One Week One Book (OWOB) is a knowledge sharing series where I share key take away from my selected books. It is not a book summary. I will share just one or two key points that I get from the book. The OWOB series will cover various books mainly in the area of personal growth; helping you becoming better in every aspect of your life. The mission of reading books should be to apply the knowledge gained. Knowledge is not power. Applied knowledge or knowledge acted upon is. Too much ideas may overwhelm you and end-up you do nothing about it. One idea executed is better than many ideas left unexecuted!
This week OWOB is “ Free To Focus” by Michael Hyatt. He is a New York Times, Wall Street Journal and USA Today Bestselling authors of 3 books inclusive Platform and Your Best Year Ever. He is an influential voice on leadership, business growth, goal-setting and productivity.
The book is about productivity; sharing 9 proven principles that will help you succeed in work and also in all areas of our life.
This praise for this book really tells it all ;
“The bridge between dreams and achievement is taking massive, determined action. One reason so few of us achieve what we truly want is that we never direct our focus; we never concentrate our power. No one understands this better than Michael Hyatt, and he’s engineered a new, easy-to-follow approach to harness this power in his new book Free to Focus.” – Tony Robbins, #1 New York Times bestselling author, Unshakeable
My key action item from this book is this; Plan Your Ideal Week. It was discussed in the book under Step 3 ; Act.
It is an activity where you allocate a block of uninterrupted time (maybe 30-60 mins) any time on Saturday or Sunday to do detailed planning for your next week activities.
This one idea really can separate you from many of your counterparts. Almost all successful people that I read about have this kind of planning. This is one of their secret weapon. They have detailed planning every week for what need to be done. It just like going to war! You must plan your week well.
The key reason why we should plan our ideal week is that we want to live our life base on our choices and not by accident.
This is how you do the Ideal Week Planning.
1. Decide when, where and how long you want to do the week planning. It should be done on anytime on Saturday or Sunday. Invest about 30 to 60 minutes of your time and find a suitable place where there will be no interruption. For me, it is Saturday morning in my study room for 60 minutes.
2. Have your planning tools are ready; planner, pen, blank paper and or any of electronic devices.
3. Time to fill up your calendar for next week;
– many of us subject to other people’s agendas, including me. This is where we have to attend meetings or any group discussion where our presence is needed. So, fill up these meetings in your calendar for next week.
– Then fill up your calendar with your vital functions. The activities being identified by author as Front stage activities. The activities that the reason you are on the payroll. What expected from you and for you, these are moving the needle kind of activities. If you are a salesperson, meeting customer / doing presentation may be your front stage activities. You need to be very clear in your vital function and its tasks so that you can plan your week well. In a week, you should decide where these vital functions needed to be done. Is it every day? Or on certain days of the week. This should part of your weekly rituals. This activities must be filled after the meetings slot being allocated.
Next is to identiy your back office activities or back stage activities . These are the activities you need to do to support your vital functions. As a salesperson, some activities like preparing report and doing some research on the prospects. You must decide where to put these activities in your calendar. Again, it should be your weekly rituals and perhaps you want to have dedicated days or portion of the day to these activities. Maybe Wednesday mostly to do your back stage activities. Maybe everyday after 4:30pm is you back stage hours. This back stage activities are crucial but ensure not to spend much time here and more time should be on the vital function activities.
Last one is block time for rejuvenate activities or off stage activities. This is simple but important. It is about planning how to reward yourself. How to rejuvenate after the hard work. You have to plan it to make real impact. If you do not plan it; when and what specific activity…you may simply laying around and your brain and body may not fully recharge!
Call For Action
Start doing this ideal week planning this weekend. If this is your first time…just try it for 15 minutes and see how it goes. Increase the time as the time goes by. Good luck.
Visit the author : www.michaelhyatt.com