How To Save Time: Plan Your Day Like a Legend!

By Sukh Singh, Associate Partner, Lighthouse International

Previously you may have seen our weekly planning and review exercise to help you take steps to make your week a success. We've also shared with you 4 key questions to set your month up. Now, it's back to the day-to-day...how to set your day up like a legend.

If you've ever felt that pain of starting your day with a million emails, phone calls and meetings waiting for you and feeling like you're hacking your way through a forest, then planning your day is definitely for you! It's the key to getting on the front foot, feeling in control and being able to say "no" to those things that really aren't that important!

The Principle of Personal Management

The third principle of effectiveness is called Personal Management and it's what all true legends align themselves with in order to manage themselves well. The first and second principles are essential to making this a success. For example you need to have clear direction in life in order to prioritise well. This is the principle of Personal Leadership, and is where visualisation and imagination come in.

How Benjamin Franklin Planned His Days

Below is an image of a daily plan from Benjamin Franklin, a passionate inventor and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States of America. In particular, it's famous for two questions he asks:

What good shall I do this day?
What good have I done today?

These two questions alone may seem tiny, but can make a massive difference to our days. Because Mr Franklin was asking "what good" he was going to do, he was seeing his day through the eyes of having an impact on his world and making a positive, meaningful contribution. It is a stark contrast to "what do I have to do now on my already-full-task list?" a question that most of us end up asking!

Take 5-10 minutes to try it yourself. We've designed 3 quick questions to help you set up your day! Feel free to bookmark this page and use it again in your evenings as a tool to set your day up!

First! Begin With The End In Mind...

The first and most important step is to reconnect with your vision and your meaning in life. What is most important to you? Where do you want to be by the end of this year? Or 5 years time? Spend a minute thinking about this and then answer the questions below...(If you need help visualising this, click here for a brief but powerful exercise)