After reading Laurie's excellent post The Transformative Power of a Planning System, I started thinking about how I started planning, and how I agree with her that I find it difficult to imagine not doing something like this in some form or another. From a fairly young age, I always had a book, notebook and a pencil case with me, so at some point the notebook started to include scribbles about things to be done alongside drawings and other random notes. I'm not sure how old I was when I started planning as such, but it definitely helped me when exams were coming up, so I suppose I've always taken it for granted.
During a recent visit to my Mum-in-law's house, she obviously had lots on her mind due to a potential future change in family living arrangements. However, like can often happen, she had only heard the news third hand, so was waiting to speak directly to the person involved. We had a long conversation about this, which mainly involved her worrying about and considering all of the changes that might be needed. Eventually I suggested that maybe it might be useful to write all of these thoughts down to get it our of her head, as she admitted that it was keeping her awake at night. I explained to her about doing a brain dump (also called a mind sweep), but she didn't seem convinced as it sounded like she felt that she needs answers to her questions before getting any benefit from writing it all down... She does use a wall calendar and also writes ad-hoc to lists on scraps of paper, but I suppose maybe a brain dump was a bit too different for her to seriously consider right now, especially when she was feeling a bit stressed.
Have you had any recent discussions with family, friends or colleagues about planning?
And as always on Fridays, please feel free to discuss anything organiser related. I hope that you have a great weekend.
Thank you Anita, I found Laurie's post really thought provoking too. I am a big fan of doing a brain dump when I'm stressed and worried about things, I find it helps me to sleep better too. I've tried to help other people to plan better without much success - it's probably good that I didn't become a teacher!
ReplyDeleteI love writing things down, planning ahead, tracking what's important. I think there are lots of very smart and talented people who have brains wired very differently who just cannot plan in a systematic way. Probably Myers Briggs type stuff going on around the J and the P for anyone who has done that in the past.
I had a colleague who looked at life very differently to everybody else, he saw solutions we couldn't see and patterns that we didn't know were there. But he was completely disorganised and dreadful at hitting deadlines, and he was very stressed about it as we worked in a delivery focused environment. I encouraged him to start a to do list in a notebook and mark down the dates that things had to be done by. He manged for a couple of days and then he forgot to update it and it fell into ruin. Bless him, he was embarrassed and I realised that all I had achieved was to add a new source of stress into his life. So I planned the important stuff for him - I set deadlines two days before they were actually due to give him time to panic, get it done and reviewed without it being obvious to central colleagues. It worked well that way instead.
My husband cannot write anything down in a systematic way. I find random scraps of paper here and there around the house - after asking "do you need this?" it goes into my planning system usually with him saying "don't let me forget". It works well as I do something I enjoy and he avoids something he struggles with. It flips the other way when we go abroad and need to learn some phrases, I'm a disaster!!
The ability to see unusual patterns, and to innovate, and the inability to follow a regimented system are probably related...
DeleteI work in an innovative research environment. Most of us have messy, chaotic desks. Management don't like this; they like clear desks, as that seems 'right' to them. But there is research that shows messy desks may either contribute to, or at least be a symptom of, innovative thinking.
Your management people also probably don’t have to cross-reference stuff from printouts and different notes to stuff on the screen, testing how to best present data by sketching out various options or simply keep track of numbers, samples, file names, settings and a myriad of other things while trying to do something very complicated that is at the very forefront of what you’ve been asked to do in the past. Or maybe I’m just projecting… :D
DeleteHave you also been told to not have cups of tea on your desk? (For the sake of data security.) Seeing the reaction amongst staff to that specific one was hilarious!
Oh my Sara…I’ve never heard of not being able to have a cuppa at your desk, absolutely draconian. It’s an affront to civilised people everywhere!
DeleteI did work somewhere where we had hot-desking only, and we all had a locker to store our stuff. I worked in London so got the train in. When I left I had to phase carrying all the shoes home that I’d left in there ‘overnight’ as it was too heavy to carry in one go. It was a soulless experience, pun intended!
@Lucy As this was in the UK (and at a university!), needless to say everyone just ignored that “suggestion “ until it died quietly. :D
DeleteI think it was mostly out of concern for your computer equipment, but why not just tell people to be mindful of where they put their drinks relative to their PC?
I have a mini chest of drawers from IKEA for most of my stationery in work and a small collection of tea making implements in my office and nobody has ever complained. But then my office doesn’t look like there’s an imminent risk of a paper avalanche like most academics’ offices, so I guess it’s all relative. I normally stack things neatly when not needed, but when I’m in full flow there is paper everywhere!