitates adding new folders. Purge protection. Get rid of information you don't use on a regular basis. Schedule a weekly or monthly appointment in your planning device to take care of it. Remember to use similar paper and electronic filing structures that compliment and crossreference each other. What a civilized way to clean things up!
Finances - Let's Get Personal You've got places to go, people to see, and things to do - in other words, bills. Show me the money! No, literally. Do you know where every cent is spent? (Time to get personal.) Money doesn't grow on trees, you know! Spare no expense in getting your personal finances in order. Here are a few tips: Time is money. In your planning device, schedule a daily or weekly appointment with yourself to balance the books. This is a good time to identify spending patterns and make necessary corrections.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Budget constraints. Set up a monthly budget and stick to it. There are great computer programs like Quicken(r) and Microsoft(r) Money that'll do most of the work for you. Remember to include savings and a personal budget for you and only you. Adjust as you go. Don't throw in the towel when your budget's in the red. It's an indication that you may be living beyond your means in some areas, and adjustments should be made (or else it's time for a raise!). Controlling personal finances - common cents (pun intended, ahem).
Focus on your roles and relationships Utilize the Weekly Compass, by itself or during Weekly Planning, to focus on your roles and relationships. "How many cares one loses when one decides not to be something, but to be someone." -Coco Chanel, fashion designer "It is a mistake to look too far ahead. Only one link in the chain of destiny can be handled at a time." -Winston Churchill, statesman "Don't compromise yourself. You are all you've got." -Janis Joplin, singer
Fowl Play Here's the scoop: There's a goose that lays golden eggs and a farmer who wants more. The impatient farmer kills the goose and opens it up to find nothing. I smell fowl play! You may be guilty also-killing yourself to get results, soon finding you have neither the time nor the energy to focus on what matters most. See if these clues can help you crack the case: P/PC Balance(r). P is for Production of desired results, like golden eggs. PC stands for Production Capability, or the ability of the asset (you, the goose) to produce results. You can't have one without the other. Cooking your goose. When was the last time you got a good night's sleep, read a book, meditated, or had dinner with a friend? Focus weekly on your personal PC in the areas of physical, social/emotional, mental, and spiritual. You are your greatest asset! Good for the goose. Taking care of you takes care of results. You'll have a greater capability to produce quality results both at home and at work. P/PC Balance - what a golden opportunity!
Get SMART Ever find yourself lamenting, "I missed it by that much!" when you don't reach a goal? You think your plans are executed with precision, and you avoid any covert obstacles that might be placed in your path, but you still come up short. Your self-confidence wanes and you lose the desire to make more goals. Careful! Chaos is right around the corner. Be an agent of change and get SMART with your goals. Here's the secret:
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations Specific: Your goals should be clear and definite. Measurable: There should be a quantifiable standard against which to measure results. Achievable: Are your goals realistically doable with the time and resources available? Relevant: Is what really matters most to you reflected in your goals? Time-Dimensioned: There should be clear and specific deadlines. You'll be back in "control" sooner than you know it!
Gone Fishing Back and forth, searching for the right spot, you throw your line out time and time again. "This is the place," you think as you wait for a bite. Another snag! You begin to reel as the tension increases. Snap! Tired of fishing for information? According to one study, you may spend up to 28 minutes a day looking for lost information. What a drag on your time and energy! Cast aside your old habits and try some new techniques. What, When, Where. When you capture information for future retrieval, remember the basics: "What" information you'll need to access, "When" will you need it (day and time), and "Where" will you store it in your planning device. Consistency. Whether you use a calendar, planner, or PDA, record your needed information the same way each time. Floaters. Eliminate floating information-any piece of information you have written down that you cannot have at your fingertips within 10 seconds. Give it a try. You'll be hooked!
Gone in 30 Seconds! When was that meeting? Just where did I put that? Sound familiar? Your brain overheats sometimes. You spin your wheels wasting time and energy trying to recall stuff, hitting dead ends along the way. Stop! Steal more time for what really matters. Take this detour to effectively capture information. It'll be gone in 30 seconds. Out of sight, out of mind. Proceed with caution: Capture information in a consistent place. Whether you use a calendar, planner, or PDA, do it the same way each time. Take your planning device with you everywhere. Enough said? Distinguish between time-specific and time-flexible. Appointments have a month, day, and time. Record them in their respective time slot. Since associated tasks are time-flexible, put them in your to-do list or "Prioritized Daily Task List." Check them off when completed. Enjoy your ride to increased peace of mind.
Got a dream? Give it a deadline. Keep track of your long-range goals and their intermediate steps in Goals, by itself or during Weekly Planning. "If you really want something, you can figure out how to make it happen." -Cher
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide "Change your life today. Don't gamble on the future. Act now, without delay." -Simone de Beauvoir "The possibilities are numerous once we decide to act and not react." -Gloria Anzaldua
Got Deadlines? You've got deadlines, right? Certain things at work and at home have to get done at certain times. So, what about your long-range goals-your dreams with deadlines? "Oh yeah. I'll get to those one day." Whoa, little dogie! If you ain't got deadlines, you ain't got goals. It's time to moove to a new level of thinking. (We'll try not to milk this for all it's worth.) The long haul. Just what is a long-term goal? Usually, it is something that has to be broken into intermediate steps and takes longer than a week to accomplish, like learning a foreign language or taking your family on an African safari. It's your dreams! Break it up. Break your long-term goal into intermediate steps. Set specific monthly, weekly, and even daily deadlines for when you will accomplish each step. Don't forget to set an overarching deadline for the goal itself! Dare to dream! You have our permission, so go ahead-dream away! Just remember to pull your head out of the clouds every now and again to check the expiration date. Dreams with deadlines - udder effectiveness! (you knew it was coming ...)
Habit 1: Be Proactive(r) Take responsibility for your life. "Responsible people do not blame circumstances, conditions, or conditioning for their behavior. Their behavior is a product of their own conscious choice." -Stephen R. Covey Your life is not just happening around you. Whether you know it or not, it is carefully designed by you. Or carelessly designed by you. It is, after all, your choice. You choose happiness. You choose success. You choose failure. You choose courage. You choose fear. Remember that every moment, every situation, provides a new choice-and in doing so, gives you a perfect opportunity to do things differently to produce more positive results. Make it a habit to be proactive.
Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind(r) Define your mission and goals in life. "Begin with the end in mind is to begin today with the image, picture, or paradigm of the end of your life as your frame of reference or the criterion on which everything else is examined." -Stephen R. Covey
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations In order to land your dream life, you need to make a conscious effort to visualize it happening. However, keeping your eye on the prize takes practice. It's all about getting rid of misconceptions about yourself, giving up emotional baggage, and putting a new belief system into place. The premise is pretty simple. All it takes is the desire to figure out what you want and the determination to make it happen. Each day ponder how and what it would take to live a more fulfilling life-to dream big and manifest your vision, inspiration, and purpose. It's just a matter of realizing your life has significance, setting your sights on what you want, and truly believing that you deserve it. Make it a habit to begin with the end in mind.
Habit 3: Put First Things First(r) Prioritize and focus on what matters most. "You can't become principle-centered without a vision of and a focus on the unique contribution that is yours to make." -Stephen R. Covey In order to live a more balanced existence, you have to recognize that not doing everything that comes your way is okay. There's no need to overextend yourself anymore. All it takes is realizing that it's alright to say no when necessary and prioritizing what matters most. But before you can move ahead, you need to become clear about who you are and what you really want. Each day think about how and what it would take to manage your life more effectively. Redefine your priorities and create more time for the most important things, which means clearing out the clutter and peeling back the layers to rediscover what you really care about. Make it a habit to put first things first.
Habit 4: Think Win-Win(r) Acquire an everyone-can-win attitude. "There's plenty out there and enough to spare for everybody. An Abundance Mentality involves sharing prestige, recognition, profits, and decision making. It opens possibilities, options, alternatives, and creativity." -Stephen R. Covey To live a rich life, it's imperative to believe in your ability to prosper-that you are deserving. Once understood and embraced, an Abundance Mentality allows you to see your life and your relationships from a new perspective. It's about sharing the wealth and focusing on the universal truth that there is truly enough in this world for everyone. Each day become more generous with yourself and others in order to reap the benefits, which means getting rid of "all about me" thinking and developing an everyone-can-win mind-set. Make it a habit to Think Win-Win.
Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood(r) Listen to people sincerely.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide "Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply. They're either speaking or preparing to speak. They're filtering everything through their own paradigms, reading their autobiography into other people's lives." -Stephen R. Covey How others communicate with you and how well you listen and respond correlates directly with the quality of your relationships. All it takes to become a good listener is giving others your sustained attention and having the desire to hear the meaning behind the words before jumping in with your own autobiography. Each day, take a moment to think about what it would take to communicate more effectively-to get inside another person's frame of reference through Empathic Listening. Make it a habit to Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood.
Habit 6: Synergize(r) Work together to achieve more. "Valuing differences is the essence of synergy-the mental, the emotional, the psychological differences between people. And the key to valuing those differences is to realize that all people see the world not as it is, but as they are." -Stephen R. Covey Creating a global society that comes together synergistically means respecting the strength and power of diversity. It means becoming more culturally savvy to function more effectively with people who are different. All it takes is mutual acceptance to work from a deeper place of respect, honor, and integrity. Remember that every day provides a chance for you to collaborate, to honor differences, to treasure diversity; a new opportunity to achieve unity-with your loved ones, your friends, your working associates. Make it a habit to synergize.
Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw(r) Renew yourself on a regular basis. "The single most powerful investment we can ever make in life is investment in ourselves, in the only instrument we have with which to deal with life and to contribute." -Stephen R. Covey Living a life in balance means taking the necessary time to renew yourself. It is all up to you. You can renew yourself through relaxation, or you can totally burn yourself out by overdoing everything. You can pamper yourself mentally and spiritually, or you can go through life oblivious to your wellbeing. You can experience vibrant energy, or you can procrastinate and miss out on the benefits of good health. Remember that every day provides a new opportunity for renewal-a new opportunity to recharge yourself instead of hitting the wall. All it takes is time and a commitment-a commitment to yourself. Make it a habit to Sharpen the Saw.
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I Do This Information Age can make you believe that knowing is really doing. But doing requires, well, DOING something! Many times there's a gap between knowing and doing. Yet, once you close the gap and unite knowing and doing, sparks really fly! Do I hear bells? Repeat after me: "I affirm the special bond and unique relationship that exists between knowing and doing and promise to keep it alive always." (Sniffle!) Here's some advice: Details. Planning is essential for converting ideas into action. But don't get hung up on details, wasting precious time and resources debating specifics of strategy and implementation. View plans like blueprints-where you focus on essentials and leave room for adjustments. Embrace technology. Technology produces new tools for getting things done in a changing world. Seek every opportunity at work and at home to learn and use these tools. Risky business. Fear of failing may prevent you from doing a lot of things, yet knowing comes from doing. Be more willing to tackle risk in your life. You'll never know until you try! I now pronounce you more effective!
Just Say No! This is your brain on stress: sizzle POP! CrACkLe-in other words, fried! When you say yes to too many things, you overdose on stress. It's an addiction that's hard to shake. Maybe you fear offending a friend or colleague, or are simply a hardcore overachiever. Whatever the circumstances, consider this therapy: Saying no to some things means saying yes to others. Doing urgent things usually excludes important things. Decide what your highest priorities are and be brave. Invite people into your life. Pull out your planning device and let people know what you've got going. Including others in the decision helps shed light on what really matters most. Rephrase it. Make it sound more positive like, "I am honored you'd ask me, yet for a number of reasons..."; Say two "no's" and call me in the morning. You'll feel great!
Learn from the "Compass" Wizard Let us teach you about the importance of personal renewal-physical, social/emotional, mental, and spiritual-in the Weekly Compass "Coach Me" interactive wizard. Click here to run the Compass Wizard. "What I fear most about stress is not that it kills, but that it prevents one from savoring life." -Jean-Louis Seven-Schreiber "For fast-acting relief, try slowing down." -Lily Tomlin, comedienne
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Leave room in your Schedule and Task List for reality Changes, deadlines, and interruptions are inevitable, so you're better off tackling your day with the realization that they will happen. "The pessimist complains about the wind; the optimist expects the wind; the realist adjusts the sails." -Anonymous "People can't live with change if there's not a changeless core inside them. The key to the ability to change is a changeless sense of who you are, what you are about, and what you value." -Stephen R. Covey "Better to accept whatever happens." -Horace
Me Inc. - A Wise Investment Up and down, up and down. Does your life seem like a volatile stock market these days? Some weeks you are on an upward climb, full of energy and ambition, while other weeks you spiral into a dive waiting for that inevitable crash. Pssst want some "insider" advice? Invest in yourself! Consider this analysis: Personal portfolio. Your personal investments are divided into four areas: physical, social/emotional, mental, and spiritual. Weekly investing. Choose a weekly goal for each area and record them in your planning system. Examples: Exercise three times a week (physical). Call a long-lost friend (social/emotional). Write in a journal (mental). Meditate or pray (spiritual). Be sure to schedule an appointment with yourself for each goal. Return on investment. You'll be an IPO (Incredible Personal Offering!) at home, work, or in other relationships. It's a trade you'll be glad you made!
Mission Possible Ever feel like a double agent, living one life and dreaming of another? Be the leader of your life! Sound impossible? It's not when you have a Personal Mission Statement. Here are some clues: Unique. It's different for everyone. It can be a sentence, paragraph, or poem. Focus. It's a clear guide based on your values-what you want to be and do. Ask yourself this question: "What can I imagine myself doing if time and money were no obstacle?" Passion. It's what excites you most in the world and lifts you up on your soapbox. Take five minutes RIGHT NOW and write as much as you can about your personal mission-your unique purpose in life. It doesn't have to be perfect. You can revise this first draft later. Keep it in your planning device and read it morning and evening for the next week. Decide what things you can do during the day to live your mission. (Warning! This message will "self-construct" in five minutes.)
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations Quick Prioritize - the daily planning tool Take a few minutes to prioritize your tasks at the beginning of each day. You can do this easily by using the Quick Prioritize feature in the bottom right-hand corner of your Home Page Task List. "It takes time to save time." -Joe Taylor "The secret of your future is hidden in your daily routine." -Mike Murdock "You will never find time for anything. If you want time, you must make it." -Charles Buxton
"Reflect"-ology Ever feel like you are making the same mistakes and struggling with the same problems week after week? You may benefit from "reflect"-ology. Never heard of it? It's a practice that's been around for many moons. Reflecting about or evaluating the past week is a natural process that can help relieve stress, identify weaknesses, and get you back on your feet. Now don't feel pressured-just relax and consider these tips for evaluating your week: Examination. Create a checklist of five or six self-evaluation questions and keep them in your planning system. Examples include: "What challenges did I face this week and how did I overcome them?" "What goals did I not achieve and why?" "What can I learn from the week as a whole?" Regular checkup. Make an appointment with yourself each week and choose a place that is quiet. Review your questions before you plan the next week. Prevention. You'll soon identify ineffective habits and patterns. This knowledge will help you avoid making the same mistakes in the future. Weekly evaluation - a cure for common ineffectiveness.
Rocks 'n' Roles! Identifying roles and assigning specific weekly goals to each one will help you balance. A role is a key responsibility or relationship in your life. Here's what to do: 1. For starters, list at least two of your most important personal or professional roles (e.g., parent, manager, volunteer). 2. Ask yourself, "What is the one most important thing I can do in each role this week that will help me balance?" These goals or rocks form a solid foundation on which to build your weekly activities. Example: "Designer-Read 30 minutes from trade magazine." 3. Make specific appointments for each goal in your planning device. As things come up during the week, prioritize and schedule around your goals. Your week will rock!
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rU n'Sync? Ever feel like you're missing the beat when it comes to managing your daily affairs? Join the band. You and many others may be out of step when dancing with information. And with so many tools and devices to capture and file information, no wonder you're off tune every now and again! Practice these tips to help you harmonize: Get it together. When choosing personal management tools (e.g., paper planner, laptop, PDA), it's important to consider how and if they can sync. The more you can get your tools to work as one system, the more effective you'll be. Remember to include a mobile tool with planning basics so you can capture information on the go. Find a hub. Choose a system-hub tool to sync things together. Some examples are Palm" Desktop or PlanPlus. Their sync features are really user-friendly. Practice, practice. Sharpen your sync skills. These may include HotSync(r), Print to Fit", AvantGo", and navigating your system-hub tool. The more you understand and use them, the easier it gets. More control and less disorder-music to your ears!
Running in Circles Personal health. Global warming. Career advancement. With so many different concerns, life can really have you running in circles. 'Round and 'round you go. When will you stop? We knowwhen you pass out, that's when! See if these tips can help you unwind and effectively focus your time and energy. Control Freak. Since many things involve you mentally and emotionally on a daily basis, it's vital to determine which ones you really can do something about. It's all about control. Circle of Concern(r). Your Circle of Concern is comprised of things over which you have no real control-things like environmental or international problems. Focusing your efforts in this circle increases feelings of inadequacy and helplessness. You empower things and others to control you. Circle of Influence(r). This circle is made up of things you can do something about, like relationships and skills. The positive energy you focus here helps you feel accomplished and in control. You'll even have time and energy left over to periodically visit your Circle of Concern. Focused control - another spin on personal effectiveness!
Say What? "Huh?" "What was that?" "Yeah, yeah." Sound familiar? I said, does it sound familiar? Listen up! Empathetic Listening(r) is key to successful relationships. When you sincerely strive to understand people, you try to view the world as they do. You don't have to agree with them, but rather emotionally and intellectually understand them. It involves the ears, eyes, and heart. Repeat. This is the first-stage skill in Empathetic Listening. By repeating what someone says, you at least show you're paying attention. Rephrase. At this more effective stage, you rephrase what was said in your own words. Now you're thinking about the other person's agenda,
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations Reflect. This stage focuses on the feeling behind the words, not just what is being said. You reflect back what you are sensing. Rephrase and reflect. This is where trust is built. When you both rephrase content and reflect feeling, others will sense your desire to really listen and understand. These skills are only the beginning. Empathetic Listening also requires a pure desire and an investment of time. Hey, are you listening?
Self Exploration - The Terrain of Heart and Soul What do you really value in life? Perhaps you have taken some time lately to reflect on what resonates within you-those ideas and convictions that need no outside validation. Because of demands on your time, you might not contemplate your values as often as you would like. Yet, it's important to make a conscious connection with those values that govern your life-the foundations upon which your life is both anchored and navigated; things like family, humor, and respect. To help you explore your values further, try this exercise: Locate a comfortable environment free from noise and distractions. Reflect on the following questions and listen to your heart and conscience. If I had to walk away from everything I ever loved, what would be left behind? What would I miss most if it were taken from me? What's of greatest importance or value in my life? As you go about your week, it will be vitally important to determine whether or not there is consistency between where you spend your time and what you value most.
Take It to the Bank - KA-CHING! How are your EBAs these days? You know, your Emotional Bank Accounts - the trust you have built up in your different relationships. Still waiting for a "statement" to arrive? Here's one: If you don't know, you're probably overdrawn! Maintaining a reserve of trust in relationships requires constant investing. Consider this advice: Bad checks. What you consider to be a deposit (like going to the movies when your date wants to talk) may actually be a withdrawal for others. They can't collect on your efforts because it does not meet their actual needs. Really understanding others is key to building trust. Pocket change. Showing respect, kindness, and courtesy may seem like small deposits, but over time, they compound and increase your reserve. Neglecting the little things will soon have you in the red. Count on me. Breaking commitments or promises often can bankrupt you. Keeping them is the best way to save for a rainy day in any relationship. Rich relationships - what a great payoff!
The Delicacies of Delegation Parents, managers, and people in general have trouble letting go, and when they do, it's gofer mania! " Hey, you! Go for this and go for that." It's pretty hard to supervise even one person when you are involved in every move he/she makes. Effective delegation focuses on results, not
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide methods, and allows others to use their imagination, free will, and conscience to get the job done. Here's some advice: Desired Results. Clearly articulate what needs to be done, not how to do it. Describe in detail the desired result so that the other person virtually sees it. Guidelines. Make sure there are parameters within which people are to operate. Point out potential failure paths-what not to do versus what to do. Resources. Help people understand what human, financial, technical, or organizational resources are available to them. Accountability. Set up standards of performance that will be used in evaluating results and when those evaluations will occur. Consequences. Specify what will happen, both good and bad, as a result of the evaluation. Effective delegation - gofer it!
The Week Link Ever feel unprepared and uncertain about life's daily challenges? Although you feel you have the knowledge to make things work, the chain to success keeps breaking. It seems like there's just not enough time to get things done. Under pressure to perform at work and home, you search for an answer. Give up? Weekly planning is the missing link! A day's perspective is too short, while a month's is too long. A week is the most valuable unit of time in which to plan around your roles and goals. Here are some hints: Schedule. Pick a day to plan-a day that works best for you. Plan on this same day every week. Duration. Your planning sessions will usually take around 30 minutes. Location. Whether you do it at home or at work, make sure your planning place is the same every time. Remember to choose a place that's quiet. Habit. Follow these suggestions, and weekly planning will soon become a habit. When your "week is linked" to what matters most, say good-bye to disorder and hello to increased personal effectiveness.
This Just In - We're Not Alone Those two-headed sci-fi aliens really had something there-collaboration. Two heads are better than one! With change as one of the few constants in our society, people must work together to solve complex problems. Going solo requires a lot of time and superior brainpower. News flash: You haven't got a lot of extra time, and you're not as smart as you think you are. Ouch! Keep these tips in mind when working with others: Birds of a feather. Not everyone thinks like you. Respecting differences is key to collaboration. Diversity = new ideas and solutions. Are you listening? Being with others in real time takes effort. Active and careful listening-where your thoughts are centered on the ideas of others and not your own-is crucial. Time-sensitive. You may have a strong desire to jump to action, dig in, and get things done. It's okay to be ambitious; but when working with people and their ideas, slow is good.
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations Collaborating effectively with others yields ideas and solutions that are out of this world!
Trust Busters They start out small, sneaking up on you and slowly eroding trust in relationships. If not detected, they grow and multiply, making matters worse. Don't look now, but I think there's one behind you! Aahh! (Made you look.) Trust busters take the form of criticism, complaining, comparison, and competition. Here's some advice in dealing with the pesky critters: Criticizing. Be loyal to those not present. In other words, don't criticize people behind their backs. Pretty simple. Complaining. Turn complaints into action. Ask, "What is one thing I can do right now to effect change in my current circumstance?" Also, make sure you address complaints. When people feel that their concerns are ignored, they'll continue to fret over those issues and look for others. Comparing. People need to feel that their contribution compliments the whole. Be aware of others' strengths, and tailor work and activities to compliment those strengths. Competing. A little bit now and again is healthy, but it's important to realize that some like it and some don't. Effectively dealing with trust busters-now just what were you afraid of?
Weekly Planning -the 20 minute promise Spend just 20 minutes at the beginning of each week to plan what's most important first. Use this proven Weekly Planning process and be amazed by your results! "Pressure usually comes when we have no plan." Jim Smoke "Organizing is what you do before you do something, so that when you do it, it is not all mixed up." A. A. Milne "A good plan today is better than a perfect plan tomorrow." George S. Patton, Jr.
Weekly Planning "Think..." As you go through the weekly planning process, "Think"& about what you did last week. You'll find introspective, thought-provoking questions to the right of each step. "To decide to be at the level of choice is to take responsibility for your life and to be in control of your life." Arbie M. Dale "What we plant in the soil of contemplation, we shall reap in the harvest of action." Meister Eckhart
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What Did You Expect? "That's your job!" "We didn't agree to that!" " That's not what I meant!" If your expectations are as "clear as mud," don't expect much else than, well, a pretty messy situation. Clean up on Aisle 5! Clarifying expectations in your family, work, and other relationships will help avoid misunderstandings, disappointments, and lack of trust. Implicit vs. explicit. Some expectations in relationships are implicit, like your boss expecting you to be at work on time. Yet, many expectations are explicit, requiring further clarification. Negative situations are created when you assume your expectations are self-evident and clearly understood by others. Speak up. In new relationships, get all the expectation out on the table at the beginning. Clearly articulate who does what. Almost all relationship difficulties are a result of ambiguous expectations around roles and goals. Time and effort. It's easy to pretend differences don't exist and to hope things will work out. Investing time and effort up front to clarify expectations will save tons of time and effort in the future. Clarifying expectations--any questions?
What is your mission - your unique purpose? Discover it in the Mission interactive Wizard. "True live is lived when tiny changes occur." Leo Tolstoy "Awaken your sense, your intuition, your desires. Awaken the parts of yourself that have been sleeping. Life is a dream, and to live it, your must be awake." Rachel Snyder "Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you've imagined. As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler." Henry David Thoreau
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Weekly Compass
Questions
As you develop your Compass for the week, here are some thoughts and questions to help you as you create your Weekly Compass goals. Ask yourself ... Are there any roles I feel uncomfortable with or concerned about? Are there any roles in which I feel I have spent too much or too little time? Are there any roles I have neglected in the recent past? Are these roles still important to me? Are there future roles I could be gradually working on now? Are there things I value and am doing for which I have no role? Do I need to establish a new role? Am I clear about my roles? Am I spending adequate time in each of them? Are there too many? Did any of my big rocks last week evolve from my long-range goals? Which intermediate goal steps this week could be part of my Weekly Compass? Did I meet my physical renewal goals this week? If not, why not? Can I establish more realistic goals this week? Did I use my roles to prioritize or emphasize certain goals last week? Did I get enough sleep last week? What unimportant activities can I eliminate this week that will allow time to rejuvenate my body? Do I maintain my most important relationships-including my relationship with myself? Do my roles work together for me? Do they combine to help me accomplish my purpose in life? Do I have more than seven roles? Maybe I should combine functions or examine if perhaps all are valid roles for me. Do they provide me energy or drain it? Does one of my roles dominate my life at the expense of others? Have any of my roles changed or evolved? Have I forgotten or neglected any relationships within any of my roles? Have I overemphasized focus in any of my roles? Should I break these down into separate roles to make sure I give enough attention to each relationship? Have I repeatedly neglected any of my roles in the recent past? Should I reconsider whether these roles are important to me? Have I considered taking myself out on a date? How can I spend more time in Quadrant II this week to reduce time in Quadrant I?
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide How can I strengthen my relationship this week with a significant other? How many of my tasks originated from my big rocks? Could it help me to schedule my big rocks as tasks or appointments? How much of my time last week did I spend in Quadrants III and IV? How can I convert that time to Quadrant I and II activities? How much of my time last week was spent "living above the line" in Quadrants I and II? If I could build my very own retreat, what would it look like? How would I use it? Can I incorporate any of its elements into my self-renewal plan this week? If I could choose two things to do outside work to nourish my soul, what would they be? Should I consider making them big rocks this week? Last week, did I exercise integrity in accomplishing what matters most to me? Last week, did I explore new ways of renewing myself in a spiritual sense? Last week, did I focus on the truly important and say no to the unimportant? How will I accomplish that this week? Last week, did I renew myself physically? Last week, did I take time for renewal, reflection, and recommitment? Last week, did I take time to Sharpen the Saw mentally? Last week, what were some of the barriers I encountered to spending time in Quadrant II? What are some things I could do to eliminate those barriers? What big rocks did I not accomplish last week that I should carry into the coming week? What can I learn from last week as a whole? What can I do less of? What should I do more of? What can I do to live a more balanced life? What challenges did I encounter in accomplishing my big rocks? How did I overcome them? What gets in the way of accomplishing my big rocks? What gives my spirit, mind, heart, and body energy? Is that reflected in my Weekly Compass entries this week? What is cluttering my life? How can I steer my focus away from those activities, allowing time for more important ones? What is one thing I could have said no to in Quadrant III last week that would have given me more time for Quadrant II activities? What is the most important thing I can do in each role this week to have the greatest positive impact? What makes life worth living? Did my choices last week reflect that? What memories can I pass on to my children about my ancestors? What am I doing so that my family remembers me?
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations What result do I want at the end of my week? What is the one thing I could do in each role to create that result? What social/emotional, self-renewal activities can I combine with other roles? What's the single most important thing I can do this week considering all of my roles? When was the last time I reevaluated the importance of each of my roles? Should I schedule time to do that this week? When was the last time I kept a journal? read a nonfiction book? continued my education either formally or informally? Which of my relationships needs improving? What action could I take this week to work toward that improvement? Who did I focus most of my time and attention on last week? Are there any other relationships I would like to focus on in the coming week? Would I be more successful in accomplishing my big rocks if I moved them to my calendar? How about moving them to my task list?
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Thoughts and Quotes

When we do what matters most, we are not at the mercy of what matters least. "Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." Muriel Strode When was the last time you said, "Gee, If only I had attended more staff meetings at work?" Hmm.... Make your time count. Schedule YOU events each week. "Frustration is a function of our expectations, and our expectations are often a reflection of the social mirror rather than our own values and priorities." Stephen R. Covey When selecting a big rock for one of your roles on the Weekly Compass, always ask yourself the question: "What is the one thing I can do in this role this week that will have the greatest positive impact?" "He has spent all his life in letting down empty buckets into empty wells; and he is frittering away his age in trying to draw them up again." Sydney Smith What is the most important thing I can do in this role this week? "If you make the fundamental choice to be true to yourself, then you will act in ways that are true to yourself, whether you feel inspired or depressed; whether you feel fulfilled or frustrated; whether you are at home, at work, with your friends, or with your enemies." Robert Fritz What if your life could be a series of events that support what you feel is important? Your Weekly Compass is key to living what matters most to you. Live deliberately! "If you want to make good use of your time, you've got to know what's most important and then give it all you've got." Lee Iacocca Treat appointments with yourself as you would treat appointments at work-plan around them. If you have to reschedule yourself, don't wait. Do it now! "In reaping for so long where we have not sown, perhaps we have forgotten the need to sow." Stephen R. Covey Spread too thin? It's easy to do. Examine your roles: Mom, Business Owner, Painter, Civic Activist, Friend.... List one week's events under each of your roles. "In truth, people can generally make time for what they choose to do; it is not really time, but the will that is lacking." Sir John Lubbock Spending too much time on things that don't support what's important to you? Ouch! Pick an important role and schedule one event this week to support it. Commit to it and see how it makes you feel!
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations "...O to be self-balanced for contingencies, To confront night, storms, hunger, ridicule, accidents, rebuffs, as the trees and animals do." Walt Whitman Spent all week following someone else's plan? Burned out by week's end? You need to refuel! Revisit that Sharpen the Saw section on your Weekly Compass now! "It's not about weight, it's about caring for yourself on a regular basis. Renew! Renew! Renew!" Oprah Winfrey Sawing through life with a dull blade? What's the point? Schedule an event to sharpen yourself up! Make it a physical, social/emotional, mental, or spiritual event just for you! "Life is painting a picture, not doing a sum." Oliver Wendell Holmes Remember the most important role on the Weekly Compass is you! Don't forget to schedule weekly personal-improvement goals under the Sharpen the Saw role at the top. Hey, you're the greatest asset you've got! "Nothing can add more power to your life than concentrating all your energies on a limited set of targets." Nido Qubein Much of the discomfort in life comes from succeeding in one role at the expense of another, possibly even more important role. Create balance. Schedule time for all roles! It's easy to lose sight of where you are headed unless you keep heading in the same direction as your values. "Of all the judgments we pass in life, none is more important than the judgment we pass on ourselves." Nathaniel Brandon It's about making priorities among your many roles, not about all or nothing. Always ask, "What's the most important thing I can do considering all my roles?" "Our business in life is not to get ahead of others, but to get ahead of ourselves-to break our own records, to outstrip our yesterday by our today." Stewart B. Johnson Feeling trapped by commitments that drain you? You might be supporting someone else's vision. What gives you fuel-energy? Make time for that! "People who cannot find time for recreation are obliged sooner or later to find time for illness." John Wanamaker Ever feel like you get lost in the activities and responsibilities of the week? Find your way out with the Weekly Compass! By identifying your major roles and setting weekly goals, you give purpose and
"In uplifting, get underneath." George Ade
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide direction to your week by focusing on what really matters to you. "Self-discipline is an act of cultivation. It requires you to connect today's actions to tomorrow's results. There's a season for sowing, a season for reaping. Self-discipline helps you know which is which." Gary Ryan Blair Don't forget your personal roles, like relationship to self or loved ones. Time spent here brings harmony to time spent in other places. "Self-knowledge is best learned not by contemplation, but by action. Strive to do your duty and you will soon discover of what stuff you are made." Johann Goethe Does one of your roles dominate your life at the expense of others? What if you created a plan that served all your roles? Balance can work wonders. "Talent without discipline is like an octopus on roller skates. There's plenty of movement, but you never know if it's going to be forward, backwards, or sideways." H. Jackson Brown, Jr. Do you have more than seven roles? Try to combine functions or examine if perhaps all are valid roles for you. Do they provide energy or drain it? "The most important ingredient we put into any relationship is not what we say or do, but what we are." Stephen R. Covey
Do my roles work together for me? Do they combine to help me accomplish my purpose in life? "There must be more to life than having everything." Maurice Sendak Ask yourself: "What is the most important thing I can do in each role this week?" Schedule one event per role-do it and walk your talk. "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit." Aristotle Are you clear about your roles? Can you list them? Are you supporting them? Are there too many? A clear sense of your roles can create more meaningful planning. "What people say, what people do, and what they say they do are entirely different things." Margaret Meade "What you teach your children is what you really believe in." Cathy Warner Weatherford "While many people derive great pleasure from their professional accomplishments, few can rely on work alone to provide complete fulfillment." Katz & Liu
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations "Work consists of whatever a body is obliged to do. Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do." Mark Twain "You cannot dream yourself into a character; you must hammer and forge yourself into one." James A. Froude "You may be disappointed if you fail, but you will be doomed if you don't try." Beverly Sills Have you completed your Weekly Compass this week? Come on, fill it out! Assigning goals to your roles each week will give you direction. We do not what we ought; What we ought not, we do; And lean upon the thought That chance will bring us through. Matthew Arnold "You see much more of your children once they leave home." Lucille Ball
"You must learn day by day, year by year, to broaden your horizon. The more things you love, the more things you are interested in, the more you enjoy, the more you are indignant about, the more you have left when anything happens." Ethel Barrymore
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Mission and Values

As you consider your Mission and Values and how they affect what you do every day, here are some questions, thoughts, and quotes to keep in mind.
Questions
Ask Yourself ... According to your values, what can you do less of this week? What should you do more of? Am I challenged and motivated when I read my mission statement? If not, should I schedule time this week to make some changes? Are you certain your values are your own, rather than what somebody else wants them to be? Did my choices last week lead me toward what I really want? Did the big rocks I accomplished last week reflect my mission? Did you live according to your values last week by acting on big rocks in your key roles? Do I see my goals reflected in my mission, and my mission reflected in my goals? Do you feel calm, peaceful, and deeply satisfied that you put first things first last week? Do you have a team mission? Did your team's actions last week align with that mission? Do my mission and values address and integrate all four fundamental human needs and capacities: physical, social/emotional, mental and spiritual? Does my mission statement challenge and motivate me? Does my mission statement express timeless, proven principles that produce quality-oflife results? Does my mission statement inspire me? Does my mission statement provide direction and purpose for me? Does my mission statement reflect my vision and values? Does my mission statement reflect the best possible "me"? If not, should I schedule time this week to make some changes? Does my mission statement represent the best that is within me? Do your values encompass both your personal and professional life? Have I repeatedly neglected to act according to my values in the recent past? Should I reconsider whether these values reflect the real me? Have new changes and opportunities arisen in my life lately? How does my reaction to them compare to my mission statement? Have you recently experienced nagging unhappiness, dissatisfaction, or lack of inner peace? Could this be a result of losing sight of your mission? How can I align this coming week's actions with my values?
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations How can I better plan this week to ensure that my activities reflect my mission? How did my activities last week compare with what I want to be, do and have? How will they compare this week? How did the long term goals I worked on last week reflect my values? How do I feel about the choices I made last week, when considering how they align with my mission? How do the roles I've identified in my Compass reflect my mission? How do you feel about the choices you made last week? Do they reflect your values? How successful was I last week in exercising integrity in the moment of choice? If I had unlimited time and resources, what would I choose to do? Last week, did I exercise integrity in choosing to do what matters most to me? Last week, did I focus on the truly important and say no to the unimportant? How will I accomplish that this week? Last week, did you create both weekly and daily plans aligned with your mission? Last week, did you fulfill your values and mission by acting on important goals? Last week, how did my team contributed to our organization's mission? What will we do this week to contribute? Should I schedule time this week to refine and re-evaluate my values? What can I learn from last week as a whole? What challenges did I encounter in acting in accordance with my values? How did I overcome them? What challenges did I encounter in living according to my mission last week? What did I do last week that contributes to my organization's values? What will I do this week to contribute? What did I do last week that contributes to my team's values and mission? What will I do this week to contribute? What do my heart and mind tell me to contribute, develop, protect, preserve, and support? What gets in the way of acting in alignment with my mission? What happens to my effectiveness when I make choices that don't align with my values? What happens when other people tell you what your big rocks or priorities should be? What patterns of success or failure do I see in making choices according to my mission? What specific activities can I plan this week that will bring me closer to my purpose? What visual images motivate me to accomplish this week's goals? When I daydream, what do I see myself doing? When I look at my personal life, which activities do I consider of greatest worth? When I look at my work life, which activities do I consider of greatest worth?
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide When was the last time I re-evaluated my values? Should I schedule time to do that this week? When was the last time my team re-evaluated its mission? Should we schedule time to do that this week?
Thoughts and Quotes

"Any life, no matter how long and complex it may be, is made up of a single moment-the moment in which a man finds out, once and for all, who he is." Jorge Luis Borges What are you passionate about? What most excites you? angers you? What do you find yourself on a soapbox about? These are good indicators of where your mission lies. "Do what you feel in your heart to be right, for you'll be criticized anyway. You'll be damned if you do and damned if you don't." Eleanor Roosevelt Your visions begin with your desires. What are they? "Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of." Benjamin Franklin Your values help you create your mission. Your mission guides you as you choose your actions. Your actions define who you are in this present moment. "Every year I live I am more convinced that the waste of life lies in the love we have not given, the powers we have not used, the selfish prudence that will risk nothing, and which shirking pain, misses happiness as well. No one ever yet was the poorer in the long run for having once in a lifetime "let out all the length of all the reins." "I always wanted to be somebody, but I should have been more specific." Lily Tomlin Your mission statement is an empowering declaration of who you are. When crafted accurately it can move you forward in life with great clarity. "I didn't have anybody, really, no foundation in life, so I had to make my own way. Always, from the start. I had to go out in the world and become strong, to discover my mission in life." Mary Cholmondeley Your values and mission are as unique as you. There are no rules. The only prerequisite is a desire to discover and serve them. "Everyone has his own specific vocation or mission in life; everyone must carry out a concrete assignment that demands fulfillment. Therein he cannot be replaced, nor can his life be repeated; thus, everyone's task is as unique as his specific opportunity. " Viktor Frankl Your mission statement can be a great tool. Use it to measure the events of your day, especially when swamped with outside stimuli. Do they support your mission?
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations Tina Turner Your character is what encourages you to say yes and empowers you to say no. "I do not want to die...until I have faithfully made the most of my talent and cultivated the seed that was placed in me until the last small twig has grown." Kaethe Kollwitz Why create a mission statement? The successful person is the average person focused. Your mission statement is your focus. "I don't want to be a passenger in my own life." Diane Ackerman When a defining moment comes along, you have two choices. You can either define the moment or let the moment define you. Which will you choose? "In the long run men hit only what they aim at." Henry David Thoreau What would it be like to live deliberately in accordance with your mission statement? Your life would be your own, that's for sure! "Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something and that this thing must be attained." Marie Curie Values are words that describe what you feel is important. They're one-word statements that represent your priorities. "Life's challenges are not supposed to paralyze you, they're supposed to help you discover who you are." Bernice Johnson Reagon Take five words that describe what you value and make a sentence with them starting with "I am..." "My mission statement is bigger than yours." With a mission statement, size really doesn't matter! It is a unique statement about you and only you. It can be a sentence, a paragraph, a poem, or even several pages. It's your passion in life and a guide based on your values-what you want to be and do. "Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one's definition of your life, but define yourself." Harvey Fierstein Read your mission statement every morning and then again at the end of the day. Do this for a week and see if it makes a difference. "No one is truly literate who cannot read his own heart. " Eric Hoffer Once you get a handle on your values, you can begin to construct a life, a schedule, and a plan of meaning and purpose.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide "None of us will ever accomplish anything excellent or commanding except when he listens to this whisper which is heard by him alone." Ralph Waldo Emerson Mission statements are different for everyone. Yours could be a sentence, a paragraph, five pages, a book, a poem, a list of objectives...you decide. "Often people attempt to live their lives backwards; they try to have more things, or more money, in order to do more of what they want so they will be happier. The way it actually works is the reverse. You must first be who you really are, then do what you need to do, in order to have what you want." Margaret Young Mission possible! Take five minutes RIGHT NOW and write as much as you can about your personal mission in life. It doesn't have to be perfect. You can revise this draft later. Keep it in your planning device and read it morning and evening for the next week. "Painting is just another way of keeping a diary." Pablo Picasso Like you, your mission statement is forever growing, changing, refining, and expanding. You've got to start somewhere to get where you're going. "Self-knowledge is best learned not by contemplation, but by action. Strive to do your duty and you will soon discover of what stuff you are made." Johann Goethe "Take your life in your own hands, and what happens? A terrible thing: no one to blame." Erica Jong Just who is living your life anyway? Sounds like a dumb question, but it's pretty important. If you don't define who you arewhat motivates you and moves you-others will. A mission statement adds clarity to your life and focus to your purpose. Get back in the driver's seat, kick it in high gear, and head for Determination City! "The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart." Helen Keller If you could teach three things to others about what most excited you in the world, what would you teach? "The greatest thing in this world is not so much where we are, but in which direction we are moving." Oliver Wendell Holmes How would your closest friend describe you? Others' observations are often curious indications of what matters most to us. "The meaning of life is to give life meaning." Ken Hudgins How will YOU be remembered? What do you dream of? What is your fire within? Knowing and defining what's important to you is the first step in creating a plan that supports the life you wish to live. Dare to know and be who you are!
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations "The minute you begin to do what you want to do, it's really a different kind of life." Buckminster Fuller How specific is your mission statement? The more clear it is, the more precision in it, the easier it is to know you are serving it through your actions. "The one-person business is...business as a lifestyle-business as a statement about who you are and what you value." Claude Whitmyer, Salli Rasberry, and Michael Phillips Examine yesterday's activities. What do they say about what you value? "The very least you can do in your life is to figure out what you hope for. And the most you can do is live inside that hope-not admire it from a distance, but live right in it, under its roof. Right now I'm living in that hope, running down its hallway, and touching the walls on both sides." Barbara Kingsolver Creating a mission statement builds character and acts as a tool to measure your daily actions. "There is no wealth but life." John Ruskin Be careful not to put undue pressure on yourself. The question is not "Have you completed your mission?" The questions is, "Are you taking steps toward it?" "There is not one big cosmic meaning for all, there is only the meaning we each give "To do good things in the world, first you must know who you are and what gives meaning to your life." Paula P. Brownlee "To forget one's purpose is the commonest form of stupidity." Friedrich Nietzsche A good way to see what you value? Look at your checkbook register. "To come to be you must have a vision of Being, a Dream, a Purpose, a Principle. You will become what your vision is." Peter Nivio Zarlenga to our life, an individual meaning, an individual plot, like an individual novel, a book for each person." Anas Nin As you craft your mission statement, remember it is important not to judge yourself. Be free, let ideas flow. Brilliance comes from some very surprising places! "Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least." Johann Goethe A mission statement reaffirms who you are, puts your goals in focus, and moves your ideas into the real world. It makes you the leader of your own life. "This is our purpose: to make as meaningful as possible this life that has been bestowed upon us; to live in such a way that we may be proud of ourselves; to act in such a way that some part of us lives on." Oswald Spengler
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Ed Harris "To know what you prefer instead of humbly saying Amen to what the world tells you, you ought to prefer is to have kept your soul alive." Robert Louis Stevenson "To make people happy." Short and sweet, but that's Walt Disney's mission statement. "To solve unsolved problems innovatively." That's pretty much what 3M is famous for. A mission statement provides focus, and is grounded on what you are most passionate about. So, what gets you up on your soapbox? "We are all born originals-why is it so many of us die copies?" Edward Young "We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop." Mother Teresa "What you pay attention to makes you who you are." "When you were born, you cried and the world rejoiced. Live your life so that when you die, the world cries and you rejoice." Cherokee expression "Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakens." Carl Jung "When you develop a vision that matters-a statement of what's most important to youyou can achieve breakthroughs, You don't necessarily need to work harder, or expend more effort, but simply to identify what it is you're working for." Gail Blanke "When you discover your mission, you will feel its demand. It will fill you with enthusiasm and a burning desire to get to work on it." W. Clement Stone
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Goals
As you develop your Goals, here are some thoughts and questions to help you shape your thinking.
Questions
Ask yourself ... Am I blaming and accusing others for my own inability to set or achieve goals? Am I creating unrealistic expectations through my goals? How can I modify them? Am I setting goals that are realistic but challenging? Are each of my goals specific, measurable, action-oriented, realistic, and timely? Are there any goals I have neglected in the recent past? Are these goals still important to me? Are there any goals in which I feel I have spent too much or too little time? Am I certain all of my goals are principle-based rather than random desires? As a result of the choices I made in working toward my goals this week, did I use my time in better ways than I had planned? Choose one goal and ask yourself, "What exactly do I desire to accomplish? What is the contribution I want to make? What is the end I have in mind?" Choose one goal. Ask yourself, "Do I really want to do it? Why?" Did I make significant progress on any long-term goals last week? If not, what prohibited me from moving my goals forward? What will I do this week to make a long-term goal a priority? Do each of my goals grow out of mission, needs, and principles? Do they empower me to contribute through my roles? Do I have a plan for career advancement? If not, do I want to focus on one this week? Do I have an ongoing savings or investment plan? If not, do I want to focus on one this week? Do I have any projects at work that I could break into smaller, intermediate steps and schedule into the Goals tool? Do I see my goals reflected in my Personal Mission Statement? Do I feel calm, peaceful, and deeply satisfied because I put first things first last week? Do I have an idea that I'm not quite ready to turn into a goal? I should consider keeping it in sight with a "perhaps" list, then reviewing that list on a periodic basis. Are there any of my goals that can only be attained at the expense of others? If so, what can I do to modify them? Does my list of goals encompass both my personal and professional life?
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Focus on one specific goal and ask yourself, "Am I willing to pay the price (make the sacrifices necessary) to accomplish this goal?" Have any of my goals changed or evolved? Have I communicated my career goals to my manager? Should I schedule time to do that this week? Have I repeatedly neglected any of my goals in the recent past? Should I reconsider whether these goals are important to me? Have I accomplished a goal lately? If so, did I take time to celebrate and reward myself? Have I taken the time to identify why and how I will accomplish each of my goals? How do I feel about the choices I made last week when it came time to work on goal steps? How does my organization's mission relate to my goals? How does my team's mission relate to my goals? How many of my tasks originated from my goals? Would it help if I scheduled my goals as tasks or appointments? If there were one thing my department or team at work could accomplish this year, what would it be? Have I worked with my team to create a goal with intermediate steps? Is there a specific long-term goal I am especially excited about? What is the next step I should take toward accomplishing this goal? Last week, did I exercise integrity in accomplishing goal steps? Last week, did I focus on the truly important and say no to the unimportant? How will I accomplish that this week? Last week, what were some of the barriers I encountered to spending time working on goal steps? What are some things I could do to eliminate those barriers? Look at your collective list of goals. Ask yourself, "Am I settling for mediocrity when I could be achieving excellence?" Select one seemingly difficult goal and ask yourself, "Do I have enough strength to do it?" What are my goals? Do I see these goals reflected in my Weekly Compass? What can I learn from last week as a whole? What can I do less of? What should I do more of? What can I do to eliminate unimportant activities, allowing more time to devote toward achieving goals? What challenges did I encounter in accomplishing my goal steps? How did I overcome them? What gets in the way of accomplishing my goals? What goals did I not accomplish last week that I should carry into the coming week? What is the one professional contribution I would most like to be remembered for? Have I made progress toward achieving it?
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations What is the one thing in my personal life I would most like to be remembered for? Have I made progress toward achieving it? What is the one thing I would most like to change about my personal life? Have I created a goal out of my answer? What patterns of success or failure do I see in setting and achieving goals? What patterns or processes can I improve on when setting and achieving goals? When was the last time I reevaluated the importance of each of my goals? Should I schedule time to do that this week? Which goals have I neglected in the recent past that I should work on this week? Which of my intermediate goal steps can be associated with a specific role? Should I move these items into my Weekly Compass for this week?
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Thoughts and Quotes

"A goal is not the same as a desire, and this is an important distinction to make. You can have a desire you don't intend to act on. But you can't have a goal you don't intend to act on." Tom Morris Your dreams. Your goals. Your future. Your plan...it's a road map to making those dreams a reality. Give your dream a deadline. Step closer to it and make it live! "A major part of successful living lies in the ability to put first things first. Indeed the reason most major goals are not achieved is that we spend our time doing second things first." Robert J. McKain You've got deadlines, right? Lots of things at work and at home have to get done at a certain time. What about your goals? "Oh, I'm workin' on them." Hey, when are they due? Make sure you set clear and specific deadlines for each and every goal you set. If you ain't got deadlines, you ain't got goals! "All who have accomplished great things have had a great aim, have fixed their gaze on a goal which was high, one which sometimes seemed impossible." Orison Swett Marden You often hear that you should "reach for the stars" when you make goals. It's a good reference point, but don't forget that your goals should be achievable. Reaching too high (setting goals that realistically can't be achieved with the time and resources available) can backfire and leave you feeling pretty down on yourself. Write a paragraph that details one goal realized. Leave nothing out. What will your world be like when your goal is realized? Take time. Give it to yourself! "For every man the world is as fresh as it was at the first day, and as full of untold novelties for him who has the eyes to see them." Thomas Henry Huxley Who are you? You are greatness. What makes you happy? Your personal success. Are you happy? You are on your way. "I have the same goal I've had since I was a little girl. I want to rule the world." Madonna What's the one thing you can do this week to take you closer to your most valued goal? Schedule it. Make it happen! "If you've lost focus, just sit down and be still. Take the idea and rock it to and fro. Keep some of it and throw some away, and it will renew itself. You need do no more." Clarissa Pinkola Estes What has been nagging at you lately? Do you want to shed a few pounds, take a family vacation, or get a higher degree? Well, stop thinking about it and make it a reality! Splitting your long-term goals into "Dreams pass into the reality of action. From the actions stems the dream again; and this interdependence produces the highest form of living." Anas Nin
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations smaller, intermediate steps is a recipe for success. How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time! Lunch anyone? "In this age, which believes that there is a shortcut to everything, the greatest lesson to be learned is that the most difficult way is, in the long run, the easiest." Henry Miller There's not much difference between your dreams and your goals. You believe in your dreams, and you commit to your goals. Go for it! "It must be borne in mind that the tragedy of life does not lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy of life lies in having no goal to reach." Benjamin E. Mays Take one of your goals and ask these three questions: What do I desire to accomplish? Why do I want to do it? How do I do it? "Just don't give up trying to do what you really want to do. Where there is love and inspiration, I don't think you can go wrong." Ella Fitzgerald Schedule time to brainstorm all the baby steps it will take to reach one of your goals. Do it with a friend and help each other out. Keep each other on track! "Know what you want to do, hold the thought firmly, and do every day what should be done, and every sunset will see you that much nearer to your goal." Elbert Hubbard Make sure the goal you are working toward is something you really want, not just something that sounds good or you think you should have or someone else thinks you should have. "None of us suddenly becomes something overnight. The preparations have been in the making for a lifetime." Golda Meir Let's define success as leading your life forward according to those things that are most important to you. Are you? Plan your success, reach your goals! "Nothing happens unless first a dream." Carl Sandburg Learn how to realize your dreams by taking realistic steps toward them. Set goals, read them every day, keep in touch with them. What are you doing to support them? "Obstacles don't have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don't turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it." Michael Jordan If you can dream, you can plan. Make a list of five steps necessary to make your dream happen. Now, attach dates to those stepsthat's a dare! "One can never consent to creep when one feels an impulse to soar." Helen Keller Got big goals? Hey, presidents and generals start somewhere. Be sure to break
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide larger goals into smaller, doable tasks. Take baby steps and you're on your way! "One of the greatest pains to human nature is the pain of a new idea." Walter Bagehot Goals are effectively planned when they're SMART: specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time-bound. "One person working toward a dream is worth 99 people just working." Lani S. Kraus Belief + Action = Success! Give your goals life! Take time to see a goal as already realized. What does it look and feel like? What has changed as a result of it? Be specific! "Our goals can only be reached through a vehicle of a plan, in which we must fervently believe, and upon which we must vigorously act. There is no other route to success." Stephan A. Brennan Do your goals reflect your values? Values are what we feel is important. Our values motivate us; so can our goals. Make sure they reflect each other. "Success is focusing the full power of all you are on what you have a burning desire to achieve." Wilfred A. Peterson Develop goals in the four dimensions of life: physical, social/emotional, mental, and spiritual. Setting goals in each area of life will ensure a more balanced life. "The pursuit of excellence is gratifying and healthy; the pursuit of perfection is frustrating, neurotic, and a terrible waste of time." Anonymous Ask yourself (and write down your response!) each day, "What one thing am I going to do today that will move me closer to my goal?" "The secret of getting ahead is getting started." Sally Berger "There are two things to aim at in life: first, to get what you want; and, after that, to enjoy it. Only the wisest of mankind achieve the second." Logan Pearsall Smith "There is no more miserable human being than one in whom nothing is habitual but indecision." Create weekly, short-term, and long-term goals that support your mission. "The past is but the beginning of a beginning, and all that is and has been is but the twilight of the dawn." Herbert George Wells "The [goal] statement helps bring your future into the present by giving you a clearer view of what your ideal future looks like." Alan Lakein
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Appendix E: Thoughts, Questions, and Quotations William James "To know is nothing at all; to imagine is everything." Anatole France "What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals." Zig Ziglar "When you reach for the stars, you may not quite get them, but you won't come up with a handful of mud either." Leo Burnett "Your mind, while blessed with permanent memory, is cursed with lousy recall. Written goals provide clarity. By documenting your dreams, you must think about the process of achieving them." Gary Ryan Blair The mathematics of high achievement: Begin with a dream. DIVIDE the problems and conquer them one by one. MULTIPLY the exciting possibilities in your mind. SUBTRACT all the negative thoughts to get started. ADD enthusiasm and determination. And the RESULT will be the attainment of your goal. Anonymous
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Appendix F
Appendix F: Articles and Stories

Balance Beams
By Stephen R. Covey Copyright (c) 2001 by Franklin Covey Co. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
As I watched a magnificent sunrise in Hawaii recently from my hotel window, I thought of a couplet: two men looked out the prison bars: one saw mud, one saw stars. What we see in our current circumstance will be greatly influenced by our perspective. Looking down, we may only see mud and bars; or looking up, we may see beams of light from the sun, moon, and stars. I know many executives who feel imprisoned in their roles and in their relationships, out of balance and out of sync both at work and at home. The bars that keep them in "prison" are rarely tangible-there are few, if any, physical barriers or restraints. Four Root Causes So what's the problem? What keeps us behind bars, seeing mud instead of stars? The problem stems from four roots: 1. Emotional imprisonment. When we disappoint or disagree with another person, we are often labeled and cast into prison. We may cross over some sensitive line and hurt, insult, or offend another person. We may feel justified at the time, feeling that the person has deserved this treatment. The other person sees it differently, takes offense, builds walls, and casts us into this prison cell, lined with labels. These labels tend to be self-fulfilling prophecies. People tend to become like we treat them, or like we believe them to be.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Whenever I cross over the sensitive line and discipline out of anger, I wound feelings. My pride, for a while, may keep me from apologizing. The other person is hurt, and the relationship is strained. If I merely try to be better and not confess and ask forgiveness, the other person will still be suspicious. He has been hurt and wounded, and so his guard is up. He is defensive and suspicious of my new behavior. Nothing I can do will change his mind because I am behind bars and walls in a prison of his own making. These bars and walls are the mental and emotional labels that he puts on me. Thus, we see people sprinting to their cars after work because they're anxious to start with their "real life." They experience so much terrible management and control in their work life that they want to get out of control and out of misery and into some recreation and meaning. Solution: Pay the uttermost farthing. It is only by acknowledging my own failings and by seeking forgiveness that I will pay the uttermost farthing and be let out of jail. 2. Mote-beam sickness. There is a strong universal tendency to find fault in others-to see the minute mote in another's eye, while ignoring the 2x4 beam in our own. When we focus on this mote, his fault, we tend to rationalize and justify the faults in our own life. If we then try to correct another, it doesn't work. We may have a correct opinion, but our approach is wrong. We then hurt, reject, offend, and threaten. Because of the beam in our own eye, we can't see clearly. Our judgment may be entirely wrong. We may be merely projecting our own weakness and calling it his. We may mistake observation for introspection. We only see mud and mote because of the beam in our own eye. If we have a foul motive, that motive will be translated in a thousand negative ways in every aspect of our lives. Solution: Work on self first. The first step we take in improving any situation is to work on the injustice or fault in our own personal lives. If we remove the beam from our own eye, we then will see clearly to cast the mote out of the other person's eye. We then become a light, not a judge. In the book, Take This Job and Love It, the author, Dennis Jaffe, advises us to take responsibility and get out of the victim mentality: to learn to confront the issues and either leave the job or make needed changes and love it. 3. Scarcity scripting. We are subjected to various sources of scripting toward win-lose, scarcity thinking: 1) conditional love supplies at home may cause us to try to win love by good behavior but leave us without intrinsic worth; 2) comparisons at school cause us to develop a comparison-based identity; 3) competition in the family, school, work, games, and in social life reinforces this scarcity mentality. This scripting gets translated in the totality of a person's life, on four levels. On the personal level, the scarcity script becomes his life script. It becomes deeply imbedded. Even though he is unaware of it, he looks at life through this lens-and that lens affects everything he sees. On the interpersonal level, this scarcity paradigm gets translated into his marriage and into all his relationships at work. When push comes to shove, this scarcity drives him to win-lose thinking toward customers, suppliers, and everybody else. At the managerial level, he won't want to share his power: he won't want to "give the keys to the inmates." He feels that if he starts sharing his power and starts empowering people, he's going to have less. And as long as he works within that point of view, he's into a self-fulfilling prophecy. He'll be right. He will have less. Working with a comparison-based identity, he will always be in a deficiency state. Do you think he'll want to share profit or gain? Do you think he'll want to share recognition with other people? Do you think he'll want to share knowledge? No, because knowledge, position, recognition, and profit are power to him.
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories At the organizational level, the scarcity-minded executive is going to set up win-lose information and reinforcement systems. He will design structures and systems based on how he sees the world. Now, suppose he gets into the quality movement and becomes aware of the fact that ninety percent of the problems are in bad systems and structures, not in bad people. He may then try to redesign the structures and systems, reengineer the operational processes, talk openly about empowerment and team building, and have people doing everything from free falling off cliffs to smile training-but it's all just bloodletting, because his style is still win-lose. Solution: Win-win, abundance scripting. Only a person with an abundance mentality and a winwin style can break the cycle of scarcity, win-lose thinking. When a person cultivates an abundance mentality, he will think win-win. He will develop more self-respect and respect for others and show tremendous compassion and tenderness toward others. Like most executives, I had to grow out of scarcity toward more of an abundance mindset. What helped me was to become aligned with a transcending purpose and become more concerned with what is right than with who is right. People can and do change from scarcity to abundance thinking. Gandhi was heavily scripted in timidity, scarcity, fear, and distrust. He was threatened by people; he didn't want to be around them. But when he had a vision of his purpose, he was able to subordinate those feelings and lead his people. 4. Role imbalance. Why even try to have balance in life when we live so many roles, all very demanding? Because, like it or not, the only thing we have to work through is self. Most people live with the lie that they can get away with doing unwise things in private or in secret-that it won't affect their work or family. That's living a lie. It gets translated in a thousand and one different ways. I agree with what Gandhi said: "A person cannot do right in one department of life while attempting to do wrong in another department. Life is one indivisible whole." We are all buffeted by different forces, and these tend to knock us off balance, especially when we lose a sense of purpose. What we seek is what we see. The key question is this: What are we seeking? That will ultimately affect how and what we see in life-mud or stars. How we behave in organizations comes out of our personal lives, out of our character. Character is reflected in the totality of our lives. A character flaw may be manifest when we deal with testy teenagers or employees-we won't have the patience, the empathy, to seek first to understand. Solutions: First, accept gracefully any short-term imbalance if it makes sense when viewed with a long-term perspective. We all move through different phases of life, and while we might wish for a more balanced life at certain times, we need to remember that the ideal of balance is impossible to achieve each day. What matters is long-term balance. Today's imbalance may be natural and necessary from the perspective of the week, month, or year. During these times of sacrifice and focus, we may need to throw away our planning tools and not get hung up or be guilt-ridden. Second, involve others in meaningful work that will take a lot of your time. I've seen people get so consumed with a project of such transcending significance that they neglect everyone and everything else. Basically, they leave their family to perform the project. They have no social life, very little recreation, even very few breaks for food or pleasure. And the project may last for a year or longer. But if the family identifies with the meaning of the project, they don't feel neglected.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide They are inspired and uplifted. So involve your family in your work. They have to share in the vision and feel part of the mission. I try to do that. I try to take them with me or involve them significantly in other ways. Third, share a common vision of the desired end result. What would happen if everyone doing a jigsaw puzzle had a different end in mind, a different picture of the thing they were trying to create? That's essentially what happens when people are kept in the dark or have incomplete information. They have to act, have to make decisions based on some picture that they're trying to create. A shared vision of a challenging, meaningful project, goal, or purpose can wash away all petty concerns. In teams, people will subordinate their ego. They've got to have "one heart, one mind, one voice" because they have to get the job done. Fourth, develop a complementary team. Start doing more leadership work. Stop managing so much. Most companies and families are over-managed and under-led. The opposite can also be true-you may be over-leading and under-managing. Both management and leadership are necessary. In my own business, I was heavy into the leadership side, but we reached the point of hemorrhaging because I wasn't managing. So we had to develop a complementary team of people who were skilled in management. Immediately the team made my strengths more productive, and made my weaknesses irrelevant. Most entrepreneurs and senior executives want to clone people in their own image, but what they need are people around them who are different, who have emotional independence from them, and who anticipate their needs, complement their strengths, and compensate for their weaknesses. Fifth, preserve some precious time for your dearest people and causes. Every executive struggles with balance. There are so many demands on their time, so many people wanting a piece of them. I've learned that I can't go to my office and expect to get any creative work done. Too many people want and need to meet with me. My home and cabin serve as "preserves"like a game preserve or a forest preserve-where I can do some creative work or have uninterrupted family time. I preserve these times through long-range planning around prioritized values based on principles. I schedule some family activities two years ahead. I try to hold family times inviolate. It's the only way I can preserve it. It's like putting fences around that family time and contribution time (volunteer work in church and community). Sixth, make what is important to the other person as important as the other person is to you. When I'm at home, I try to give myself to my wife and family. I let them write the agenda. I go on their dates. I do what they want to do. For example, I don't care for golf, but my boy does; therefore, I golf because I care about him. Your kids will open up if you open your ears and heart, close your mouth, and be there for them.
Dr. Stephen R. Covey is an internationally respected leadership authority, family expert, teacher, organizational consultant, and co-chairman of Franklin Covey Co. He is also the author of several acclaimed books, including The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
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Balancing Work and Family

Being principle-centered as a pathway to life balance is a key element and vital concept to remember in thinking about how best to meet your challenges with your work and family. Could you fake fifty push-ups? Could you fake cardio-vascular fitness? Of course not. Why do you think you can fake a meaningful relationship with your teenage son? Can you imagine in any sense that creating a lasting relationship would be a product of cramming? Of some quickfix approach? Obviously it is a function of the law of the harvest-we will always reap as we sow. Marriage also is subject to the law of the harvest. The key is alignment with principles. We control our actions, but the consequences that flow from those actions are controlled by principles. The body, the mind, marriage, family, all relationships-every natural system is governed by principle, by natural laws. This is particularly true as we consider how to find a sense of balance between work and family. Now intellectually, this may not be hard to understand, but emotionally this is a tough idea because the social value system of most people is determined by some quick fix, some way of shortcutting this natural process. There is none. We will always reap as we sow. Try to find one exception anywhere of any person or relationship or enduring family that is not based upon principles. I would challenge anybody. There is not true enduring balance, enduring success, apart from these principles. None. Someone might say, "Yeah, but what about this person or this family?" All I'd say is, "How's the marriage?" "Well, he's into his third." "How's the quality of his relationship with his teenagers?" "Well, it's kind of rocky, but look at the money he makes," or look at the prestige that he has or whatever. It's all cosmetic, surface stuff, my friends. There are a lot of things that can give material success that are apart from this. I do not think you can find an exception anywhere of a truly effective or balanced person or family that does not have at least a pretty good handle on these principles. Life Centers Now, I would like to briefly discuss what could happen if we don't put principles at the center of our lives and don't base our decisions on a balanced set of principles. Work-centered Let's just say that I put my work at the center of my life. Everything is oriented around my work, all relationships, all pleasures; everything has to do with my work. How do I see my relatives? (As contacts, customers, referral sources.) How would you perceive your little children if you're work-centered? (Obstacles. Oh, I have to deal with that, what an interference. Go through the motions, you know, try to do my family thing so that I can get back to work.) Work-centered people may become "workaholics," driving themselves to produce and sacrifice health, family and others important areas of their lives. Their fundamental identity comes from their work. Taking care of one's family is a noble reason for making money. But to focus on moneymaking as a center will bring about its own undoing. (Money-centered people often put aside family or other priorities, assuming everyone will understand that economic demands come first.) Possession-centered
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Another common center for many people is possessions-"things"-"stuff"-not only tangible, material possessions such as fashionable clothes, homes, cars, boats and jewelry, but also the intangible possessions of fame, glory or social prominence. Most of us are aware, through our own experience, how totally flawed such a center is, simply because it can evaporate so rapidly. Self-centered Perhaps the most common center today is the self. The most obvious form is selfishness and greed, which violates the values of most people. But if we look closely at many of the popular approaches to growth and self-fulfillment and even approaches to work and family issues, we often find self-centeredness at their core. Family-centered Finally, what if we put family at our center? This, too, may seem to be natural and proper. Now I want to make a distinction here: I'm not talking about "prioritizing" your family; rather I'm talking about putting your family at your center. As a center in and of itself, it ironically destroys the very elements necessary to family success and work-family balance. We could go through an analysis of every alternative center. Or even a combination of them and I'll guarantee at the conclusion of it all it will cause tremendous imbalance and your life will be unfulfilled. Only when we put principles at the center of our lives will we be able to bring a sense of proper pacing and a sense of proportion, perspective and appropriate balance to our family and work and other important roles in our life. This sense of balance includes consideration of any number of relevant principles and not the elevation of a single principle to the exclusion of other principles. It allows us to be adaptable, flexible and sensitive, yet still effective, in a wide variety of changing circumstances and roleswhile still being true to our deepest priorities in life. It allows us to deal with whatever changes may come along and gives us a constant frame of reference to make all decisions by. Take time with your family and loved ones to make explicit what principles are. Principles ultimately govern. As Abraham Lincoln put it, "People will pass away, but principles will live ... live on forever."
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Character First
An interview with Stephen R. Covey From Executive Excellence Magazine Copyright (c) 1998, 2001 by Franklin Covey Co. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Even the very best structure, system, style, and skills can't compensate completely for deficiencies in character. Why do you emphasize the importance of character in the lives of leaders? Because I believe that character (what a person is) is ultimately more important than competence (what a person can do). Obviously both are important, but character is foundational. All else builds on this cornerstone. Also, I believe that courage and consideration are the key building blocks of emotional maturity, and that emotional maturity is foundational to all decisions and all relationships. It relates to all the great management themes of the past. That's why I place my 7 Habits along a maturity continuum to suggest that the aim of all these habits is to help us achieve character and competence, courage and consideration. We can then be highly effective with tasks and with people. Why is the emotionally mature person also highly effective? Mature people may have a lot of ego strength, but they also have high respect for other people. They balance their courage with consideration. So they communicate in the spirit of "I and thou," the expression philosopher Martin Buber used in his book, I and Thou. Immature people communicate in terms of "I and it" where they treat people like objects or things, or "it and it" where they manipulate and treat themselves in the same way. Or they may think in terms of "it and thou," having respect for others, but not for themselves. When did you first arrive at this notion of maturity being a balance between courage and consideration? I first learned this concept from one of my professors at the Harvard Business School, Rhand Saxenian. At the time, Rhand was working on his own doctoral thesis on the subject. This is how he taught it: emotional maturity is the ability to express your feelings and convictions with courage, balanced with consideration for the feelings and convictions of others. And that hit you like a lightning bolt? Yes, the truth of that idea struck me powerfully. But even more powerful was the way he modeled it. For instance, when we entered the statistics portion of the course, he told the class that he didn't know much about statistics, and that he would be learning along with us. He also acknowledged what our feelings might be, as we were in competition with other students and sections and had to take a school-wide exam. In self-defense, we sent a delegation to the dean's office to ask for a new teacher of statistics. We told the dean that we liked Mr. Saxenian as a teacher but that his ignorance of statistics would put us at a disadvantage when we took the tests. To our amazement, the dean simply said, "Well, just do the best you can." So with the teacher's help, we got some technical notes and passed them around. In a sense, we taught each other statistics. And our section, out of eight, came out second in the exams. I'm convinced we did well because Rhand had the courage to confess his ignorance of the subject and the consideration to help us come up with a solution.
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Did your professor show you that "courage balanced with consideration" was common to great leaders? Yes, in fact, Rhand went back through history to show how the truly great leaders who built strong cultures behind a common shared vision were those who had these two characteristics of emotional maturity, who beautifully balanced courage and consideration. In a different way, haven't you also tested this idea? Yes, in many ways. First, I have gone back into the history of management thought, interpersonal relationships theory, and human psychology theory, and I have found the same two concepts. For instance, the transactional analysis area that Thomas Harris made popular in his book I'm Okay, You're Okay, really had its theoretical roots in both Eric Burn (Games People Play), and Sigmund Freud and his psychoanalytic theories. Well, what is "I'm okay, you're okay" but courage balanced with consideration? "I'm okay, you're not okay" means I have courage, but little respect or consideration for you. "I'm not okay, you're okay" suggests no ego strength, no courage. And "I'm not okay, you're not okay" suggests a very negative outlook of life. These are the four dimensions of maturity. Then I looked at Blake and Mouton, who developed the managerial grid, which basically deals with two dimensions: are you task-oriented or are you people-oriented? Those who are high task-oriented and low people-oriented are called nine-ones. Those who are high peopleoriented and low task-oriented are one-nines. Those who are in the middle are five-fives. The ideal, of course, is nine-nine high people and high task. In other words, high courage to drive what you want to get the task done, plus high respect and consideration for others. Again, the spirit of "I-thou." And then I noted that the concept of "win-win" is essentially the same thing: you have high respect for self to ensure that you win, but you work in a way that enables other people to win as well. If you're synergistic and have the "I-thou" spirit, you create far better solutions, as manifest in mission statements, decisions, strategic partnerships, or customer and employee relations. The win-lose approach is symptomatic of high respect for self and low regard for others and their situation. The lose-win approach suggests low respect for self, and high regard for other people. I examined other psychological theories and found that they all look at the two sides. Sometimes courage is called respect, confidence, toughmindedness, or ego strength; and consideration may be called empathy or kindheartedness. I found that same balance in the great philosophical and religious literature. "Love thy neighbor as thyself" is an expression of the spirit of "I-thou." Finally, I've interviewed a lot of Malcolm Baldrige award winners, and asked them the question, "What is the most difficult challenge you faced?" And they always say, "Giving up control." In effect, they are saying, "We had to create 'I-thou' relationships with all stakeholders. We had to reach the point where we really believed in other people, in a bone-deep way, not in some public relations manner. We also had to learn to be strong in expressing how we see it." Essentially, the Baldrige winners learned to think win-win, seek first to understand then to be understood, and synergize (Habits 4, 5 and 6 of the Seven Habits). By practicing these habits, they gained new insights and learnings, opened new options, engaged in high-level partnering and bonding, and boosted creativity. But it has to come out of this deep spirit of win-win, I and thou, courage balanced with consideration. Is "courage balanced with consideration" a good way to achieve both improved results and relationships? Exactly. Better in both ways. You get more results, and you get better relationships. Without this balance, you tend to get one at the expense of the other. For instance, I once worked with the
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories president of a large organization who was a nine-one, meaning he was a result-oriented person. But, if he needed to build relationships to get results, he could charm the socks off anybody. But it was always with regard to a task. His task became the relationship. In other words, once he built the strategic relationship, he would then get on with the task. I have known other people who were the opposite. They are so needful of relationships that they work relationships through tasks. Is it possible to get a profile of ourselves as leaders to assess the balance of courage and consideration or determine our orientation toward results and relationships? Yes, in fact, David McClelland, one of the great research psychologists at Harvard, developed what he called his Need Achievement Inventory. He would give people different pictures and then have them talk about a story that was portrayed in that picture. By using a number of these pictures, McClelland would profile the candidate, and then give his recommendations to employers who are looking to match the profile of the person with the needs of the job. He tended to classify people according to their need for power, affiliation, or achievement. In a sense, McClelland was looking at this concept of inward motivation. He identified character as the critical factor of long-term success. Do you feel that the hundreds of contributing writers to Executive Excellence over the last ten years have verified the preeminence of character? What I have seen over and over again, in the pages of Executive Excellence and elsewhere, is how character eventually becomes more important than competency. So, even though people may go through management training and improve their skills, if they don't grow in emotional maturity, eventually their skills may even be their undoing. For instance, I witnessed this taskoriented president exhaust his social capital with the Board to the point he no longer had power or influence with them. The Board would not sustain the president, and eventually they had to make a change. Board members felt that they were being manipulated by one superlative presentation after another, one big charm after another. Eventually the hens came home to roost. And yet, isn't the training and education of most people designed to build competence and courage for the sake of getting results? Absolutely. Almost all training is focused on competency. That's the courage aspect of maturity, have your way, be nice to people, use the human relations approach, but not the human resource approach. The human resource approach asks, "What's your opinion? The human relations approach says, "How's your family?" And the malevolent authoritarian approach says, "When I want your opinion, I'll give it to you." So, how can we meet this need for ongoing character development? We need to stop managing people by performance appraisals where some supervisor is judging someone else's character and competence. We need to look for balance between production (P) and what I call "production capability" (PC), which includes developing people and building teams. Because, as we learn from Aesop, if we go for all the golden eggs (P) without regard for the wellness of the goose (PC), we'll soon be out of business. This is why Peter Drucker says, "Don't judge people's characters." I totally agree with him. I tell executives to do away with traditional performance appraisals and instead look at how well that individual balances P and PC, results and relationships, competence and character, courage and consideration. I also encourage them to set up a 360-degree stakeholder information system which gives people solid, scientific, systematic feedback on their performance in both dimensions. Then the person will say, "Gosh, I have low marks for team building and interdependency, even though I'm producing the numbers. What can I do? Now they recognize the need for on-going character
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide development, which they themselves have to take charge of. They can then organize resources to draw on their families, their friends, their church, their professional association, their support groups. They seek character development in order to produce those desired results. Why do you say that humility is the mother of virtues? Because humility helps us center our lives around principles. Humility helps us see the need for on-going character development. Humility helps us be considerate of others. I then say that courage is the father of all virtues. Together courage and consideration create the internal integration inside the human personality. This is why Karl Jung says that we never achieve what he calls individuation, the total integration of the human personality, until our later years in life. He says that people must go through different phases to learn some things. His belief was that it takes a great deal of experience, going around the block many times in many ways, before we gradually come to see the full consequences of erring on one side or the other and gradually achieve an integration of our internal character. Can one person, working within his or her circle of influence, really make a difference? Without question. I see it continuously. The people who start small and start to build on true principles in the ways we've been talking about, expand their circles of influence until they truly become models, and eventually mentors and teachers of other people. They become change catalysts and transition persons Why do these change catalysts also need what you call an abundance mentality? The abundance mentality is courage and consideration. Scarcity is courage without consideration. Interdependence is courage and consideration. Independence is me-centered: I want what I want. For example, I once had an experience with the top partners of an international firm who after three days reached this conclusion: the experts in quality Juran, Crosby, Deming, and others basically say that people aren't so bad; what's bad are the systems they work in. But suppose you have an executive who has courage but no consideration. He'll think win-lose, and he'll design win-lose systems. Now, if he attends a quality seminar, he may start designing win-win systems but he'll implement them in a win-lose way. Why? Because character eventually comes out on top. So, all the top partners concluded: "We now know our problem is scarcity thinking. It shows in the way we admit people, the way we make them partners, the way we reward them. No wonder we have a screwed-up culture. No wonder we're losing some of our best minds. No wonder we have such a political atmosphere where everyone is reading the tea leaves. We have moved so far away from our founding principles." In the last analysis, it's the character in the culture that counts. And yet we let many characterdestroying forces have their way with us until we lose the original character of the founding group, or until we become programs ourselves, not programmers. And so, we must begin the process not only of reengineering business processes but also of self-directed rescripting of business executives. How can executives rescript themselves? Well, often we must first be humbled, either by circumstances not getting desired results and preserving the assets or by crisis not getting the meaning or fulfillment that we desire, or failing to maintain good relationships with our spouses and kids. We are then more willing to accept the fact that universal principles ultimately govern. We are then more willing to accept responsibility for who and what we are. And we are then more willing to develop and live by
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories mission statements, which does much to produce integrity. Ultimately what we are is the most critical component of success. In fact, I've concluded the only way that I can grow toward the ideal balance between character and consideration is by living true to my conscience, to the principles I know are right. If I begin in any way to falter in either courage or consideration, I can usually trace my failures within a few hours, if not days, to some flaw in the integrity of my life. We read of actors who feel that they were exploited in certain roles and parts early in their careers. But as they gain more respect, they turn down scripts and roles that aren't supportive of their new vision of themselves. They may even write their own scripts, or determine what parts they play. Can executives also do that in their careers? I'm convinced that we can write and live our own scripts more than most people will acknowledge. I also know the price that must be paid. It's a real struggle to do it. It requires visualization and affirmation. It involves living a life of integrity, starting with making and keeping promises, until the whole human personality the senses, the thinking, the feeling, and the intuition are ultimately integrated and harmonized.
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Controlling Your Life

By Hyrum W. Smith Copyright (c) 2001 by Franklin Covey Co. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Several years ago, when I was teaching a time-management seminar at Citibank in New York, I asked the participants, "How many of you would like to do more reading?" Every hand in the room shot up. It was clear they all thought reading was important but, as it turned out, few of them had bothered to open a book recently. Books Don't Ring "Well," I said, "you've obviously placed a value on reading, but you're not doing it. Why aren't you doing it?" After some time, a guy in the last row raised his hand and said, "Books don't ring." I thought that was a wonderful answer. It leads to a very meaningful question: Why is it that the things that matter most to us, the most vital elements in our lives, are so often at the mercy of the ones that matter the least? If the telephone rings, we feel compelled to leave everything else in midair and answer it-because a ringing telephone conveys a feeling of urgency. This man in the seminar drew an important distinction between something urgent-a ringing telephone-and something he considered vital, which was reading. Urgent or Vital Let's not confuse the two. Some tasks are never going to be urgent, even though they may be extremely vital. Other tasks may never be important, but they will be urgent. True, it's difficult to give vital tasks a sense of urgency, to make books ring-along with family, service or exercise programs. But failing to place the things you value as the highest priorities in your daily life is the quickest way to feel you've lost control. We live in a society that bombards us with a constant stream of tasks and problems that scream for our attention. Our lives are so overflowing with things we must do and should do that the pace and pressure can make us feel that we're no longer in charge. There is no worse feeling than being out of control, sensing that other people or external circumstances govern what we do, when we do it and how. Yet that's what happens when we let circumstances dictate our actions. It's a lot like being a pinball that has no control over where it goes. It just responds to outside forces. Control Your Time To control your life you must control your time. And that means controlling the way you spend that time. There's no shortage of classes and programs that teach time management. But the goal of most time-management seminars is just to teach you to work more efficiently. No one invites you to ask yourself why you're doing that work or even if you want to do it at all. And, unless you are consistently creating opportunities to accomplish things that are important or meaningful to you, being better organized may only allow you to fill up more time with the same type of work that made you frustrated in the first place. If it were possible, I'd do away with the term "time management" and replace it with "event control." People gain a sense of fulfillment not because they can do things efficiently, but because they choose to do things that are important to them. In other words, they are in control of the events that make up each day.
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories Now, the fact is that none of us is ever in complete control of everything. You'd be surprised how many things you have no control over at all: the stock market, airplane schedules, who wins the World Series, your boss or your colleagues. But there are some things over which you have complete control. You decide what time to get up in the morning, how you react to people and the attitude you'll have while you're doing it. Don't Set Yourself Up for Stress About the only thing you can do about things that aren't under your control is to accept them, adapt to them and control your response to them. If you don't, you're setting yourself up for a lot of worry and stress. Along a control continuum-from things over which you have very little control to things that are completely within your control-are life events you can either control or to which you only control your response. There are little distractions that seem to exist just to use our time and energy. Some of them come from outside situations; others come from within. Either way, they're time robbers. They turn us away from what we ought to be doing and cost us both productivity and self-esteem. I've asked seminar participants to list the ones they find to be most challenging, and here they are: Interruptions Procrastination Shifting priorities Poor planning Waiting for answers If you're like most people, these are frustrating and can make you feel out of control. What's worse, they become habits. Unless you learn to exercise the control you have over your response to each situation, you will continue wasting time repeatedly. Learning how to handle time robbers involves some creativity. The following coping strategies are a good way to start. Interruptions Interruptions are unavoidable. But you can determine what priority each interruption has for you. Is it something you need to handle immediately? Is it something you can schedule at another time? If the interruption is not the next important task of your day, note it, then ignore it. Procrastination Procrastination is something we do to ourselves. Many important tasks are unpleasant at best: doing your taxes, putting a new roof on the house. The natural response is to put these tasks off until later-even indefinitely. But this response lets the event control us instead of the other way around, and our productivity and self-esteem drop. Being productive, successful and healthy often requires us to leave our comfort zones. A good strategy to avoid procrastination is to create a sense of urgency by setting definite deadlines. Try doing the most unpleasant part of the job first so you end your day with a positive feeling. Make a game of it. Give yourself an incentive to finish. Priorities Shift Most companies shift their priorities from week to week or month to month. A shift in priority focuses everyone on solving the immediate crisis. If the shifts in priorities have meaning and purpose, this can be stimulating. But if the priorities shift too quickly, especially without an earlier crisis being resolved, it can be frustrating and unproductive. It's unfortunate, but this is a situation where you really only have two productive responses: leave the company, or find your passion for the new priority and enjoy the ride. Poor Planning
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Poor planning is something that falls almost entirely under your control. Typically, it's a result of an unorganized environment, unclear goals and a lack of understanding about the benefits of control via planning. You can take charge by learning to plan-and by learning to follow through and implement your plans. Try our 21-day test. Plan your schedule and prioritize your tasks before your day starts for three weeks, and create a habit you'll love. Waiting for Answers Waiting for answers can make you feel like you can't move any further with a project. You may have more control than you realize. If it's a vital task (remember our discussion on urgent vs. vital), stop by the person's office and explain the situation, and ask for other people you might be able to talk to. Follow up on all those leads. If you run into a higher management level than your own, enlist your leader's help. Keep following through until you reach either a solution or an unavoidable blockage. Make sure that everyone involved knows to contact you as soon as the answer is available. There's an interesting relationship between exercising control over your life and self-esteem. Psychologist Nathaniel L. Branden, author of The Psychology of Self-Esteem, pointed out that the better you feel about yourself, the more productive you will be; and the more productive you are, the better you will feel about yourself. I like to add a third element-event control-to his equation. If I can exert greater control over the events in my life, I can become more productive, better organized and spend more time on activities that I value. The natural by-product is an increase in my sense of self-worth. As I get better control over things that matter a great deal to me, I feel terrific. Is that a book I hear ringing?
Hyrum W. Smith is co-chairman of Franklin Covey Co. and author of the books What Matters Most, The Power of Living Your Values and The Ten Natural Laws of Time and Life Management. He is a highly sought-after international speaker and the originator of the Franklin Planner.
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First Things First

I've learned that the good is the enemy of the best when the first things in our lives are subordinated to other things. A few days after my daughter Maria delivered a new baby, I visited with her, expecting to find her happy. Instead, I found her frustrated. She told me, "I have so many other projects and interests that are important to me. But right now, I have to put everything on hold. I'm spending all my time just meeting the physical needs of this new baby. I can't even find time to be with my other two children and my husband." Seeking to understand, I replied, "So, this new baby is consuming you?" She continued, "I have other work to do. I have some writing projects that need my attention. I have other people in my life." I asked her, "What does your conscience tell you to do? Maybe right now there is only one thing that matters-your baby." She said, "But I have so many other projects and plans." She showed me her organizer. "I schedule time to do these other things, but then I'm constantly interrupted by my baby." I talked to her about the concept of a compass, not a clock. "You're being governed by your internal compass, your conscience, and you're doing something of enormous good. Now is not the time to be controlled by the clock. Throw away your planner for a few weeks. Only one thing is needful. So, relax and enjoy the very nature of this interruption to your life." "But what about life balance and sharpening the saw?" she asked, knowing I teach these principles. "Your life is going to be imbalanced for a time, and it should be. The long run is where you go for balance. For now, don't even try to keep a schedule. Forget your calendar; take care of yourself; don't worry. Just enjoy the baby, and let that infant feel your joy." I reminded her: "The good is often the enemy of the best. You won't get much satisfaction from fulfilling scheduled commitments if you have to sacrifice first things and best things. Your satisfactions are tied to your role expectations. Maybe the only role that matters this entire day will be mothering your new baby. And if you fulfill that role well, you will feel satisfied. But if you schedule other commitments when you have no control of the demands your baby is going to make, you'll only be frustrated." Maria learned to relax and enjoy her baby more. She involved her husband and other children more in caring for the new baby, sharing with them all that could be shared. Identify Your First Things What are the first things in your life? One good way to answer that question is by asking other questions: "What is unique about me? What are my unique gifts? What is it that I can do that no one else can do? For instance, who else can be a father to your child? A grandparent to your grandchildren? Who else can teach your students? Who else can lead your company? Who else can be a mother to your baby?
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide In a sense, we all have our "babies," meaning some demanding new project or product. Each of us has unique talents and capabilities and an important work to do in life. The tragedy is that our unique contribution is often never made because the important "first things" in our lives are choked out by other urgent things. And so some important works are never started or finished. In our book, First Things First, coauthored with Roger and Rebecca Merrill, we suggest that the path to personal leadership follows the stepping stones of vision, mission, balance, roles, goals, perspective, and integrity in the moment of choice. It's an ecological balancing process. We invite readers to think very carefully through this process. "What are my responsibilities in life? Who are the people I care about?" The answers become the basis for thinking through your roles. Your goals are then set by asking, "What is the important future state for each relationship or responsibility?" Setting up win-win agreements with people and maintaining positive relationships is not an efficient process; in fact, the process is usually slow. But once a win-win agreement is in place, the work will go fast. If you're efficient up front, you might be taking the slowest approach. Yes, you might drum your decision down someone else's throat, but whether or not he is committed to live by that decision and to carry it out is a different matter. Slow is fast; fast is slow. Peter Drucker makes the distinction between a quality decision and an effective decision. You can make a quality decision, but if there isn't commitment to it, it won't be effective. There has to be commitment to make a "quality decision" effective. An executive may be highly efficient working with things, but highly ineffective working with people. Efficiency is different in kind from effectiveness: Effectiveness is a results word; efficiency is a methods word. Some people can climb the "ladder of success" very efficiently, but if it's leaning against the wrong wall, they won't be effective. Efficiency is the value you learn when you work with things. You can move things around fast: you can move money, manage resources, and rearrange your furniture quickly. But if you try to be efficient with people on jugular issues, you'll likely be ineffective. You can't deal with people as if you're dealing with things. You can be efficient with things, but you need to be effective with people, particularly on jugular issues. Have you ever tried to be efficient with your spouse on a tough issue? How did it go? If you go fast, you'll make very slow progress. If you go slow and get deep involvement- doing what is necessary through synergistic communication based on a win-win spirit- you'll find that in the long run it's fast because then you have total commitment to it. You also have a quality decision simply because you have the benefit of different creative ideas interacting, creating a new solution that is better and more bonding. Subordinate Clock to Compass For many executives, the dominant metaphor of life is still the clock. We value the clock for its speed and efficiency. The clock has its place, efficiency has its place, after effectiveness. The symbol of effectiveness is the compass-a sense of direction, purpose, vision, perspective, and balance. A well-educated conscience serves as an internal monitoring and guidance system. To move from a clock to a compass mindset, you focus on moving the fulcrum over by empowering other people. But the empowerment process itself is not efficient. You can't think control; you think of releasing feelings seldom expressed and interacting with others until you create something better-and you don't know what it is at the beginning. It takes a lot of internal security; a lot of self-mastery, before you can even assume that risk. And the people who like to control their time, money, and things, tend to try to control people, taking the efficiency approach, which in the long run is very ineffective.
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories Effectiveness applies to self as much as to other people. You should never be efficient with yourself either. For example, one morning I met with a group in our training program. Someone said, "Creating a personal mission statement is a tough process." And I said, "Well, are you approaching it through an efficiency paradigm or an effectiveness paradigm? If you use the efficiency approach, you may try to bang it out this weekend. But if you use the effectiveness approach, you'll carry on this tortuous internal debate on every aspect of your nature, your memory system, your imagination system, your value system, your old habits, old scripts. You'll keep this dialogue going until you feel at peace." Why do executives find it easy to schedule and keep appointments with others, but hard to keep appointments with themselves? If people can make and keep promises to themselves, they will significantly increase their social integrity. Conversely, if they learn to make and keep promises to others, they will have higher self-discipline. The private victory of keeping appointments with ourselves doesn't just mean that we spend some private time alone-it might also mean that we promise ourselves not to overreact, or to apologize in the middle of a mistake. Keeping these promises enormously increases your sense of integrity. For example, I saw my son once chewing out his little sister for rearranging his office. He had everything laid out to work on his project, but she thought it was messy and she wanted to help her brother. In the middle of his tirade, he caught himself and said, "I apologize. I'm just taking my frustrations out on you, and I know you meant to do well." He did it right then. He kept an appointment with himself to live by his values even in the heat of the moment. I admired him enormously. Knowing that people and relationships are more important than schedules and things, we can subordinate a schedule without feeling guilty because we superordinate the conscience, the commitment to a larger vision and set of values. We subordinate the clock approach of efficiency to the compass approach of effectiveness. When using the compass, we subordinate our schedules to people, purposes, and principles. The "mega priorities" of the compass subordinate the "mini priorities" of the clock. When your projects are worthy ones, then your purpose will transcend petty concerns and matters of secondary importance. What Charles Dickens learned from writing A Christmas Carol is that a transcendent purpose subordinates the old scripts of scarcity and independence. It may not totally erase them, but at least it subordinates them. Dickens got a strong sense of purpose about writing a story that would bless the lives of families, particularly children, when he reflected on the time when he worked in the factories twelve hours a day, every day of the week, and his father and other members of his family were in debtor's prison for several months. He remembered those times of scarcity and recognized them as scripts. And as he combined the images of the present with the past, he experienced an enormous burst of creative energy that subordinated all of his present problems, his depression, and the possibility of financial ruin, to get out this magnificent story. Without valuing interdependence and abundance thinking, you won't be able to keep first things first. Some people never understand these realities. They fall back into independence and scarcity thinking. Those perspectives are more a function of scripting than of anything else. But we can change the script. From Urgency to Importance When we are guided by an internal compass, a highly educated conscience, we may decide to dedicate an entire morning to one person or to focus on one project and subordinate an earlier
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide schedule we'd set up, unless we have strong commitments to meet with certain individuals, then we work around those. Or we may decide to set aside an afternoon to keep an appointment only with ourselves. During that time, we might sharpen the saw by exercising one or more of the four dimensions of our personality-physical, mental, social, and spiritual. We use selfawareness to know what to do and when. I recommend a time management credo that says: "I will not be governed by the efficiency of the clock; I will be governed by my conscience. Because my conscience deals with the totality of my life. And since it is well educated from study and from experience, it will help me make wise decisions." Under the influence of a well-developed conscience, you make decisions on a daily, hourly, and moment-to-moment basis to be governed by principles. If you are immersed in an extremely productive or creative work, don't let anything interrupt. Can you imagine a surgeon taking a telephone call in the middle of surgery? Most people are buried in urgency. Most production and management jobs call for quick reactions to what is urgent and important. The net effect of a reactionary, urgent lifestyle is stress, burnout, crisis management, and always putting out fires. If you're into daily planning and prioritizing, then by definition you live with urgencies and crises. Important but not urgent activities are easily pushed out by daily planning. When you are guided by an internal compass or set of principles, you begin to see that the idea that I am in control is an arrogant concept. You have to humbly submit yourself to natural laws that ultimately govern anyway. If you internalize those laws and principles, you create a highly educated conscience. And if you are open to it, you will keep first things first.
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Stop Wasting Time

Imagine a large building that looks like a bank but is not. A brass marker on the front door reads: "Time for Sale." All day long, people rush in and out of the building to purchase time. A man says, "Now I will buy the five years I need to prepare for a big promotion." A woman says, "I wasted the last three years I had with my daughter; I will buy them back and make them more productive." Each person leaves the building with what they desperately wanted: time to do the many things they had failed to do, or that they wanted to do. You stop one man, a business executive, and ask him, "What will you now do differently with your time than you have done before? How will you be more effective?" The man only returns a blank stare. He has no idea what he will do differently or how he will be more effective. Time is the currency of your life. How will you invest it? Four Generations of Time Management To be wise investors of time, the currency of life, we need both a philosophy and a tool to implement it. Over the last four decades, we've seen four generations of time management tools. Each generation has moved us toward greater control of our lives. The first generation could be characterized by notes and "to do" checklists. These help us to identify tasks and to recognize the many demands placed on our time. However, many "planners" and "organizers" are nothing more than note pads in expensive binders. In fact, they often provide a false sense of organization and planning. First-generation managers often take the course of least resistance. They experience little pain or strain because they "go with the flow." Externally imposed disciplines and schedules give them the feeling that they aren't responsible for results. These managers, by definition, are not effective people. They produce very little, and their lifestyle does nothing to build their production capability. Buffeted by outside forces, they are often seen as undependable and irresponsible, and they have very little sense of control and self-esteem. The second generation includes calendars and appointment books, reflecting an attempt to look ahead and to schedule events and activities. These tools encourage "daily planning," and some unknowingly reinforce habits of crisis management and provide hundreds of special forms to give the illusion of productivity. Second-generation managers assume a little more control. They plan and schedule in advance and generally are seen as more responsible because they "show up" when they're supposed to. But again, their activities have no priority or correlation to deeper values and goals. They have few significant achievements and tend to be schedule-oriented. The third generation adds the important ideas of prioritizing activities, clarifying values, and aligning activities with values and goals. These tools emphasize daily planning and goal setting to direct one's time and energy. Most third-generation planners focus us on completing daily tasks, on efficiency; however, they don't help us improve our effectiveness. They are ill suited to an increasingly complex world of interconnected lives and interdependent responsibilities.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Third-generation managers clarify values, set goals, plan each day and work on what they consider to be top priorities. While they may take a step forward in productivity, they often lose perspective. Their "daily planning" focuses them on the urgent, the "now." Seldom do they question the importance of the activity in the first place, nor do they consider activities in the context of principles, personal mission, roles, and goals. Basically, they prioritize the pressing problems and crises of the day, making no provision for managing roles in a balanced way. Moreover, they tend to over-schedule the day, resulting in the desire to throw away the plan and escape to diversions. The fourth generation focuses on activities that are important but not necessarily urgent. The key is not just to prioritize what's on the schedule but to schedule priorities and then organize around them. Fourth-generation managers open new windows of effectiveness in their personal and professional lives. They are more efficient with things, more effective with people. They realize that contribution and achievement are often determined by the quality of their relationships and the overall balance of their lives. Their focus, therefore, is on effectiveness and results, not on efficiency and methods. Effective people don't just do things differently, they do different things. Avoiding the Activity Trap This time management matrix defines activities in terms of "urgent" or "not urgent" and "important" or "not important." The key to effectiveness is to keep crises and pressing problems (Quadrant I) to a minimum, and to eliminate as many urgent but not important activities (Quadrant III) as possible by placing priority on the important but not urgent (Quadrant II). Effective people are not problem-minded; they're opportunity minded. They feed opportunities and starve problems. They think preventively. They have genuine Quadrant I emergencies that require their immediate attention, but with prevention and planning, they keep the number comparatively small. They maintain balance by focusing on the capacity-building activities of Quadrant II. Quadrant II is at the heart of effective management and leadership. It deals with such things as writing a personal mission statement, long-range planning, exercising, preventative maintenance, preparation-all those things we know we need to do but seldom get around to doing, because they aren't urgent. Time spent in Quadrant II is time spent in the "general's tent." Here we map out our campaigns, do strategic planning, anticipate and reduce crises, and focus on high-leverage activities that pay such huge dividends in terms of desired results. To lead your life and "leverage" your talents, devote more time to Quadrant II, less time to activities that are pressing, proximate, popular or pleasant. Say "no" to some things. If you're not saying "no" to the unimportant, you may not be able to say, "yes" to the important. Even "the good" can keep you from better and best-keep you from making your unique contribution if you let it. Indeed, the good is often the enemy of the best. The answer, then, to the activity trap is to learn to say "no" to those things in Quadrant III that are urgent but not important, and "yes" to those things in Quadrant II which are not urgent, but vitally important. Features of Fourth-Generation Organizers A fourth-generation organizer meets six important criteria. Coherence. Coherence suggests harmony, unity and integrity between your vision and mission, your roles and goals, your priorities and plans, and your desires and discipline. In your planner,
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories there should be a place for your personal mission statement, your roles and both short- and long-term goals. Balance. True effectiveness requires balance, and your organizer should help you create and maintain it. Some people seem to think that success in one area can compensate for failure in other areas of life. But can it really? Can success in your profession compensate for a broken marriage, ruined health, or weakness in personal character? Focus. Your planner should encourage you to organize on a weekly basis and to spend more time in Quadrant II to achieve greater life balance. Most societies and cultures operate within the framework of the week, designating certain days for business and others for relaxation or inspiration. While most people think in terms of weeks, their planning tools focus them on dayson organizing crises and busy work. Flexibility. Your planning tool should be your servant, never your master. Since it has to work for you, it should be tailored to your style, your needs, your particular ways. Portability. Your tool should also be portable so that you have access to important data at all times. You may want to review your personal mission statement while riding the bus or measure the value of a new opportunity against something you already have planned. People Dimension. A fourth-generation tool enables you to be more efficient with things, more effective with people. The Quadrant II lifestyle may require you to subordinate schedules to people. Your tool needs to reflect that value, to facilitate it, rather than create guilt when schedules aren't met. At one point in his life, one of my sons was deeply into scheduling and efficiency. One day he had a very tight schedule with down-to-the-minute time allocations for every activity, including picking up some books, washing his car, and "dropping" Carol, his girlfriend. Everything went according to schedule until it came to Carol. They had been dating for a long period of time, and he had finally concluded that the relationship would not work out. So, congruent with his efficiency model, he called her and scheduled a ten-minute visit at her home. Needless to say, the news was very traumatic to her. Two hours after the visit began, he was still deeply involved in a very intense conversation with her. Even then, the one visit was not enough. The situation was frustrating for them both. Becoming an Effective Self-Manager Effective organizing involves the following five activities. Discovering your personal mission. Real self-management begins with you, with your own personal vision of who you are. Your mission statement should deal with 1) what you want to do or accomplish, what contributions you want to make; and 2) what you want to be, what character traits, qualities and talents you want to have. And it should cover three dimensions: personal, family, professional. As you "discover" what you want to be and do, write a first draft of your personal mission statement. Over time, refine it and put a copy in the front of your organizer, and review weekly as you go through the planning process. Defining roles. We live our lives in terms of roles-roles at work, in the family, the community, and in other areas of life. These roles give order to what we want to do and to be. For example, you may define your family role as "wife" and "mother" or "husband" and "father." Your profession may involve several roles-in administration, marketing, personnel and long-range planning. Record the key "roles" or functions you fill. Since research shows that it is ineffective to attempt to manage more than seven categories, limit your roles to seven, combining some functions if necessary.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Selecting Goals. As you review your roles, ask yourself, "This week, what are the two or three most important things I can do to move forward in that role?" Write as goals the two or three important things you feel you should accomplish in each role during the next seven days. Shortterm goals should be tied to your longer-term goals and to your mission statement. Scheduling Events. As you look at the week ahead with your goals in mind, consider the opportunities for implementation each day. For example, you may want to set a goal to work on your personal mission statement on Sunday or to exercise for one hour three mornings a week. There are some goals that you may only be able to accomplish during business hours, or some that you can only do in the evenings or weekends. Prioritizing Activities. As you organize your week and plan your day, focus on those activities that produce the greatest results. Determine that you will accomplish your highest priorities first, so that the things that matter most are never at the mercy of the things that matter least. Remember to make appointments with yourself to act upon your goals-and when you set an appointment with yourself, keep it. Also, schedule time for other important activities. Ask yourself: "What one activity, if done consistently and well, would greatly improve the quality of my life and my standard of living?" Since these activities invariably fall into Quadrant II, find ways to fit them into your schedule. Living a Quadrant II lifestyle This is primarily a function of our independent will, our self-discipline, our integrity, and commitment-not to short-term goals and schedules or to the impulse of the moment, but to the correct principles and our own deepest values, which give meaning and context to our goals, our schedules, and our lives. As you go through your week, your commitment will be tested. The popularity of reacting to the urgent but unimportant priorities of other people in Quadrant III or the pleasure of escaping to Quadrant IV will threaten to overpower the important Quadrant II activities you have planned. Your test is focus on the priorities you have scheduled or subordinate your schedule to higher values; to rise above the limiting perspective of a single day and keep in touch with your deepest values; and to invest your time, the currency of your life, in activities that will balance your life, leverage your talents and make best use of your time and all of your other resources.
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The Perspective of the Week

By Stephen R. Covey from First Things First Copyright (c) 2001 by Franklin Covey Co. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Professional photographers work with a variety of lenses. They use ultra-wide-angle and wideangle lenses to capture the big picture. They use a telephoto lens to bring an object closer. They use a normal lens to capture the view that most closely resembles what's seen by the human eye. They use a micro lens for close-up work. Part of their expertise is in knowing when to use each lens to create the desired result. Like the photographer, part of our expertise in personal leadership is knowing when to focus in the most effective way. Most time management tools and techniques focus on daily planning, and there seems to be good rationale for the focus. We can only live one day at a time. The day is the smallest complete natural unit of time-the sun rises and sets, and we face a new agenda every 24 hours. We can plan the day, set daily goals, schedule appointments, and prioritize activities. And when one day is over, we can take what's left and plan, schedule, and prioritize it all over again tomorrow. Nothing gets lost in the cracks. But the problem with focusing on daily planning is that it's like trying to walk down the street while looking through the telephoto lens of a camera. It keeps us focused on what's right in front of us-what's pressing, proximate, and urgent. So we're essentially into prioritizing crises. While the objective of most daily planning approaches is to help us Put First Things First, the reality is that daily planning keeps us focused on doing urgent things first. The perspective is insufficient to accomplish the result. Of course, we can't just be focused on the big picture either. If we don't translate vision into action, we lose touch with reality, become idealistic dreamers, and lose credibility with ourselves and with others. So, how do we resolve this dilemma and keep things in focus and in perspective? The perspective of the week provides a synergistic "third alternative" solution that links the big picture to the day in a balanced, realistic way. Because it creates these vital connections, the week becomes the "normal lens" that gives the most accurate perspective for creating a balanced quality life. Three Operating Perspectives The week represents a complete patch in the fabric of life. It has the workdays, evenings, and the weekend. It's close enough to be highly relevant, but distant enough to provide context and perspective. It's the international standard: many business, education, government, and other facets of society operate within the framework of the week. In addition, the week provides us with three useful operating perspectives: 1) balanced renewal, 2) whole-parts-whole, and 3) content in context. 1. Balanced Renewal The perspective of the week prompts us to plan for renewal-a time for recreation and reflectionweekly and daily. Weekly Renewal
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Most cultures support the notion of weekly renewal. The Judeo-Christian world, for example, honors a weekly Sabbath-one day in seven expressly devoted to reflection and recommitment. The academic world expands this concept to include the sabbatical, the one year in seven devoted to the personal development of the instructor. The most common examples of weekly renewal are found in weekend activities that may include recreational sports or social events with family and friends. Quadrant II organizing helps us to make weekly renewal part of a balanced lifestyle. Instead of living day after day pressed up against the urgent until we feel we have to break out and escape to Quadrant IV, we can proactively plan genuine re-creation and renewal as a needed change of pace between creative periods. Renewal is not mindless, purposeless escape activity. It includes such valuable Quadrant II activities as: Building, repairing, or renewing relationships with family and friends. Recommitting to deep values through religious activities. Restoring energy through rest and recreation. Developing talents through special interests and hobbies. Contributing through community service. Experience teaches us the immense value of weekly renewal. When we're pressed by urgency and work day after day and into the weekends without any change of activity or pace, we feel ourselves losing our edge, our energy, and our perspective in every area of life. It's like reading a run-on sentence that goes on for pages without a comma or period, or like listening to a piece of music without any phrasing. When we finally do escape to Quadrant IV, the change in pace gives some relief, but we generally feel empty and dissatisfied, neither renewed nor re-created. Personal leadership is cultivating the wisdom to recognize our need for renewal and to ensure that each week provides activities that are genuinely re-creational in nature. Quadrant II weekly organizing itself is a renewing activity. Through it, we renew our awareness of our needs and capacities and True North principles. We renew our connection with our four human endowments and our commitment to a path of contribution, of living for purposes higher than self. We renew the passion of vision, the balance of roles, the power of goals in our lives. After experimenting with weekly organizing, one man wrote to say: I used to spend Sunday evenings in Quadrant IV watching TV. But I've found it's the point in the week when I have the most peace of mind. I've attended church services. I've spent time with my family. That creates an excellent frame of mind for reviewing my mission, roles, and goals. So I now block out time on Sunday evenings to plan the upcoming week. Some people prefer to organize on Friday afternoon before they leave the office. Others prefer Sunday morning or first thing Monday morning. The important thing is to do it when you can be alone to connect with your deep inner life. Without this regular renewal, people are generally pushed in other directions. Instead of acting, they're constantly being acted upon. Daily Renewal The perspective of the week provides a context for balance in daily renewal. If you were to devote an hour a day to renewal, for example, you might interpret "balance" to mean that you exercise for 15 minutes, listen to your teenage daughter for 15 minutes, study for 15 minutes, and meditate for 15 minutes. But consider the increased possibilities when you expand your perspective to the week. Health experts say that to achieve the "training effect," you need to invest at least 30 minutes three times a week in vigorous exercise, and rest the body between workouts. Emphasizing physical renewal on those three days will have a more positive effect than faithfully spending 15 minutes
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories a day doing light exercise. On the days you don't do vigorous resistive exercise, you could stretch or go for a walk-perhaps increasing the value of that activity by doing it with your spouse or listening to tapes at the same time. On those days, you could spend more time on in-depth educational or inspirational reading. Though the nature and timing of each activity varies over the week, we're sharpening the saw in a balanced, optimal way. 2. Whole-Parts-Whole As we review our mission statement, we see the whole-the big picture, the end in mind, the meaning in what we do. But to get lost in the whole is to become an idealistic dreamer. So we then move to the parts-our roles and goals. We take a "close-up" look at each part of our lives. But to get lost in the parts is to make our life more mechanical, compartmentalized, or fragmented. So as part of the process, we bring them together again into the whole, marrying the strengths of both perspectives through the normal lens of weekly organizing. As we bring them together, we can see the interrelatedness of the parts. We see how each part of life-work, family, personal development, community activity-empowers us to contribute and fulfill our mission. We see how each part contributes to every other part, how character and competence in any role benefits us in all roles. This "whole-parts-whole" perspective enables us to create synergy and to remove artificial barriers among roles and goals. Creating Synergy Between Goals Whole-parts-whole thinking empowers us to create synergy among roles and goals. We recognize that some activities can be combined and accomplished in ways that are actually better than if each activity were pursued separately. We also recognize that some activities should not be combined-they need exclusive focus. We can then adjust the rest of our activities with wisdom, knowing how each impacts the other. For example, as we do our weekly organizing, we might combine a parental goal "to build a relationship with my son" with a Sharpen the Saw goal "to exercise my body" by planning a time to take your son for a swim. We might combine a goal to learn a new language with a community service goal by volunteering to work with minority groups in need of social support. As we really begin to develop an Abundance Mentality, we find ways to synthesize even more goals. We could fix a gourmet meal, meet the new neighbors, and prepare for next month's service club meeting by cooking enough for three meals at once-serving one to the family, taking one to the new neighbors, and freezing one so we don't have to spend time preparing dinner on the night of the service club meeting. The possibilities are endless. There are an infinite number of ways we can create synergy in our lives that we might never see with a segmented, linear perspective. The objective, however, is not to cram as many activities as possible into our schedule or to try to do everything at once. We're not trying to be Superman or Superwoman. The objective is to use our creative imagination to come up with synergistic, principle-based ways to accomplish goals that create even greater results than would be achieved if accomplished separately. Removing Artificial Barriers We often tend to build walls between work, family, and personal time. We act as if what we do in one area doesn't affect what we do in the others. Yet, we all know that these barriers are artificial. A bad day at the office may create a sense of hopelessness, a lack of contribution that affects us in our personal and family lives. Personal and family struggles can affect the quality of
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide our work. On the other hand, a quality family relationship can positively impact our work, and when something wonderful happens at work, we often want to share it with family and friends. Life is one indivisible whole. As we make connections between the various aspects of our lives and our overall sense of purpose, we discover that renewal in any role creates renewal in other roles as well. At work, we may connect with some of the purposes of the organization, and find fulfillment by contributing to them. We may find fulfillment in the service we provide for our customers or in the growth and development of the people we train or work with. As we invest and connect in ways that bring growth and contribution, we discover that the person who comes home from work at night is stronger and better than the one who left for work in the morning. 3. Content in Context Priority is a function of context, or the "bigger picture" in which something occurs. For example, if you were told right now that someone close to you was having a serious problem and needed assistance, you'd probably put down this book and go to help. Why? Because the context for deciding how best to spend your time had changed. Weekly organizing puts content-the activities of our lives-into the context of what's important in our lives. It's big-picture renewal that puts us in touch with the purposes and patterns of life. It creates a powerful framework that represents our best thinking around what first things are and how we can put them first during the next seven days of our lives. When urgency pushes us, moods pull us, or unexpected opportunities beckon, we have something solid against which we can weigh the value of the change. We can put content in context and choose the "best" over the "good." As one individual noted: Before I practiced weekly organizing, I would jump whenever the telephone would ring. If someone told me of a committee meeting, I would go. Now I can say, "I'd love to be there, but I have a commitment at that time with my daughter." Sometimes I have to cancel an appointment with a friend because of responsibilities at work, but I reschedule the appointment for another time if it's important. Nothing goes on the schedule unless it's important. Quadrant II organizing is not prioritizing what's on the schedule; it's scheduling priorities. It's not filling every time slot with scheduled activity; it's putting the "big rocks" in first and filling in with whatever sand, gravel, and water we need to add. The objective is not to fill the container to the brim, but to make sure that the big rocks are there and that the container is not so full it can't accommodate conscience-directed change. To help keep content in context, many people find it helpful to create time zones and preserve time for preparation. Creating Time Zones Time zones are large, interchangeable blocks of time set aside for specific important activities. If family activity is a high value with you, you might want to regularly block out Saturday mornings for family activities as you organize your week. In doing this, you're not making an appointment or a firm commitment that every Saturday morning, without fail, you'll do some family activity. But as you plan other activities and goals, you tend to keep that time reserved for family activities. If you're active in a local community project or a service club that meets on Thursday evenings two weeks out of the month, you might block out Thursday evening for that service activity.
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories When no meeting is held, you could use the time to work on the membership roster, or whatever else you may need to do to fulfill that role. In your job, you may want to block out one morning a week for one-on-one staff interviews. When people want to see you, you can channel your appointments toward that established time zone. You might set aside another block of time during the week to prospect for new clients, read trade journals, or work on long-term planning. Time zones can provide a template for more effective weekly organizing. The idea is not to fill the entire week with time zones, but to set aside a few specific time periods to provide focus for high-priority activities. Setting Aside Time to Prepare Much of our frustration and anxiety comes from the feeling of being unprepared. Many activities become urgent as a result of lack of proper preparation. Through weekly organizing, we create a framework that allows for and encourages preparation. For example, if you're supposed to make an important presentation at a meeting set for Friday morning, you may need to set aside some time on Wednesday to prepare and on Thursday to practice. If you plan to work in your garden on Saturday morning, you may need to go to the store on Friday to purchase seeds or tools. The successful experiences most of us would like to have in life are rarely an accident. They are almost always an achievement, the result of careful planning and thorough preparation. The moment of clarity when we organize the week gives us the perspective to set aside the time necessary to make that preparation possible. Obviously, when things go as planned, we're generally much more effective when we're prepared. But even if things change, time spent in preparation empowers us to more quickly and effectively recognize the value and cost of change, and to move in the right direction. Once you gain the perspective of the week, you'll find it hard to limit yourself to the myopic view of the day. Content in context empowers you to make more wise and effective decisions in your moments of choice. The Quality-of-Life Difference An attempt to Put First Things First in our lives with a single-dimensional chronos paradigm is simplistic. It's saying that what's important in our lives and how well we're doing are functions of mechanical clocks and printed calendars. The tick of the clock determines the pace of our lives. But the wide-range perspective created through the weekly organizing process creates whole new levels of seeing and being. The best way to understand the difference is to experience it. We often hear comments such as these: My profession was consuming most of my time, but not any longer. I feel as if a great weight has been lifted off my shoulders and I'm enjoying life again. I'm getting more done at work and still having plenty of time for my other roles. My life is regaining a sense of balance. I'm discovering a significant amount of quality time. Before, I was always saying, "There just aren't enough hours in the day, enough days in the week. I've got too much to do." I fall back into old habits sometimes, but I have the comfort of knowing that I'm anchored and balanced, and I can adjust very quickly. There are rushes, work crunches that just won't wait, but the reward is that I can then block out some time for myself and know, really know, that this is as important as any Quadrant I client emergency or anything else. Before I thought I had to schedule every hour of the day. Then I realized that the point was not to schedule every little thing but to work on first things first.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide The most noticeable change has been with my children. Mondays were always hectic days, with my daughter going horseback riding and my son off to soccer practice and the whole family trying to get dinner together in between events. In organizing my week, I suggested to my wife that we make this a special time with the kids, each taking one child and going out to eat before or after the event, and that we put our focus on the child rather than the rushing around. Last Monday, after working with the plan for two weeks, my son took my hand as we were leaving the fast food restaurant on our way to soccer practice. "Monday's my favorite day of the week, Dad," he said as we walked to the car. "I don't even care which of you is with me. I just like to talk." There are quality-of-life issues that simply can't be seen through a myopic chronos paradigm. Even the simple addition of a weekly worksheet to a daily planning system creates a significant difference. But there's an even more powerful difference when we add the kairos or abundance paradigm-when we see that all parts of our lives matter to our mission, and that synergy among the parts creates energy in the whole. Life becomes a productive cycle of growth and continuous learning, fulfilling relationships, and meaningful contribution. The perspective of the week nurtures balance and perspective, and provides the context for making effective choices, moment by moment, regarding the things we decide to put first in our lives.
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The Power of Goals

By Stephen R. Covey From First Things First Copyright (c) 2001 by Franklin Covey Co. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
One of the most common elements of all self-help and management literature is the idea of the power of goals. We've been told to set long-term goals, short-term goals, daily goals, monthly goals, personal goals, organizational goals, 10-year goals, lifetime goals. The virtues of "measurable, specific, and time-bound" goals have been preached from the pulpit of self-help books for generations. Goal setting is obviously a powerful process. It's based on the same principle of focus that allows us to concentrate rays of diffused sunlight into a force powerful enough to start a fire. It's the manifestation of creative imagination and independent will. It's practicality of "eating our elephants one bite at a time," of translating vision into achievable, actionable doing. It's a common denominator of successful individuals and organizations. But despite their obvious value, our experience with and feelings about goals are mixed. Some of us can set heroic goals, exercise tremendous discipline, and pay the price for incredible achievement. Others can't keep a New Year's resolution to pass up dessert two days in a row. Some see goals as the primary factor shaping the destiny of individuals and nations. Others see them as superficial, pie-in-the-sky idealism that has no staying power in the "real" world. Some people stick to a goal, no matter what. And some goals stick to us, no matter what. Some authors tell us that if we think positively, we can do anything; others tell us to stop beating ourselves up when we find out we can't. Two Areas of Pain In all our experience around goal setting, there seem to be two major areas of pain: 1) the blow to our integrity and courage when we don't achieve our goals; and 2) the sometimes devastating results when we do. Withdrawals from the "Personal Integrity Account" Each of us has what we might call a "Personal Integrity Account" that reflects the amount of trust we have in ourselves. When we make and keep commitments, such as setting and achieving goals, we make deposits. We increase our confidence in our own trustworthiness, in our ability to make and keep commitments to ourselves and to others. A high balance in this account is a great source of strength and security. But when we don't achieve our goals, we make withdrawals, and this becomes a source of great pain. Over time, frequent withdrawals cause us to lose confidence in our ability to make and keep commitments, and to trust ourselves and others. Cynicism and rationalization follow, and these attitudes sever us from the power of setting and achieving meaningful goals. Then, when we need strength of character to meet critical challenges in our lives, we find it just isn't there. Once I served as an assistant in a survival camp and led a group of students on an overnight hike. We ended up in a valley where we had to cross a river hand-over-hand on a rope. We were exhausted, fatigued, and dehydrated. We'd had no food or water for about 24 hours. But we knew that across that raging, forty-foot-wide river was breakfast. As one of the leaders of the group, I was supposed to go first. I started out with determination and even a little arrogance. I even started bouncing around on the rope and showing off. But by
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide the time I got half way over, I felt my strength starting to go. I tried every technique I knew-from sheer willpower to visualizing myself making it across and eating that food-but I reached the point where I was afraid to even take my hand off the rope to move forward. I didn't have the confidence my other hand could continue to hold up my body weight. Right in the middle of the river, I fell. The strength just wasn't there. I was dangling on my safety rope on top of this churning water. The students loved it! "Pride goeth before the fall." As it turned out, most of them had the same experience. Only a few had the strength to make it. Building character strength is like building physical strength. When the test comes, if you don't have it, no cosmetics can disguise the fact that it just isn't there. You can't fake it. It takes strength to set a heroic goal, to work on chronic problems instead of going for "quick fix," to stay with your commitments when the tide of popular opinion turns against you. There are many reasons why we don't achieve our goals. Sometimes the goals we set are unrealistic. We create expectations that don't reflect any sense of self-awareness. New Year's resolutions are typical examples. Suddenly, we expect to change the way we eat, the way we exercise, or the way we treat people simply because the calendar has changed from December 31 to January 1. It's like expecting one of our children to learn to crawl, eat with a fork, and drive a car all in the same day. Our goals are based on illusion, with little self-awareness or regard for the principles of natural growth. Sometimes we set goals and work to achieve them, but either the circumstances change or we change. A new opportunity surfaces; there's a shift in the economy; another person comes into the picture; we get a different perspective. If we hold onto our goals, they become masters instead of servants. But if we let them go, we often feel uneasy or guilty that we didn't keep our commitment. We find it hard to maintain a high balance in our Personal Integrity Account when we constantly change our goals or fail to achieve our goals. Ladders Against the Wrong Wall While failing to achieve our goals creates painful problems, accomplishing them can as well. Sometimes the goals we achieve are at the expense of other more important things in our lives. It's the "ladder against the wrong wall" syndrome, meaning we climb the proverbial ladder of success only to find that it's leaning against the wrong wall for us. One of our associates shared this story: Several years ago, a man announced to his friends and neighbors that his goal for the year was to earn a million dollars. He was an entrepreneur who believed, "Give me a good idea and I can sell a million." He developed and patented a state-of-the-art recreational product, and then drove around the country selling it. Occasionally he would take one of his kids with him on the road for a week or so. His wife complained to him about taking the kids, saying, "When they come back, they stop saying their prayers and doing their homework. They just party the whole week. Don't take the kids if you aren't going to help them do the things they ought to be doing." Well, at the end of the year, the man announced that he had met his goal: He made a million dollars. Shortly after, however, he and his wife divorced. A couple of his kids wound up on drugs. Another went off the deep end. Basically the whole family disintegrated. This man was focused on a single goal and measured everything against it. But he failed to count the total cost: That million dollars cost him a lot more than it was worth. When we become consumed by a single goal, we're like a horse with blinders, unable to see anything else. Sometimes our goals are "hit-and-run" goals that leave bodies strewn along the
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories way. At other times, our goals may be well intended, but accomplishing them creates other undesirable results. We typically set a goal with the expectation that meeting it will create positive change and quality-of-life results. But often the change isn't so positive. Accomplishing one goal impacts other areas of life in a negative way. When we come face-to-face with the results, we become disillusioned. In light of this "disillusioned if we do, and doomed if we don't" dilemma regarding goals, is it any wonder that many of us feel uncomfortable with the goal-setting process? Is it possible to have the power without the problems? To build a strong Personal Integrity Account by setting and achieving meaningful goals on a regular basis? To be able to let go of or change, or even partly reach, a goal and still maintain, or even add to, our Personal Integrity Account? To ensure that our ladders are leaning against the right walls? We affirm that it is possible-even that we can access a significant increase in the power of goal setting. The key is in using our four human endowments in a synergistic way in setting and achieving principle-based goals. Using Our Four Human Endowments Done well, traditional goal setting is powerful because it accesses the power of two of our unique endowments: creative imagination and independent will. We use our creative imagination to visualize, to conceive of possibilities beyond our direct experience. We use our independent will to make choices, to transcend background, scripting, and circumstance. When we set a goal, we're saying, "I can envision something different than what is, and I choose to focus my efforts to create it." We use our imagination to keep the goal in mind, and our independent will to pay the price to achieve it. The power of these two endowments is formidable-it's the power of purposeful living, the fundamental process of conscious change. But it's only a small part of the power available to us. What's often missing in the goal-setting process is the power of two other endowments: Conscience-the deep connection of goals to mission, needs, and principles Self-awareness-the accurate assessment of our capacity and the balance in our Personal Integrity Account. Let's take a closer look at these two endowments to see how they can empower us to set and achieve meaningful goals. Conscience Creates Alignment with Mission and Principles Conscience is powerful because it creates alignment between mission and principles and gives guidance in the moment of choice. The moment we set a goal-the moment we consciously decide to focus our time and energy toward a particular purpose-is a moment of choice. What determines that choice? Is it the social mirror, the agendas of others, values that are truncated from fundamental principles, needs, and capacities? Or is it a deep, principle-based, conscience-connected, contribution-focused fire within? Goals that are connected to our inner life have the power of passion and principle. They're fueled by The Fire Within and based on True North principles that create quality-of-life results. One of the best ways to access this power is to ask three vital questions: What? Why? and How? What?
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide What do I desire to accomplish? What is the contribution I want to make? What is the end I have in mind? A principle-based "what" focuses on growth and contribution. It isn't just setting and achieving goals that creates quality of life. Hitler set and met goals. So did Gandhi. The difference is what they chose to focus on. What we seek, we generally find. When we set goals that are in harmony with conscience and the principles that create quality of life, we seek-and find-the best. Why? Why do I want to do it? Does my goal grow out of mission, needs, and principles? Does it empower me to contribute through my roles? In the context of mission and vision, the what may be easier to identify than the "why" and "how." The key to motivation is motive. It's the "why." It's what gives us the energy to stay strong in hard moments. It gives us the strength to say "no" because we connect with a deeper "yes" burning inside. If a goal isn't connected to a deep "why," it may be good, but it usually isn't best. We need to question the goal. If it is connected, we need to push our thinking and feeling until we break through and create an open flow between the passion of vision and the goal. The stronger the connection, the stronger and more sustained the motivation. How? How am I going to do it? What are the key principles that will empower me to achieve my purpose? What strategies can I use to implement these principles? Once we create alignment between the "what" and the "why," we're ready to look at the "how." The choice of "how" often boils down to a choice between "control" and "release" styles of thinking and managing. If our paradigm is one of control, we assume that people have to be tightly supervised if they're going to produce or perform well. If our paradigm is one of release, our assumption is that, given the freedom, opportunity, and support, people will bring out the highest and best within them and accomplish great things. Self-Awareness Empowers Us to Build Integrity Our trustworthiness is only as high as the balance in our Personal Integrity Account. Because our integrity is the basis of our confidence in ourselves and the confidence we inspire in others, one of the greatest manifestations of effective personal leadership is the exercise of care and wisdom in building a high positive balance in that account. Primarily, we build it through the exercise of independent will in making and keeping commitments. But without self-awareness, we don't have the wisdom necessary to manage such an account. We may set our goals too high, turning potential deposits into huge withdrawals when we fail to achieve them. We may set our goals too low, depositing pennies when we could be depositing dollars. We may pass up daily, weekly, moment-by-moment opportunities to make deposits because we're too busy blaming circumstances or other people for our own failure to achieve our goals. Self-awareness involves deep personal honesty. It comes from asking and answering hard questions: Do I really want to do it? Am I willing to pay the price? Do I have enough strength to do it?
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories Do I accept the responsibility for my own growth? Am I settling for mediocrity when I could be achieving excellence? Am I blaming and accusing others for my own inability to set and achieve goals? Self-awareness prompts us to start where we are-no illusions, no excuses-and helps us to set realistic goals. On the other hand, it also doesn't allow us to cop out with mediocrity. It helps us recognize and respect our need to stretch, to push the limits, to grow. Since much of our frustration in life comes as a result of unmet expectations, the ability to set goals that are both realistic and challenging goes a long way toward empowering us to create peace and positive growth in our lives. Self-awareness is ear to the voice of conscience. It helps us to recognize that there are principles independent of us, to understand the futility of trying to become a law unto ourselves. It helps us to be humble and open to growth and change, to realize that we are neither omniscient nor omnipotent when we set a goal. To the best of our awareness at the time, out of all the good things we could do, we choose the best thing, for the best reason, and we plan to do it in the best way. But the situation may change. We may change. And we can't act with integrity without being open to that change. Self-awareness empowers us to ask: Am I allowing the good to take the place of the best? The best may be the goal we set. The best may be in the unexpected opportunity, the new knowledge, the new options created by increased understanding. If change is driven primarily by urgency, mood, or opposition, it takes us away from the best. If change is driven by mission, conscience, and principles, it moves us toward the best. To have the self-awareness to know the difference between the good and the best, and to act based on mission, conscience, and principles is to make the most significant deposits in our Personal Integrity Account. Integrity means more than sticking to a goal, no matter what. It's integrity of system, an integrated process that creates an open connection between the mission and the moment. How to Set and Achieve Principle-Based Goals Without principles, goals will never have the power to produce quality-of-life results. You can want to do the right thing, and you can even want to do it for the right reasons. But if you don't apply the right principles, you can still hit a wall. A principle-based goal is all three: the right thing, for the right reason, in the right way. Principle based goal-setting involves the full, synergistic use of all four human endowments: Through conscience, we connect with the passion of vision and mission, and the power of principles. Through creative imagination, we envision possibility and synergistic, creative ways to achieve it. Through self-awareness, we set goals with realistic stretch and stay open to consciencedriven change. Through independent will, we make purposeful choice and carry it out; we have the integrity to walk our talk. The principle-based, goal-setting process is most effective when it includes: 1) setting "context" goals, 2) keeping a "perhaps" list, and 3) setting weekly goals. 1. Setting "Context" goals.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Most people find it helpful to connect weekly goals with the context provided by their mission statement through the use of long-term and mid-range goals. But the terms "long-term" and "mid-range" put these goals into a chronos framework. While timing may be an important issue, we suggest that other issues such as relationships with people and other goals and events are better recognized through "context" goals. The term "context" reminds us that personal leadership is not just having a long-range view- it's having broad-range understanding. If you organize around your roles, you could keep a page of context goals under each role in your organizer for easy access. The what/why/how format is an effective way to capture these goals. For example, a context goal in your "Sharpen the Saw" role might look like this: WHAT: My goal is to maintain a healthy, well-disciplined body. WHY: So that: I can have the strength, endurance, and physical presentation necessary to effectively fulfill my missions. I can be an example to my children and to others in effective health maintenance. I can build my personal character strength. HOW: Good nutrition. I will increase my intake of fresh fruits and vegetables, complex carbohydrates, whole grains, poultry, and fish; I will decrease my intake of sugars, fats, salt, and red meats; and I will eat smaller meals more frequently. Physical maintenance. I will do 30 minutes of aerobic exercise four times a week; I will join a basketball league; and I will get seven hours of sleep a night by retiring and rising early. Mind/body connection. I will think positive thoughts about my body and health; I will read and attend seminars and workshops to learn more about health. Focus. I will attend to specific health problems. This "what/why/how" format creates the open connection between mission, principles, and goals. As you prepare to set your weekly goals, you can review these context goals to immediately tap into that connection and select a bite-sized actionable piece that will move you toward them. Looking at a goal in this way reaffirms the interconnectedness of our lives. Although this goal might be considered a "physical" goal and filed under the "Sharpen the Saw" role, think of how interrelated it is with each of the other dimensions and with all other roles. For example, most people report that one of the greatest benefits of regular physical exercise is not in the physical, but in the spiritual dimension-the increase in integrity and character strength. The mental dimension-learning more about health, thinking healthy thoughts, and reducing stress-powerfully impacts the effectiveness of this "physical" goal. Exercising with friends or family members can create a rich social, as well as physical, experience. Increased health empowers us in the physical, mental, social, and spiritual dimensions of all our other roles. An awareness of this interconnectedness keeps us open to abundance thinking and empowers us to create a powerful synergy among our goals. 2. Keeping a "Perhaps" List One problem we have in dealing with goals is that often we read a book, attend a seminar, or have a conversation with someone and come away from the experience with an idea of
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories something we really want to do. We're not ready to set a goal, but we don't want to lose the idea. Most of the time, we let it wander around in an already over-cluttered cerebral waiting room, floating in and out of awareness, distracting us from the task at hand, and causing a vague uneasiness of something not yet done. Or we write it down on a generic "to do" list that collects items faster than they can ever be accomplished, mingles top-priority items with things that don't matter much, and constantly reminds us of all we haven't done. Far more effective is the "perhaps list," a list kept under each role of things you might want to do. Whenever an idea occurs to you, write it on the "perhaps list" under the appropriate role for future consideration. Writing it here does not mean it's a goal or a commitment. Perhaps you'll do it; perhaps you won't. It's simply input to be considered for future organizing. Your integrity is not on the line. Noting ideas on a "perhaps list" diffuses the anxiety and distraction, and makes them accessible for future consideration. During weekly organizing, you can look over the list, translate any item you wish to a goal for the week, keep it on the list for future reconsideration, or discard it as not really that important. 3. Setting Weekly Goals When we set our weekly goals, the what/why/how format becomes more a way of thinking about our roles and goals. As we set our goals, we look at each role and then we pause in that space between stimulus and response to ask: What are the one or two most important things I could do in this role this week that would have the greatest positive impact? The answer to this question may be in a feeling or impression that comes as we review our mission and roles. One man shared this experience: When I review my roles each week, I often get impressions of specific things I need to do, especially in my role as a father. Something will come to my mind regarding a particular child. I find I'm more aware of my children's individual needs, more sensitive and open to opportunities to make a difference. The answer may come as a result of reviewing our context goals in each role, or from an insight or idea we put on our "perhaps" list in a particular role during the week. As we review these things, we create an open connection between our deep inner life and our current situation. We create the context that gives meaning to our goals. Characteristics of Effective Weekly Goals As you set your goals, keep in mind five characteristics of effective weekly goals: They're driven by conscience. An effective goal is in harmony with our inner imperatives. It's not driven by urgency or reaction. It's not a reflection of the social mirror. It's something we feel, deep inside, we need to do, and it's in harmony with our mission and with True North principles. We need to be sensitive to our inner voice of conscience, especially as we select goals in our most unique roles, where we can have the greatest influence. We also need to maintain balance. It's important to remember that we don't necessarily need to set a goal in each role each week. There are times of short-term imbalance when wisdom suggests that we make the conscious choice not to set goals in some roles. They're often Quadrant II goals. The Quadrant II organizing process automatically creates a connection between the "what" and the "why." As a result, the goals that we select are typically
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide important, but not necessarily urgent. We may also select some Quadrant I goals that are both urgent and important, but we select them primarily because they're important. They reflect our four basic needs and capacities. Good goals can be about doing in the physical dimension, but they can also be about understanding and being (the spiritual dimension), relating (the social dimension), and growing or learning (the mental dimension). Many of us feel dissatisfied and imbalanced because the goals we pursue are essentially time-bound and physical. To ignore the reality of other vital dimensions is to severely limit our capacity to create meaningful quality of life. It's also to deprive ourselves of the incredible synergy that can be created among goals. They're in our Center of Focus. We each have what we call a Circle of Concern(tm) that encompasses everything we're concerned about-our health, a meeting with the boss, a teenage son's plans for the weekend, offensive magazines on display in a neighborhood convenience store, the President's foreign policy decisions, the threat of nuclear war. We also have another circle that usually falls within this Circle of Concern called the Circle of Influence(tm). This circle defines the area of concern where we can actually make a difference. We may not be able to influence the President's foreign policy decisions or the threat of nuclear war, but we can do something about our health. We may also be able to influence our son's weekend plans or the neighborhood store's magazine display. But the most effective use of our time and energy is generally in a third circle-the Center of Focus. In this circle are the things we're concerned about, that are within our ability to influence, that are aligned with our mission, and are timely. To spend time and effort in any other circle diminishes our effectiveness. When we operate in our Circle of Concern, we basically waste effort on things we have no ability to control or affect. When we operate within our Circle of Influence, we do some good, but what we do may be at the expense of something better. When we set and achieve goals that are in our Center of Focus, we maximize the use of our time and effort. Interestingly, we find that as we do this over time, our Circle of Influence automatically increases. We find positive ways to influence more people and circumstances. They're either determinations or concentrations. You may find it helpful to distinguish between determinations-things you're determined to do, no matter what-and concentrations, areas of pursuit you focus your efforts around. When you set a determination, you put your integrity on the line. This is when it's vital to follow through, to keep your commitment, to do what you said you were going to do. The only valid reason for not sticking to a determination would be if you became thoroughly convinced-through conscience and deep self-awareness-that the "best" goal you set had for some reason become only "good." Then, and only then, could you change with integrity. When you set a concentration, you identify an area where you desire to focus time and energy. You seek opportunities to do it. You move toward it. But you don't risk your integrity. If you don't do it, you lose the benefit of the time and energy you invested, but you don't make withdrawals from your Personal Integrity Account. Remember, you don't have to put your integrity on the line every time you set a weekly goal. In fact, it's important to manage your actual commitments with great care, being sensitive and wise in building the balance in your Personal Integrity Account. But your caution should not keep you from moving forward with purpose.
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories Confidence and Courage To set and work toward any goal is an act of courage. When we exercise the courage to set and act on goals that are connected to principles and conscience, we tend to achieve positive results. Over time, we create an upward spiral of confidence and courage. Our commitment becomes stronger than our moods. Eventually, our integrity is not even an issue. We build the courage to set increasingly challenging, even heroic goals. This is the process of growth, of becoming all we can become. On the other hand, when we exercise courage in setting goals that are not deeply connected to principles and conscience, we often get undesirable results that lead to discouragement and cynicism. The cycle is reversed. Eventually, we find ourselves without the courage to set even small goals. The power of principle-based goal setting is the power of principles-the confidence that the goals we set will create quality-of-life results, that our ladders are leaning against the right walls. It's the power of integrity-the ability to set and achieve meaningful goals regularly, the ability to change with confidence when the "best" becomes the "good." It's the power of the four human endowments working together to create the passion, vision, awareness, creativity, and character strength that nurture growth. To access this power is to create the upward spiral that empowers us to continually put first things first in our lives.
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Three Resolutions
Every organization-and individual-struggles to gain and maintain alignment with core values, ethics and principles. Whatever our professed personal and organizational beliefs, we all face restraining forces, opposition and challenges, and these sometimes cause us to do things that are contrary to our stated missions, intentions and resolutions. We may think that we can change deeply imbedded habits and patterns simply by making new resolutions or goals-only to find that old habits die hard and that in spite of good intentions and social promises, familiar patterns carry over from year to year. We often make two mistakes with regard to New Year's resolutions: First, we don't have a clear knowledge of who we are. Hence, our habits become our identity, and to resolve to change a habit is to threaten our security. We fail to see that we are not our habits. We can make and break our habits. We need not be a victim of conditions or conditioning. We can write our own script, choose our course, and control our own destiny. Second, we don't have a clear picture of where we want to go; therefore, our resolves are easily uprooted, and we then get discouraged and give up. Replacing a deeply imbedded bad habit with a good one involves much more than being temporarily "psyched up" over some simplistic success formula, such as "think positively" or "try harder." It takes deep understanding of self and of the principles and processes of growth and change. These include assessment, commitment, feedback, and follow-through. We will soon break our resolutions if we don't regularly report our progress to somebody and get objective feedback on our performance. Accountability breeds response-ability. Commitment and involvement produce change. In training executives, we use a step-by-step, natural, progressive, sequential approach to change; in fact, we require executives to set goals and make commitments up front; teach and apply the material each month; and return and report their progress to each other. If you want to overcome the pull of the past-those powerful restraining forces of habit, custom and culture-to bring about desired change, count the costs and rally the necessary resources. In the space program, we see that tremendous thrust is needed to clear the powerful pull of the earth's gravity. So it is with breaking old habits. Breaking deeply imbedded habits-such as procrastinating, criticizing, overeating or oversleeping-involves more than a little wishing and will power. Often our own resolve is not enough. We need reinforcing relationships-people and programs that hold us accountable and responsible. Remember: response-ability is the ability to choose our response to any circumstance or condition. When we are response-able, our commitment becomes more powerful than our moods or circumstances, and we keep the promises and resolutions we make. For example, if we put mind over mattress and arise early in the morning, we will earn our first victory of the day-the daily private victory-and gain a certain sense of self-mastery. We can then move on to more public victories. And as we deal well with each new challenge, we unleash within ourselves a fresh capacity to soar to new heights. Universal Resolutions
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories In each of our lives, there are powerful restraining forces at work to pull down any new resolution or initiative. Among those forces are 1) appetites and passions, 2) pride and pretension, and 3) aspiration and ambition. We can overcome these restraining forces by making and keeping the following three resolutions. First, to overcome the restraining forces of appetites and passions, I resolve to exercise selfdiscipline and self-denial. Whenever we over-indulge physical appetites and passions, we impair our mental processes and judgments as well as our social relationships. Our bodies are ecosystems, and if our economic or physical side is off-balance, all other systems are affected. That's why the habit of sharpening the saw regularly is so basic. The principles of temperance, consistency and self-discipline become foundational to a person's whole life. Trust comes from trustworthiness-and that comes from competence and character. Intemperance adversely affects our judgment and wisdom. I realize that some people are intemperate and still show greatness, even genius. But over time, it catches up with them. Many among the "rich and famous" have lost fortunes and faith, success and effectiveness, because of intemperance. Either we control our appetites and passions, or they control us. Many corporations and cities have aging inventories and infrastructures; likewise, many executives have aging bodies, making it harder to get away with intemperance. With age, the metabolism changes. Maintaining health requires more wisdom. The older we become, the more we are in the crosscurrents between the need for more self-discipline and temperance, and the desire to let down and relax and indulge. We feel we've paid our dues and are therefore entitled to it. But if we get permissive and indulgent with ourselves- overeating, staying up late or not exercising-the quality of our personal lives and our professional work will be adversely affected. If we become slaves to our stomachs, our stomachs soon control our mind and will. Gluttony is a perversion of appetite, and to knowingly take things into the body that are harmful or addicting is foolishness. More people in America die of over-eating than of hunger. "I saw few die of hunger-of eating, a hundred thousand," observed Ben Franklin. When I overeat or overindulge, I lose sensitivity to the needs of others. I become angry with myself, and I tend to take that anger out on others at the earliest provocation. Many of us succumb to the longing for extra sleep, rest and leisure. How many times do you set the alarm or your mind to get up early, knowing all of the things you have to do in the morning, anxious to get the day organized right, to have a calm and orderly breakfast, to have an unhurried and peaceful preparation before leaving for work? But when the alarm goes off, your good resolves dissolve. It's a battle of mind versus mattress! Often the mattress wins. You find yourself getting up late, then beginning a frantic rush to get dressed, organized, fed and be off. In the rush, you grow impatient and insensitive to others. Nerves get frayed, tempers short. And all because of sleeping in. A chain of unhappy events and sorry consequences follows not keeping the first resolution of the day-to get up at a certain time. That day may begin and end in defeat. The extra sleep is hardly ever worth it. In fact, considering the above, such sleep is terribly tiring and exhausting. What a difference if you organize and arrange your affairs the night before to get to bed at a reasonable time. I find that the last hour before retiring is the best time to plan and prepare for the next day. Then when the alarm goes off, you get up and prepare properly for the day. Such an early morning private victory gives you a sense of conquering, overcoming, and mastering-
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide and this sense propels you to conquer more public challenges during the day. Success begets success. Starting a day with an early victory over self leads to more victories. Second, to overcome the restraining forces of pride and pretension, I resolve to work on character and competence. Socrates said: "The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be." To be, in reality, what we want others to think we are. Much of the world is image-conscious, and the social mirror is powerful in creating our sense of who we are. The pressure to appear powerful, successful and fashionable causes some people to become manipulative. When you are living in harmony with your core values and principles, you can be straightforward, honest and up-front. And nothing is more disturbing to a person who is full of trickery and duplicity than straightforward honesty-that's the one thing they can't deal with. Whenever we indulge appetites and passions, we are rather easily seduced by pride and pretension. We then start making appearances, playing roles and mastering manipulative techniques. If our definition or concept of ourselves comes from what others think of us- from the social mirror-we will gear our lives to their wants and their expectations; and the more we live to meet the expectations of others, the more weak, shallow and insecure we become. A junior executive, for example, may desire to please his superiors, colleagues and subordinates, but he discovers that these groups demand different things of him. He feels that if he is true to one, he may offend the other. So he begins to play games and put on appearances to get along or to get by, to please or appease. In the long run, he discovers that by trying to become "all things to all people," he eventually becomes nothing to everyone. He is found out for who and what he is. He then loses self-respect and the respect of others. Effective people lead their lives and manage their relationships around principles; ineffective people attempt to manage their time around priorities and their tasks around goals. Think effectiveness with people; efficiency with things. When we examine anger, hatred, envy, jealousy, pride and prejudice-or any other negative emotion or passion-we often discover that at their root lies the desire to be accepted, approved and esteemed of others. We then seek a shortcut to the top. But the bottom line is that there is no shortcut to lasting success. The law of the harvest still applies, in spite of all the talk of "how to beat the system." Several years ago, a student visited me in my office when I was a faculty member at the Marriott School of Management, Brigham Young University. He asked me how he was doing in my class. After developing some rapport, I confronted him directly: "You didn't really come in to find out how you are doing in the class. You came in to find out how I think you are doing. You know how you are doing in the class far better than I do, don't you?" He said that he did, and so I asked him, "How are you doing?" He admitted that he was just trying to get by. He had a host of reasons and excuses for not studying as he ought, for cramming and for taking shortcuts. He came in to see if it was working. If people play roles and pretend long enough, giving in to their vanity and pride, they will gradually deceive themselves. They will be buffeted by conditions, threatened by circumstances and other people. They will then fight to maintain their false front. But if they come to accept the truth about themselves, following the laws and principles of the harvest, they will gradually develop a more accurate concept of themselves. The effort to be fashionable puts one on a treadmill that seems to go faster and faster, almost like chasing a shadow. Appearances alone will never satisfy; therefore, to build our security on
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories fashions, possessions or status symbols may prove to be our undoing. Edwin Hubbell Chapin said: "Fashion is the science of appearances, and it inspires one with the desire to seem rather than to be." Certainly, we should be interested in the opinions and perceptions of others so that we might be more effective with them, but we should refuse to accept their opinion as a fact and then act or react accordingly. Third, to overcome the restraining forces of unbridled aspiration and ambition, I resolve to dedicate my talents and resources to noble purposes and to provide service to others If people are "looking out for number one" and "what's in it for me," they will have no sense of stewardship-no sense of being an agent for worthy principles, purposes and causes. They become a law unto themselves, a principal. They may talk the language of stewardship, but they will always figure out a way to promote their own agenda. They're may be dedicated and hard working, but they are not focused on stewardship-the idea that you don't own anything, that you give your life to higher principles, causes, purposes. Rather, they are focused on power, wealth, fame, position, dominion and possessions. The ethical person looks at every economic transaction as a test of his or her moral stewardship. That's why humility is the mother of all other virtues-because it promotes stewardship. Then everything else that is good will work through you. But if you get into prideinto "my will, my agenda, my wants"-then you must rely totally upon your own strengths. You're not in touch with what Jung calls "the collective unconscious"-the power of the larger ethos, which unleashes energy through your work. Aspiring people seek their own glory and are deeply concerned with their own agenda. They may even regard their own spouse or children as possessions and try to wrest from them the kind of behavior that will win them more popularity and esteem in the eyes of others. Such possessive love is destructive. Instead of being an agent or steward, they interpret everything in life in terms of "what it will do for me." Everybody then becomes either a competitor or conspirator. Their relationships, even intimate ones, tend to be competitive rather than cooperative. They use various methods of manipulation-such as threat, fear, bribery, pressure, deceit, and charm-to achieve their ends. Until people have the spirit of service, they might say they love a companion, company or cause, but they often despise the demands these make on their lives. Double-mindedness, having two conflicting motives or interests, inevitably sets a man at war within himself- and an internal civil war often breaks out into war with others. The opposite of doublemindedness is self-unity or integrity. We achieve integrity through the dedication of ourselves to selfless service of others. Implications for Personal Growth Unless we control of our appetites, we will not be in control of our passions and emotions. We will, instead, become victims of our passions, seeking or aspiring our own wealth, dominion, prestige and power. I once tried to counsel a junior executive to be more committed to higher principles. It appeared futile. Then I began to realize that I was asking him to conquer the third temptation before he had conquered the first. It was like expecting a child to walk before crawl. So I changed the approach and encouraged him to first discipline his body. We then got great results. If we conquer some basic appetites first, we will have the power to make good on higher-level resolutions later. For example, many people would experience a major transformation if they
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide would maintain normal weight through a healthy diet and exercise program. They would not only look better, but they would also feel better, treat others better, and increase their capacity to do the important but not necessarily urgent things they long to do. Until you can say "I am my master," you cannot say "I am your servant." In other words, we might profess a service ethic, but under pressure or stress we might be controlled by a particular passion or appetite. We lose our temper. We become jealous, envious, lustful or slothful. Then we feel guilty. We make promises and break them; make resolutions and break them. We gradually lose faith in our own capacity to keep any promises. Despite our ethic to be the "servant of the people," we become the servant or slave of whatever masters us. This reminds me of the plea of Richard Rich to Thomas More in the movie, A Man For All Seasons. Richard Rich admired More's honesty and integrity and wanted to be employed by him. He pleaded, "Employ me." More answered, "No." Again Rich pleaded, "Employ me," and again the answer was no. Then Rich made this pitiful yet endearing promise: "Sir Thomas, employ me. I would be faithful to you." Sir Thomas, knowing what mastered Richard Rich, answered, "Richard, you can't even so much as answer for yourself tonight," meaning "You might profess to be faithful now, but all it will take is a different circumstance, the right bribe or pressure, and you will be so controlled by your ambition and pride that you could not be faithful to me." Sir Thomas More's prognosis came to pass that very night, for Richard Rich betrayed him! The key to growth is to learn to make promises and to keep them. Self-denial is an essential element in overcoming all three temptations. "One secret act of self-denial, one sacrifice of inclination to duty is worth all the mere good thoughts, warm feelings, passionate prayers, in which idle men indulge themselves," said John Henry Newman. "The worst education which teaches self-denial is better than the best which teaches everything else and not that," said Sterling. Making and keeping these three universal resolutions will accelerate our self-development and, potentially, increase our influence with others.
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Doing More in Less Time

Productivity is a measurement of production over time, and the key principle of life and time management is to organize and execute around priorities and goals: prioritize, organize, and then perform. To prioritize means to decide what is most important to do, what values to actualize, which goals to pursue. To organize means to either schedule ourselves or delegate tasks to others to achieve the goal. To perform means to discipline our activity according to our plan for getting desired results. Prioritization: First Things First Over the years, I have used a number of exercises to help people prioritize their lives and deal with questions of direction and purpose. I sometimes challenge them to think what they would do if they had but six months to live and then to organize those months accordingly. Or, I ask them to write their own eulogy and decide what contributions really matter. Or, I ask them to review their lives and record what is most gratifying to them, what contributions they consider most valuable, and then see themselves passing from this earth and looking back and asking, "What is most rewarding?" A Time Matrix diagram is another useful device. It divides activities into four quadrants. The key to better time management is to devote less time to quadrants III and IV activities and more time to quadrant II activities. Urgent and important matters (Quadrant I) are often crises or big problems that require immediate attention. We must react to them as best we can. But those matters that are important and not urgent (Quadrant II) require more initiative: we must act on them. If we neglect taking the initiative or seizing the opportunity, Quadrant I will grow ever larger until it consumes most of the time once allotted for preventive maintenance, planning, preparation, and interpersonal communication (II). Proactive people develop the discipline to do important but not necessarily "urgent" things. Reactive people get caught up in being busy, buried in "the thick of thin things," where "things that matter most are at the mercy of things that matter least." Time Management is really a misnomer. All people have exactly the same amount of time, but some accomplish several times as much as others do with their time. Self-Management and Life Leadership are a better terms, because they imply that we manage ourselves in the time allotted us. Proactive people make important contributions by focusing on those activities that make a significant difference in results. Many famous political leaders, business executives, and performing artists serve as good examples of efficient "self-managers." Their ideas and works flow from carefully selected values and goals. They give their energies to top priorities and new opportunities. Studies have verified that most (about 80 percent) of the desired results flow from a few (20 percent) high priority or "high leverage" activities.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Every profession will have its own high-leverage tasks, but the common denominator of success is having an all-consuming purpose. That's why an hour spent prioritizing and planning may be worth ten in execution. One hour of executive time invested in high-leverage activity can greatly increase the productivity of an entire organization. Once when training a group of shopping center managers, I first tried to help them clarify values and prioritize goals. I asked them to identify one management activity, which, if done superbly well, would have a tremendous effect upon desired results. Almost to a man, they mentioned deep, one-on-one communication with their tenants and their staff members. They said they were only spending about five percent of their time with these people because they were so busy with other problems, crises, meetings, interruptions, phone calls, and record keeping. Each of them then set a goal, agreeing to spend at least one-third of their time in meaningful association with tenants over a period of several months. Those managers who did so achieved dramatic results. No longer were tenants seeing them only when they had to negotiate and enforce contracts. Many of them soon became mentors, consultants, advisors, or advocates, helping tenants to cope with the host of business problems confronting them. Organization: Schedule it or Delegate it After selecting priorities, we need to carefully organize; otherwise, we procrastinate, wasting time and talents, weakening resolve, and undermining confidence and self-esteem. Organization involves scheduling the activities that produce results and delegating some tasks to others. Proper delegation will increase our time for high-priority tasks. Most managers know exactly what they want to do and why they want to do it, but they simply don't take the time to schedule the activities necessary to achieve their desired results. For instance, they fully intend to have meaningful communication with employees, but they don't schedule it. They fully intend to write an annual report to stockholders, but they don't block out the time to do it. They fully intend to get back into shape, but they don't schedule their exercise program. They simply hope that somehow things will automatically fall into place. Our schedules, of course, are our servants, not our masters. They are not as important as people, principles or values, which is why we must be flexible and mature enough to adapt to changing realities, to new perceptions, and to changing values and goals. Generally, however, it's wise to stay with planned activities and schedules unless there is an overriding reason to abandon or to change them. In his brilliant little book, The Effective Executive, Peter Drucker recommends that executives occasionally keep a time log in fifteen-minute segments for a period of two weeks and then use the information to assess their effectiveness. It's revealing to honestly document our activities in fifteen-minute segments and then compare our use of time with our priorities and goals. Invariably, people are shocked to see how much time is being spent in low-priority, low-leverage activities that don't produce desired results. Delegation William Oncken, Jr., tells the story of the harried executive who is caught in an activity trap and buried in the thick of thin things. He frantically tries to get through it all, but each time he meets someone he gets another assignment or "monkey." He says to himself, "I can't take this anymore." He tries to sneak out the back door to take a break from all the monkeys in his office. But halfway down the hall, he meets a subordinate with a problem. After learning of the problem, the already overburdened executive agrees to check into it-and in the process, another hairy monkey leaps onto his back.
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories After spending a miserable Saturday morning in his office, he decides to study up on the nature of the monkeys. So he goes to the encyclopedia and looks under "M" for monkeys. "Monkeys climb as high as they can go," he reads, "and they have no reverse faculties." The light breaks. He reads on, "They each have a home room where they rightfully belong." He puts the monkeys back in their cages, goes home, and takes his boys fishing. Monday morning, the subordinates come in to inquire about their monkeys. "What do you recommend be done with them?" asks the executive. "We don't know," say the subordinates. "You said you'd handle them." "But you're all so close to the problem," exclaims the executive. "I have great confidence in your abilities to analyze the situation and make a recommendation on the problem you spoke to me about. You study it, make your best recommendation, and then we'll deal with it." Each subordinate left the executive's office carrying his own monkey, as the executive had finally learned to delegate. Delegation makes the difference between the independent producer and the interdependent manager or leader. Properly done, delegation enables one to accomplish much more work in the same amount of time by multiplying one's strengths through others and by relieving oneself of "monkeys." Ultimately, much more work will get done in much less time. In fact, time spent delegating, in the long run, is our greatest time saved. Delegation may take more time in the beginning, and many who feel they are now pushed to the hilt simply won't take this time to explain, to train, to commit. Instead, they will say to themselves, "Every time I delegate it, either it doesn't get done or it gets done poorly, and I have to redo it myself. So why delegate? It just takes more time." But they end up leading harassed lives, putting in fourteen-hour days, neglecting their family and their health, and undermining the vitality of the entire organization. If delegation is done correctly-if it is based on high trust, considerable training, and mutual understanding of and commitment to desired results, guidelines, resources, accountabilities, and consequences-both parties will benefit. Performance: Working the Plan As Charles Garfield has proven, peak performers have a habit of doing first things first. They plan their work and work their plan, exercising discipline and concentration and not submitting to moods and circumstances. They schedule blocks of time for important planning and project work and for creative activity and do this work when they are most refreshed. They bunch less important and less demanding activities-appointments, phone calls, correspondence, detail matters-and work on them when the fatigue level is higher. Also, they avoid handling paper more than once, because shuffling through stacks of bills, letters, literature, and notices breeds procrastination. Avoid touching paperwork unless you intend to take specific action on it. Our ability to do more and perform better will increase as we exercise the discipline of doing important and difficult work first, when we are fresh, and deferring routine jobs to other times. Emerson wrote: "That which we persist in doing becomes easier, not that the nature of the task has changed but that our ability to do it has increased." It is this critical action step where most people falter and fail, usually because they do not first set clear objectives and make careful plans. Hence, they bog down in details, mirror their moods and feelings, and react to the circumstances of the moment.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide Poor performance can often be attributed to poor prioritization and organization. Weak resolve is easily uprooted by mood or circumstance, but deep resolve and good organization get results. If our priorities and plans are well internalized and visualized, we will find the ways and means to realize them.
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Courage to Change - "My Flower Shop"

From Living the 7 Habits - Stories of Courage and Inspiration Copyright (c) 2001 by Franklin Covey Co. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
This story is a beautiful illustration of how our mind creates our world. If we hold a vision or a dream deep inside our heart and mind, it will begin to not only influence our attitudes and actions, it will reach out and influence the circumstances of our lives. Notice how all things are created twice - first mentally and then physically [Habit 2: Begin With the End in Mind]. This woman planted the mission statement so deeply into her heart that it bridged the gap between her dream and its fulfillment. I've dreamed about owning a flower shop since high school. In college, I studied horticulture. Slowly the dream died under the pressure of marriage, divorce, and raising a family. Ironically, it was my son's death that resurrected my dream. As I saw those beautiful flowers coming to our door in expression of people's sorrow for our loss, I was moved. As I touched their petals and smelled their fragrance, I thought, "There you are. You're what I've been looking for-your touch, your brave color, your smell. I'd forgotten all about you." I envisioned the florist carefully arranging these beautiful blooms so that this arrangement could brighten our lives at this dark, dark time. I knew I wanted to help in that way. When I imagined my eightieth birthday as part of developing a Personal Mission Statement, I thought about my flower shop. I imagined all the people I could help: the births, weddings, birthdays and funerals. On all those days I could help people show they cared. I couldn't imagine a more nurturing and rewarding way to spend my days. When it came time to write my mission statement, I put that I would own a flower shop one-day. Just seeing the words on the paper somehow made my dream more real. About a year later I ran into the owners of a flower shop called Ocean Shores. I asked, "How's the flower shop going?" They said, "Oh, we're getting ready to sell it. We haven't got a buyer yet. Would you be interested?" These words grabbed my heart. Rather than say, "I can't do it; it's not possible" - instead of making excuses, like "Gee, I would really like to, but it's not the right time," or "You know, I have a full-time job, and am a single mother supporting two teenagers," I thought, "This is it. This is it. Here comes my dream." I set to work to make it happen. I examined their profit and loss statements. I hired a business consultant to see if this was financially feasible. I got the financing I needed and was able to buy the store. Now that I own my own flower shop, all of my business decisions and how I deal with the employees is measured against the dream I had in the first place. My mission statement gave me the courage, and I am actually doing what I've always dreamed. I know owning a flower shop is my own peculiar dream come true. Others want to own the world. I just want to make it more beautiful. Imagination is more powerful than memory. Imagination taps into possibilities, into the infinite. Memory is limited by past events and the finite. When this woman used her imagination and her dreams as the criteria to make her decisions, they became self-fulfilling prophecies. The subconscious mind seizes upon experience and opportunity to actualize those imagined dreams. Such dreams also ignite excitement and hope in other people.
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Nothing Can Stop a Determined Soul

"Someday, when I have the time, I'm going to..." Have you ever said that? Whatever you put at the end of that phrase represents a desire, a wish, a value in your life. Take a moment to think about it. In fact, go ahead and finish that statement: "Someday, when I have the time, I'm going to..." Guess what? You'll never achieve that desire, and you'll always have regrets-unless you do something about it today. When we talk about goals, we often ask seminar participants these questions: What is the one activity that you know if you did superbly well and consistently would have significant positive results in your personal life? What is the one activity that you know if you did superbly well and consistently would have significant positive results in your professional or work life? If you know these things would make such a significant difference, why are you not doing them now? Did you feel a tiny twinge of guilt reading that last question? If so, you're not alone. We're human, and we tend to gravitate toward things that are familiar. We stay in our own mental, emotional, social, physical and psychological comfort zones. But doing so keeps us from achieving what we most want out of life. Comfort Zones A goal, by definition, is a planned conflict with the status quo. Working toward a goal means doing something new, leaving the familiar, comfortable terrain of our comfort zones to explore new frontiers. This can be a great adventure, but it also scares us half to death! This is probably the main reason why so many people simply don't set goals. In our society we have adopted a myth that says failure is bad. Let me illustrate: If I write down a goal and don't reach it, what have l done? I have failed. So isn't it smarter not to have any goals at all? The easiest way to avoid failing is by not placing ourselves in situations where we could fail. And if we remove the possibility of failing, what else have we eliminated? The possibility of succeeding. That may not be a conscious thought for most of us, but it's one of the subconscious ideas that keeps us in our comfort zone. The Personal Integrity Account Someone once said that an unwritten goal is merely a wish. It's true that writing down a goal forces you to he specific, it can also increase your fear of failure. There's another side to that coin: If a goal is not specific, you will have a hard time knowing whether or not you've reached it. And knowing whether you've reached that goal can have a huge effect on your confidence. Each of us has a "Personal Integrity Account" that reflects the amount of trust we have in ourselves. Knowing that we achieved a goal is like making a deposit to that account. On the other hand, frequent withdrawals cause us to lose confidence in our ability to make and keep commitments and to trust ourselves and others.
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories To set any goal is an act of courage. When we exercise the courage to set and act on goals that are connected to principles and conscience, we tend to achieve positive results. Over time, we create an upward spiral of confidence and courage. It's as though our account is earning an increasingly higher rate of interest. Small achievements give us the courage to set increasingly challenging goals, which in turn give us more and more courage. That's what personal growth is all about. Obstacles Every New Year's Eve, it seems, we make lofty resolutions that rarely last more than a few weeks. Why? Sometimes they're poorly planned goals. Other times it's because we're afraid to make a change. Here arc three obstacles that try to keep us from reaching our goals: The invisible committee. Some of our values aren't ours-they're adopted from people we admire: family, friends, associates at work. If we don't determine our own core values, the borrowed ones can be hard to spot. Recognizing "true north" in our lives will help us make goals that take us in that direction and discard the ones that don't. This is where the courage you've built in your Personal Integrity Account becomes important. It takes great inner strength to stand up for your own values and live your life in harmony with them, rather than living according to the values of others. Walls. We can feel walled in by past mistakes, present circumstances, obligations or perceived limitations. And the longer we stay in one place, the higher those walls seem to get. Fear of change. Fear of failure is a very intense motivation for avoiding goals. We'd rather not try at all than try and fail. Fear of change-even a positive change-can be just as paralyzing. How many people know they should give up smoking but are afraid to try? How many people want to change jobs but are afraid they would miss their old coworkers? How many people are afraid of changing because other people will see a difference? Ben Franklin once said, "The eyes of other people are the eyes that ruin us. If all but myself were blind, I should want neither fine clothes, fine houses nor fine furniture." Nothing Can Stop a Determined Soul In 1970, I was an advisor to an Explorer post in the local Boy Scout organization. These scouts were just about the "coolest" teenagers you can imagine. The first time I met them, they barely spoke. But their body language was speaking very loudly. It said, "I dare you to teach me something!" I grew up in Hawaii, and I thought that setting a goal for these kids of making a trip to Hawaii the next year might have some effect on them. I painted them a verbal picture of all the wonderful things we'd do, without a flicker of reaction. Finally one of the boys rocked forward on his chair and said, "Yeah! And the year after that we'll go to the moon." They all laughed. This was not a good experience. In our next meeting they didn't look any more enthusiastic-or any friendlier. "Listen, guys," I said, "last week I offered you a trip to Hawaii. You didn't get very excited about that, but I'm going to tell you something. Next summer my wife and I are going to Hawaii. Whether you go with us or not, l couldn't care less. Have you got that? I don't care. If you want to come, that's entirely up to you." They decided I might just be serious. One of them finally asked, "What do we have to do? You have to tell us exactly what to do." I said, "The first thing you're going to do is memorize a poem." Well, you can imagine how excited they got over that. "Your ticket to get on the plane next summer," I continued, "is that
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide you are going to quote this poem, word perfect, to the flight attendant." Then I made them memorize the following words from Ella Wheeler Wilcox's poem "Will": "There is no chance, no destiny, no fate, that can circumvent or hinder or control the firm resolve of a determined soul." They didn't even understand half the words. For the next 11 months, every Wednesday evening, they had to stand up and repeat it. During that time we ran 28 major fund-raising projects. We sold cuff links, Christmas wreaths, fire extinguishers, cookies, and a cow. We even sold a guy's boat-and told him about it the next day. (I'll have to explain some other time.) About halfway through, a little behind on our money projections, we approached a man who owned a rusty old D-9 Caterpillar bulldozer that had been sitting in the same place for 12 years. We told him we'd like to have the bulldozer, and we thought we could sell it. "It doesn't run," he said. "You can't sell it." I taught him the poem. He gave us the bulldozer. We went to another man who was a welder. We said, "We understand you can cut steel. We've got this big thing. We've got to cut it down into little pieces." "What is it?" he asked. "It's a bulldozer." "Nobody cuts up bulldozers." We taught him the poem. He brought his cutting equipment. It took him four weeks to cut it into tiny pieces. The kids borrowed a septic tank truck and took nine loads of bulldozer down to a steel mill, where they sold it for scrap metal. They netted $800. Over the year, the kids earned more then $8,000. Talk about leaving comfort zones! When the first boy walked onto that airplane, he handed the flight attendant his ticket and said, "There is no chance, no destiny, no fate, that can circumvent or hinder or control the firm resolve of a determined soul." Isn't that a great poem?" Seventeen times she listened to that poem. When my wife and I handed her our tickets she quoted it back to us. I said, "Isn't that a great poem?" She said, "Yeah, and we're thirty minutes late. Do you mind if we leave?" We had two wonderful weeks in Hawaii. We spent time surfing and went to Pearl Harbor. The best part of the trip was when our Explorers crossed paths with a group of eight Explorers from Nevada. They were cool. Our kids were wearing new uniforms; these guys had wild shirts opened to the navel. They thought our kids were a little weird. Finally one of my boys asked the question: "How did you guys earn your trip?" "What do you mean, earn our trip, man?" they said. "Our fathers wanted us to go to Hawaii to get us out of their hair for a week, so we came. No big deal." Well, our guys circled around them and said, "What do you mean, you didn't earn your trip? Let me tell you how we got here." They laid it on thick and heavy. We've kept track of those kids over the years. They learned something about character and determination that year, and what they've done with their lives since with other learning is electric. I couldn't give my seventeen Explorers the determination to leave their comfort zone and achieve their goal. I can't give it to you. It must come from within you. If you are not a person of determination, you must become one to gain control over your time and life and experience inner peace. If you do, nothing can stop you.
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Plan Your Day

One of the earliest and best-known stories in business folklore concerns Charles Schwab, then president of Bethlehem Steel. It so happened that Schwab was talking with a management consultant, Ivy Lee, when he came up with this challenge: "Show me a way to get more things done with my time, and I'll pay you any fee within reason." Ivy Lee handed Schwab a piece of blank paper. "Write down the most important tasks you have to do tomorrow and number them in order of importance,'' he said. "When you arrive in the morning, begin at once on number one and stay on it till it's completed. Once you've completed the first task, recheck your priorities and begin number two. Stick with your task all day if necessary-as long as it's the most important one. If you don't finish all your tasks, don't worry. You probably couldn't have done so with any other method, and without some system you'd probably not even decide which one was most important. Now, make this a habit every working day. When it works for you, give the idea to your management. Try it as long as you like. Then send me your check for what you think it's worth." Sounds like a simple idea, doesn't it? Some weeks later, after the idea had been tried and found worthy, Mr. Schwab sent Ivy Lee a check for $25,000. This was the 1930s, and that was an enormous sum. Schwab eventually used Lee's idea to formulate a plan for all Bethlehem Steel management, and this plan was credited with turning Bethlehem Steel into the biggest independent steel producer in the world at the time. If there is anything that I could get you to do as a result of reading this column, it would be to follow Ivy Lee's advice. Spend time planning your day, consciously focusing on the things that are most important to you and making them priority tasks. If you do this, you will be far more productive and far more satisfied with your life, because you will be choosing to spend time on the things that are most important to you instead of letting other circumstances govern your time. Leveraging Your Time Planning takes time. In fact, one of the most common excuses that people give for not planning is, "I don't have time to plan my day." Do you buy that? Of course not. What they're really saying is that planning is not as important to them as watching TV or reading the newspaper or sleeping an extra fifteen minutes. They haven't placed a high enough value on planning. Perhaps they simply don't understand the wonderful consequences that planning can have in their lives. You're probably familiar with the investment strategy known as leveraging. Simply put, it means borrowing money to increase the yield on your investment. Ideally, the amount due is paid back with interest, and you keep the profits. Costs are minimal, and the dividends can be tremendous. Time can be leveraged in much the same way. Investing a little of your time in planning can actually free up time throughout the rest of the day. The cost is small-only ten to fifteen minutes a day-but you will enjoy many benefits all day long, such as clearly defined tasks with deadlines, increased focus on more important tasks, less time spent between projects and a greater sense of accomplishment at the end of the day. Isn't that worth a few minutes of your time? Edwin Bliss, author of Getting Things Done, said: "The more time we spend on planning a project, the less total time is required for it. Don't let today's busywork crowd planning time out of your
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories schedule." Good planning is a tool that focuses your energy and activities to ensure that you will receive the greatest possible return on your time investment. Building a Prioritized Daily Task List Ivy Lee's idea was relatively simple: Focus all your energy on the most important task first. I like to think of this as laser thinking. A laser is really just condensed light, focused through a lens until it's powerful enough to cut through steel. If you focus your time and energy on your daily activities through the lens of your governing values and goals, you will accomplish those things that are most important to you. As I see it, there are three steps in determining what should be on your list and which task should have the highest priority: Step 1: Make a list of everything you would like to accomplish today including tasks that are not urgent. You don't assign values to any task at this point. You just let everything surfaceprofessional and occupational tasks, family responsibilities, civic duties, church assignments, etc. Twenty-five tasks may surface in step 1. Step 2: Give a value to each item on the list. This is called the ABC Valuing System. As you go back over the list a second time, you put an "A" next to anything that is vital, that absolutely must be done. If nothing else happens today you're going to do the A's. You then put a "B" next to any task that's important, something that should be done. At the end of the day, if your A's have been accomplished and you have some discretionary time, you'll do the B's. Finally, you write a "C" next to any task that is relatively trivial, anything that could be done. If you have free time at the end of the day, after the A's and B's have been accomplished, you'll do the C's. Step 3: Give a numerical value to each item on the list. You now go back over the list one final time and prioritize your A tasks, your B tasks and your C tasks. This means that you determine which A task is most important, and you label it A-1. The next most important A task you label A-2, and so on. Then you do the same thing with the B and C tasks. You should come out of your daily planning time with a prioritized task list, a list that tells you which tasks you're going to finish first. Now, making a prioritized daily task list is a waste of time if you don't follow it. For instance, if you get to work and look at your list and see that A-1 says, "Talk to Jack about flaws in his marketing plan," you might be tempted to put it off. Jack is your boss, and he hates honest feedback. You know if you don't give it to him, it could cost the company lots of money, but you hate to confront Jack. So you look down the list and see A-2. It says: "Write proposal for PQ Company." That's a big task; it'll take at least two hours. So you peek at A-3, and it's a tough task too. Well, in about nine seconds you're at C-10, "Call Steve about tennis.'' You pick up the phone. "Steve, how about some tennis?" Good. You check off that task. And the whole day goes like that. At the end of the day have you earned the right to serenity, inner peace, balance, harmony? No. Why? What's left on the list? A-1 and A-2, those tasks that you know have the greatest value. This is the secret to the prioritized task list: It isn't a "to do" list where every task carries equal weight. It means that you focus all your energy on accomplishing that which is most important to you at any given moment. And because you've organized your list in order of priorities, everything else can be put out of your mind until you're finished with the most important item on your prioritized daily task list. Habit We are all creatures of habit, whether we like it or not. Even though the inertia of habits often keeps us in our comfort zone instead of reaching our goals, habits per se are not necessarily bad. In fact, life would be a nightmare without habits. We would have to make conscious decisions at every turn. Nothing would be automatic. We would have to think about everything
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide from brushing our teeth and combing our hair to driving the car. If all our actions were at the conscious level, we would be effectively paralyzed by the sheer mass of information we would have to process. Habit allows us to perform thousands of tasks and routines without causing a mental overload. The only pertinent question regarding habit is this: Am I willing to develop good habits or am I content to develop bad ones? Developing good habits, in every area from diet to communication skills to planning your time, can be viewed as a conscious effort to become consistent in our performance. And this consistency manifests itself in two distinct ways. Good habits will be consistent with our governing values. That is why they are good. And if I am a person of character, then my good habits must not vary when external circumstances change, no matter how uncomfortable those circumstances may be. Character, simply stated, is doing what you say you're going to do. A more formal definition is: Character is the ability to carry out a worthy decision after the emotion of making that decision has passed. Keeping commitments, then, is a matter of character, of willpower. And that's what it takes to build a prioritized daily task list and then follow it. I can give you tools to help you gain control of your life. But I can't give you the strength of will to use them. You have to find that within yourself. What I can do, however, is give you a promise. If you'll try daily prioritized planning for twenty-one days, if you'll give it a serious chance, I promise you a major reduction in stress. Why? Ask any medical doctor. Doctors will tell you the best medicine for stress is feeling that you're in control. If you build and follow plans, you'll start feeling the effects of exerting greater control over the events in your life. You'll be more productive and you'll feel better about yourself. With those reinforcements coming your way, you'll find it a lot easier to continue this commitment. You'll find daily planning becoming a habit just like taking a shower or opening your mail. And because your daily planning is actually helping you act on your most deeply held values, you will experience an increased measure of inner peace. I know what you're saying. You're saying, "I could get used to that." Think about it. Having that kind of control over your time and your life could become a very good habit.
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Stop Being So Efficient

By A. Roger Merrill Copyright (c) 2001 by Franklin Covey Co. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
In a recent survey, Franklin Covey Co. found that 42 percent of adults report that too often they feel "life is a treadmill and I can't get off." Even more-78 percent-say they wish they had more time to "stop and smell the roses." And though 81 percent of people consider themselves organized, 83 percent say getting more organized is among their goals. Could the problem be the way we learn to manage our time? A lot of time-management programs teach efficiency. They teach us to get more done in less time. On one hand, this makes sense. We get more done. We reduce or even eliminate non-essential extras. We're streamlined, leveraged, faster. The increase in our productivity is incredible. But when we talk about being efficient, the underlying assumption is that "more" and "faster" are better. As the old song says, it ain't necessarily so. There's a fundamental difference between efficiency and effectiveness. If you're efficient, you may be getting a lot of things done. You might even have a sense of accomplishment. Here's a good example: You're driving down the highway, enjoying great traveling weather and getting terrific mileage. Sounds efficient, doesn't it? But if you're headed south down the California coast on Highway 10I and your destination is New York City,-some three thousand miles to the east-you're not being very effective. In addition, trying to be efficient with people can be disastrous. Have you ever tried to be efficient with your spouse or your teenager on an emotional issue? "Don't bother me now, son. Just take your emotionally broken and bleeding self somewhere else for a few minutes while I finish this 'to-do' item I have here on my schedule" isn't exactly effective. The efficiency that works well with things doesn't go over nearly as well with people. People who are truly effective get the important things done, and their sense of accomplishment is replaced with a sense of Fulfillment. So stop being so efficient-and start being more effective. Here are some strategies to help you conquer your time-crunch frustrations and become more effective-efficiently-at work and at home: Try multi-tasking. It isn't just a computer term. Multi-tasking-doing two or more things at once-is one of the most effective ways to use your time. There are lots of ways to combine tasks effectively. I know executives who carry a file of articles related to their business with them when they're away from the office. Then when they get stuck in an airport, they read them. Flying on a business trip, for example, you can respond to e-mail on a laptop or fill out your expense report on the way home. Just make sure that when you combine tasks, you're dealing with things, not people. You wouldn't want to discipline a child while watching The X-Files out of the corner of your eye. But if you're a little creative you can find a lot of ways to combine tasks, and that can be a huge help in both increasing your productivity and making sure that you can use more time for the things that are most important to you. Use Technology Wisely. It can be a great time saver, but technology can also be a terrific time waster. Only about half of the people we surveyed (58 percent) believe that technological advances have given them more time. So use this technology to the best of its-and your-abilities.
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PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide To interview a job candidate who lives across the country, consider video-conferencing. Use e-mail-where brevity is considered a virtue-instead of writing time-consuming letters or memos. A gadget I've been using lately is a voice memo card. When you're driving and a sudden insight comes to you, the voice memo card lets you dictate that thought into a creditcard-sized device you can carry on a key chain. Beware, however, of "technology addiction"-getting so addicted to gadgets that you spend inordinate amounts of time trying to figure out how to use them without considering if they really fill a need. Similarly, don't waste your time debugging version 1.0 of the software you've been waiting for. Instead, it can pay to wait for later, improved versions. The "Five-minute Rule." On the surface, this may be counterintuitive. Instead of spending an extra, "found" five minutes to be more efficient-completing another urgent task, for exampleuse it to be more effective. Ask yourself the question, "Is there anything I can do for five minutes to make tomorrow better?" Then do it. For example, you can call a customer and ask about your company's bidding process. You ask questions like, "What was it about the process that helped? Did anything unnecessary get in the way?" If you can improve an item like that by even five percent, it's better than improving 10 other things that aren't that critical. The Five-minute Rule gives you a set amount of time-five minutes-to unleash your creativity and be as effective as you possibly can be. You'll find that sometimes this doesn't mean doing another action-oriented activity; sometimes it means you'll sit at your desk with your feet up and give yourself five minutes to daydream and brainstorm about market positioning or your sales technique. Whatever you use it for, when the five minutes are up, move on to your regularly scheduled activities. "Thinking Time." Institute an hour's "quiet time" each day in which people can close their doors and work without interruptions or answering phones or e-mail. Arrange your day so you can accomplish the most crucial, creative tasks when you have the most energy. For most people, this is in the morning. So if you tire in mid-afternoon, use that time to do more mundane, repetitive tasks-like opening mail or returning phone calls-and save your highenergy time for the part of your job that really is the job. Along the same lines, be sure that every meeting has a clear purpose and an agenda. I've noticed that really successful executives zero in on what they do that "adds value" to an organization. Often, instead of trying to jam as many things into a day as possible, you can accomplish more by stepping back and thinking. So instead of dictating three letters in the back of the cab on your way to the airport, ask yourself, "What is the most important thing I could be doing?" For each task, ask yourself, "Should it be done? By me or someone else? Is it vital?" For example, a CEO I know at an electronics company keeps a work journal. He jots down the key decisions he's made each day, the issues he has struggled with. He considers this one of the keys to his company's success-he is able to see patterns and respond quickly. Establish priorities. There always will he items on your "to do" list. The trick is to figure out which are priorities. True, you must first attend to the things that are both urgent and important. But efficient people and effective people handle the items farther down the list differently. Someone who's efficient will head straight for the rest of the urgent tasks, whether they're important or not. But to be truly effective you should spend as much time as possible doing important things that aren't urgent. In fact, you may find that those urgent but unimportant tasks can be delegated to someone else-or maybe, with a little planning, eliminated entirely.
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Appendix F: Articles and Stories Once you've established your priorities-the things on your "to do" list that are really important-deal with them effectively. Break down difficult projects into smaller tasks that are easier to start. Schedule exercise and "play time" just as you schedule business appointments. Then, as you head home Friday night, you can take a few minutes to stop and smell the roses.
A. Roger Merrill is co-author of the best-selling book First Things First.
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Appendix G
Appendix G: License Agreement

FranklinCovey Software License Agreement By breaking the seal on the software CD-ROM, or installing, copying, or otherwise using this software product, you agree to be bound by the terms of this software license agreement. If you do not agree to the terms of this license agreement, you are not authorized to use the software product and must promptly return the package to the place of purchase. Purchasers License FranklinCovey software is protected by copyright law and international copyright treaty. The FranklinCovey software computer program (Software) is licensed, not sold, to the purchaser (herein you). You own the CD-ROM, but FranklinCovey and its Licensors retain ownership of all copies of the Software. You may copy this Software onto a computer for personal use and you may make an archive copy for the sole purpose of protecting your investment from loss. As an express condition of this license, you must reproduce on each copy the copyright notice as it appears on the original Software supplied by FranklinCovey. The Software may not be available for use by more than one person. Making the Software available for use by more than one person is illegal and will terminate this license. Each person using the Software must purchase a separate Software package, just as they would purchase their own copy of a FranklinCovey Planner. Copyrights, Trademarks, and Patents FranklinCovey and the FranklinCovey logos are trademarks of FranklinCovey. The Software, including without limitation any images, animation, sound, music, and text incorporated therein is the subject of U.S. and international copyright protection, including a U.S. copyright registration. This Agreement grants you no right, license, or interest of any kind in or to such copyrights, trademarks, and patents, and you agree that you will assert no such right, license, or interest, or otherwise challenge FranklinCoveys exclusive ownership of such copyrights, trademarks, and patents. Transferring the Software License You may legally transfer all of your rights to use this Software to another person provided you also transfer all copies of the Software, CD-ROM, and documentation (including this Agreement). Remember, by transferring your right to another person, you no longer have any right to use it. The person to whom this Software is transferred may legally use it in accordance with copyright law, international treaty, and this Agreement. Upgrades and the original version of the Software constitute a single product. The original version and upgraded Software may not be available for use by two
249

different people at the same time and may not be transferred separately. You may not decompose, reverse engineer, disassemble, or otherwise reduce the Software to a human perceivable form. Except as provided in this license, you may not transfer, rent, lease, lend, copy, modify, translate, sublicense, time-share, or electronically transmit or receive this Software, media, or documentation. You agree that neither the Software nor any direct product thereof will be transferred or re-exported, directly or indirectly, into any country prohibited by the U.S. Export Administration Act and its regulations, nor will it be used for any purpose prohibited by the Act. Limited Warranty This Software and accompanying physical media are warranted to be free of defects in materials and workmanship for thirty days from the purchase date. FranklinCovey will replace the defective media or documentation. If FranklinCovey does not receive notice within thirty days of purchase, it will be assumed that the Software is operating in a satisfactory manner and that you wish to keep the Software and be bound by the terms and conditions of this license. Specifically, FranklinCovey makes no representation or warranty that the Software or documentation are error-free or meet any userparticular standards, requirements, or needs. Other than the above mentioned guarantee and support, this Software and accompanying media and documentation are provided as is, without warranty of any kind, either expressed or implied, including but not limited to the implied warranties of performance, merchantability, and fitness for a particular purpose. The entire risk as to the quality and performance of the program is assumed by you. Should the Software prove defective after the trial period, you (and not FranklinCovey) assume the entire cost of all necessary servicing, repair, or correction. In no event will FranklinCovey be liable for any damages, including lost profits, lost savings, or other incidental or consequential damages arising out of the use or inability to use this program. Termination of This License This License will terminate immediately, without notice from FranklinCovey, if you fail to comply with any of its provisions. Upon termination of this License, you must destroy all copies of the Software. You may terminate this License by destroying all copies of the Software at any time. FranklinCovey reserves all rights not specifically granted to the user in this statement. Disclaimer and Limitation of Liability FranklinCovey assumes no responsibility for any damage or loss resulting from the use of this Software. FranklinCovey also assumes no responsibility for any damage or loss caused by the use of any third party software or hardware. FranklinCovey assumes no responsibility for the deletion of data as a result of malfunction, repairs, or hardware battery replacement. Be sure to make backup copies of all important data or other media to protect against data loss. Notwithstanding the foregoing, aggregate liability of FranklinCovey to you in relation to any claims arising under this Agreement shall not exceed the total amount paid to FranklinCovey under this Agreement. Entire Agreement This Agreement sets forth the entire understanding and agreement between the parties and may be amended only in writing signed by both parties. No vendor, distributor, dealer, retailer, salesperson, or other person is authorized by FranklinCovey to modify this Agreement or make any warranty, representation, or promise that is different than, or in addition to, the warranties, representations, or promises of this Agreement. Restricted Rights The Software is provided with restricted rights. Use, duplication, or disclosure by the government is subject to restrictions as set forth in DFARS 252.227-701 (c) (1) for the Department of Defense of FAR 52.227-19 (c) (2) for other U.S. Government entities. Contractor/manufacturer is FranklinCovey. 2006 FranklinCovey. All rights reserved. 2006 Agilix, Inc. All rights reserved. Microsoft and Windows are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. 2006 FranklinCovey Co.
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Appendix G: License Agreement
Redemption License Agreement

By installing this software you agree to the following terms and conditions: 1. This software product is licensed to you for the software development purposes only. This product may not be distributed or copied except for backup purposes. 2. If you need a distributable version, please visit http://www.dimastr.com/Redemption/ LIMITATION OF LIABILITY. TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, IN NO EVENT SHALL THE CREATOR OF THIS SOFTWARE BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES WHATSOEVER (INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, DAMAGES FOR LOSS OF BUSINESS PROFITS, BUSINESS INTERRUPTION, LOSS OF BUSINESS INFORMATION, OR ANY OTHER PECUNIARY LOSS) ARISING OUT OF THE USE OF OR INABILITY TO USE THE SOFTWARE PRODUCT OR THE FAILURE TO PROVIDE SUPPORT SERVICES.
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PlanPlus v.

4 for Outlook User Guide

FranklinCovey, Inc. www.FranklinCovey.com

Welcome to PlanPlus for Outlook!

System Requirements & Installation

PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide

System Requirements & Installation

Before You Begin

Palm OS Device Preparation

Converting FranklinCovey Planning Software Data

PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide

Installing PlanPlus for Outlook

System Requirements & Installation The Setup Type screen appears.

Getting Around in PlanPlus

PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide

The Home Page

Display the Home Page

Planning & Projects menu

Tasks list Mini Calendar Calendar view Toolbar

Selected folder & preview area

Getting Around in PlanPlus

Why use PlanPlus Home?

How do I use the PlanPlus Home Page?

Customize the Home page

PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide

The Today Page

Calendar Jump-starter Compass

Getting Around in PlanPlus

Changes from Previous FranklinCovey Tools

Organizing Your Schedule with Tasks and Projects

What is a Master Task?

PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide

Creating and Editing Tasks

Set Task Priority

Organizing Your Schedule with Tasks and Projects

Change Task Priority

Assign Action Codes

PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide

Manage Tasks with the "Right Click" Feature

Organizing Your Schedule with Tasks and Projects

Using the Calendar

Moving a Task to a Different Date

Changing a Task to an Appointment

Changing an Appointment to a Task

PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide

Using Quick Prioritize

Organizing Your Schedule with Tasks and Projects

Organizing Your Schedule with Tasks and Projects

2. Select <Create Project> from the dropdown list.

3. A window appears, asking you to name the project.

PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide

Adding Tasks to a Project

Organizing Your Schedule with Tasks and Projects

Adding Existing Tasks to a Project

PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide

Working with Project Tasks

Organizing Your Schedule with Tasks and Projects

PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide

Organizing Your Schedule with Tasks and Projects

PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide

Organizing Your Schedule with Tasks and Projects

PlanPlus for Outlook v.4 User Guide

Organizing Your Schedule with Tasks and Projects

Project Notes & Progress Tabs