I always urged my teams to spend five to ten percent of their time planning, and to start each day reassessing and reaffirming their priorities.
Next, plan the rest of your week. Then, if you shift your thinking outwards three–twelve months, you’ll reduce the lack of control that builds up from being constantly in a reactive mode.
You begin to find patterns in your planning and you begin to see possibilities and to develop contingency plans.
Organizational success is a marathon, not a sprint. Too many individuals and organizations run at an unsustainable pace that is reactive but not strategic. Always model and reinforce the importance of planning to your staff: You must plan to succeed. And you must plan… to succeed.
- Have you established your personal planning process?
- What can you do to make it more effective both in the short term, but also for longer term planning?
Use the audio player below to listen to the short chapter Prioritize & Focus from the audiobook of Applied Wisdom for the Nonprofit Sector.