Get Organized for Greater Productivity and Time Management

A couple weeks ago, I wrote about small business owners having it all.  About being to balance work and personal life.  You can see the post here.

Recently, I've been reading a lot about organization and time management.  About how there are too many emails, phone calls to return, meetings and other things that zap our time and don't allow us to focus on what's most important.

In an article in Business Week Small Biz about the subject, the author talks about how to manage it all, from organizing your desk to doing a time estimate and time budget to making a daily plan.  Whew!  By the time you do all of this, you could have gotten 115 things crossed off your list.


THE REAL WORLD RETAILING TAKEAWAY
There's a reason that time management and organization books and seminars exist - People stop using what they learn and revert to their old habits.

The Business Week Small Biz author's advice for getting organized and managing your time is just a quick fix like a book or seminar on the subject.

Stick with what you know, and more importantly, what you're comfortable with.  I did the Franklin Planner thing and the Palm thing for awhile, using it as my rolodex, calendar and even keeping notes in it.  Years later, I've abandoned both.  However, I now do use the calendar and to do list on the computer, but I print out my calendar each day and have my good old notebook that I carry everywhere and keep notes in.  That's what I prefer, and at my ripe old age, I'm not going to change.

While attending these organizational and time management seminars can jump start your need to get organized and productive, and you may walk away with one thing that you incorporate and keep doing, for the most part you're going to end up right back where you started. 

So save some money and start being more productive simply by avoiding the trap of reading books and attending seminars about the subject.  After all, success is mostly about action, not planning to do that action.