Your Most Important Appointment

Drowning in a Sea of…

We work in a sea of meetings, phone calls and e-messages. If you described your typical day, do you find yourself…

• Sinking?
• Treading Water?
• Or, Swimming?

Too often we settle for treading water. It’s tough to stay afloat. Sometimes we sink.  How can you spend more of your time actually swimming?

Whose Needs Are You Serving?

We have customers (internal and external), bosses, teammates and colleagues. All need a piece of our time.  When their demands exceed the number of hours in the day, we’re sinking.  With time so scarce, how can you invest a reasonable amount of time to serve your own agenda?  The answer lies in how you manage…

Your Appointment Calendar

Unless you can somehow seize control of at least part of your day, you’re more likely to sink than swim.  We all keep an advance record of our commitments to others in the form of our appointment calendar.  Most of us forget to use our appointment calendar as a tool to make commitments to ourselves. It’s so elementary, we dismiss the idea. But is it really? If you’re like most, here’s a simple suggestion that will serve as your life saver.  Both literally and figuratively.

Book An Appointment With Yourself and Commit to Keep It

Use that time to address your goal supported activities that will allow you to actually swim instead of treading water or sinking. If you’re asking: “What goals?” Or you don’t know what those goal-supported activities should be, start by using your appointment time to figure that out.

Seven Steps to A Successful One-On-None Appointment

You’re more likely to swim further with these steps:

1. When I say “book” it, I mean enter it in your calendar to reserve that time.  Resist the temptation to “make a mental note”.  How well does that really work when your phone is ringing and your in-box is backed up?
2. Commit to keeping that appointment the same as you would to a meeting with your boss or best customer.
3. Shut off all potential interruptions and distractions
4. Choose a proper location
5. Start and end your personal appointment meeting on-time
6. Take notes as you would to record the key points in any other appointment and use those notes to form the agenda for your next meeting with yourself.
7. Upon conclusion, book your next meeting for an appropriate time and location into your appointment calendar.

Develop A Mindset for Self Discipline

This most important appointment of the day is not urgent in that no one else will be alarmed if you blow it off. But if you truly want to serve your own agenda instead of being a servant to other people’s demands and whims, you will give it he priority it deserves.  And commit accordingly.

If you’re treading water or sinking on most days, give this potential life saver a try. The life you save will be your own.

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