Productivity For Dummies

Chapter 14

Calendar Management

In This Chapter

Planning the work to be done

Discovering all the tricks and tools to using your calendar

The calendar is perhaps the most underutilised tool in your toolkit, yet it can be one of the most powerful. Many people use their calendars for planning daily activities, keeping track of events and reminding themselves of important festival dates, but after that the calendar remains empty. In this chapter, I show you how your calendar can be more than just a place to store events and meetings but a tool for getting organised, achieving your goals and living a more balanced and fulfilled life.

Using Your Calendar to Get Things Done

Many people argue that the calendar shouldn’t be overloaded with all the work you need to do. Others say you should put all your tasks into your calendar so you can monitor your work and get it done. I lie somewhere in the middle. I have experienced the power of the calendar and found that planning the work I have to do in my calendar helps me to focus and get a lot more work done than I ever thought possible. The trick is to use your task manager for your tasks but to use your calendar to plan larger bodies of work, like projects and writing. You can find more on task management in Chapter 13.

The calendar: A timeline ...