Time For Action
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In this guide, you’ll learn about...
Cutting distractions by using a '5 before Noon' list. • The one question you must ask to evaluate your day, that will propel you into doing better the next day |
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• Building connections’ to expand your circle of influence and support for achieving your goals.
• Reducing your stress and freeing up hours by knocking out ‘unfinished task’
• Tracking expenses, appointments, contacts, and much, much, more on a single sheet
• Reducing your stress and freeing up hours by knocking out ‘unfinished task’
• Tracking expenses, appointments, contacts, and much, much, more on a single sheet
Why having a Daily Written Action Plan is critical
Once you have clearly determine what you want to accomplish in the next 90 days, you must take action every day. It only takes small steps to reach your future goals. When you choose to do what you say you will do, your success in life boils down to a series of simple “yes” or “no” questions.”
All the best intentions in the world are worthless until you act upon them. We have found no better way to move from intention to action than to follow a simple process of think, write, and do. The goal of this guide, is to help you through that process with a single systematic repeatable format we call The Crafty Daily Progress Report pages.
These pages, as your daily written action plan, are critical for three reasons:
First, these pages will help you plan your work in a way that reduces stress and maximises productivity. Specifically, you’ll reduce unfinished tasks, increase focus on high value activities,and increase connections.
Second, the daily progress pages will raise your awareness of critical elements necessary for great health and energy. Simple daily prompts will trigger you to examine how you care for and nurture your mind, body, and spirit. This is so critical because your ability to act will always be defined by your energy level.
Third, the daily progress pages will provide a single place to record your progress and any important information you need to recall. If you’re prone to recording phone numbers on napkins, to-do lists on the back of envelopes, or messages on scraps of paper only to scramble to find them later, you’ll be relieved to know those days are over
Second, the daily progress pages will raise your awareness of critical elements necessary for great health and energy. Simple daily prompts will trigger you to examine how you care for and nurture your mind, body, and spirit. This is so critical because your ability to act will always be defined by your energy level.
Third, the daily progress pages will provide a single place to record your progress and any important information you need to recall. If you’re prone to recording phone numbers on napkins, to-do lists on the back of envelopes, or messages on scraps of paper only to scramble to find them later, you’ll be relieved to know those days are over
Your written action plan on the daily progress pages is the key to prioritising, organising and simplifying your life at home.
How to complete this worksheet
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We’ll tackle how to create your daily written action plan through the three critical functions of the daily progress pages:
Planning Your Work, Raising Your awareness, and Recording Your Progress. Before you begin filling out the daily progress report pages, please be sure to complete the Prioritise, Purpose, and 90 Day Goals worksheets.
In the process of think, plan, and do, these worksheets are foundational for the ‘think’ component. Until you have goals clearly rooted in your priorities and purpose, your efforts at time management will be minimally effective at creating greater meaning and productivity in your life. |
THINK IT _ PLAN IT : DO IT
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Planning your work
What will I do…Get It Done:Five Before Noon
A Five Before Noon list is a list of the highest-value activities that you are willing to commit to completing before 12:00 a.m. The best time to create this list is just before you leave the office for the afternoon or at the end of your day. If you do not come through the door with a written action plan of high value activities and an intention to achieve those activities first, your time will likely get devoured by other less important tasks.
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What I Will Do...FIVE BEFORE NOON
1. ______________________________________________ 2. ______________________________________________ 3. ______________________________________________ 4. ______________________________________________ 5. ______________________________________________ |
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Your life will be radically different if you start every day knowing what five specific actions steps you must take that morning in order to get closer to reaching your goals. Many people report that this single productivity strategy when rigorously maintained has doubled their productivity. The key is to make sure that these tasks are high value. During the week your Five Before Noon list is likely to be geared toward helping you achieve your work goals. On the weekend you may focus more on social or civic obligations and household duties.
Work-week Five Before Noon examples:
Create meeting agenda for new conference
Contact Heather regarding new account documentation
Schedule meeting to introduce new product
Send contract to attorney
Meet with Susan regarding proposal deadline
Complete cardio workout
Write thank-you letter to Ann
Practice guitar for thirty minutes
Return books and pick up a new one from the library
Have breakfast with my daughter
Contact Heather regarding new account documentation
Schedule meeting to introduce new product
Send contract to attorney
Meet with Susan regarding proposal deadline
Complete cardio workout
Write thank-you letter to Ann
Practice guitar for thirty minutes
Return books and pick up a new one from the library
Have breakfast with my daughter
Notice that these activities don’t have to be large tasks. They can take only a few moments. We call these micro-actions. The key is that they must be high value. Imagine the change that could happen in your life if you consistently achieved five high value tasks for the next ninety days. That would be four hundred and fifty actions taken toward the completion of your goals.
Business and Personal Connections
This might be a prospective customer, someone you could network with, or even a friend. Creating a master list of business and personal connections that you would like to nurture is really helpful to have. Go back to that list regularly and transfer three names every day to your Daily Progress Pages.
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In this segment of the daily progress report, list three people you would like to connect with today.
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Unfinished tasks
As with any to-do list, it is important to actually do what you’ve set out to accomplish. However, for a variety of reasons some tasks just don’t get done. Each of these tasks is a silent stress that is diminishing your energy and diverting your attention.
Each day on your daily progress report pages if you will plan on completing unfinished task you’ll rapidly free up time and attention. To do so, create two lists: unfinished tasks at home, and unfinished tasks at work. Use the links below to download copies of our unfinished tasks worksheets at
As you brainstorm a master list of unfinished tasks think of any incomplete tasks you have from the smallest to the largest. You may have an unfinished tasks as small as replacing a button on a shirt or as large as completing your taxes.
Each day on your daily progress report pages if you will plan on completing unfinished task you’ll rapidly free up time and attention. To do so, create two lists: unfinished tasks at home, and unfinished tasks at work. Use the links below to download copies of our unfinished tasks worksheets at
As you brainstorm a master list of unfinished tasks think of any incomplete tasks you have from the smallest to the largest. You may have an unfinished tasks as small as replacing a button on a shirt or as large as completing your taxes.
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Each day choose only the unfinished tasks you know you can complete. Day by day your list shrinks. You will soon gain control of your unfinished tasks lists and be free to do more important things. Make sure you keep track of everything you accomplish by marking each completed action with a check-mark. The simple power of the check-mark is in itself a mysterious motivating power. Writing, accomplishing, and checking off task after task, can be incredibly empowering.
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Raise your awareness
It is often said, “The first step to solving a problem is recognising there is a problem.” The Daily Progress Report pages are designed to elevate your awareness of the core elements of a healthy and productive life.
You will find on the bottom of Daily Progress Page 1 an area to track your:
You will find on the bottom of Daily Progress Page 1 an area to track your:
Water intake : Sleep : Exercise : Time spent reflecting: Meals and snacks
Each one of these elements, plays an important role in having a productive life filled with energy. Just by tracking these items for a few minutes a day, you will become consciously aware of whether or not you are giving each of these areas the attention they deserve. This awareness can drive you to act in your health’s best interest. Doing so will pay huge future dividends as your energy grows, knowledge deepens, and over health increases.
What I spent
Financial stress is a major stress for many people. Good financial management begins with awareness
of your spending habits.
of your spending habits.
Daily contacts
it is often said that, “Successful people are simply willing to do what unsuccessful people are not.” Business is about contact – daily contact. If you are a corporate leader, you must contact your managers, vendors, and most important, your customers, every day.
If you’re in sales, your success depends on the number of people to whom you present your product and how well you deliver customer service
If you’re in sales, your success depends on the number of people to whom you present your product and how well you deliver customer service
The daily progress pages are designed to help you track the people you contact. To the left of the daily contacts section you’ll see a series of dashes. These dashes allow you to track how many people you attempt to contact. You have no control over the number of people you actually contact, but you do have control over how many people with whom you try to get in touch.
Appointments
You may already handle your appointments using an electronic calendar on your computer or smart phone. Continue to do so if that works well for you, but consider at the end of the day recording your meetings and appointments here as well. This practice of having a single reference point is also extremely helpful in doing a quick review of your day.
Track your progress
Voice mail
You can use this section to note voice mail messages you have received, ones you have left, or even important notes that come up during phone conversations.
Open lines
People use this space in many ways. This space can be a catch-all space for reminders and other notes. I spoke to someone who lists items that don’t get done in this space. I personally like to make a short bullet point evaluation of what went well and what didn’t go well. So for me, this is a reflection space. You can define its use anyway you like. Which brings us to the most important item on the daily progress pages.
Did I do what I said I would do?
Is it really possible to simplify your life down to one questions? Yes. Not only is it possible, but also it’s necessary in order to meet your goals. Once you have clearly defined your priorities, articulated your purpose in life, and established written goals and action steps to fulfil your purpose, then the only thing left for you to do is do it!
Did I Do
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A daily written action plan empowers you to say what you want to do and do what you say you’ll do. When you set a goal you are creating an emotional commitment between yourself and that goal. It is the tiny wins – the small daily accomplishments – that encourage you to continue making the right choices, like choosing how much sleep you will get, what you will eat, how much water you will drink, and finishing your 5 before Noon. It really is as simple as doing what you say you’ll do.
This is simplicity - and, simplicity brings an incredible sense of joy
1. Choosing to do urgent tasks for your 5 before Noon list rather than high value tasks.
People gravitate toward any action that is urgent in nature. Resist placing urgent tasks on your five before Noon list unless they are also high value tasks. Otherwise, you’ll find yourself on a treadmill of being busy.
2. Not completing the purpose, priorities, and goals worksheets prior to using Daily Progress Report pages.
If you daily action plan is not driven by your own purpose, priorities, and goals, you find yourself living in someone else’s expectations. This can lead to resentment, unnecessary stress, a lack of feeling fulfilment and even burn-out.
3. Answering the question “Did I do what I said I would do?’ with a ‘NO’, but not figuring out why.
The whole point of this question is to prompt you to examine your day. If you answer ‘NO’, come up with ideas about what you need to do differently so that tomorrow is a resounding ‘YES.’ I will never forget the rush of joy and deep peace that came over me the first time I could honestly tell myself, “You did everything you said you would today.”
4. Failing to create your 5 before Noon list prior to the day beginning.
This was mentioned above, but is nevertheless, often overlooked. Set aside a few minutes at the end of your work day or evening to intentionally plan your most important activities prior to coming through the door of work; otherwise, they will most likely just get crowded out.
What makes something a high value tasks?
First, ask yourself is this task in alignment with my purpose, priorities, or goals? Any task that helps fulfill one of these core elements of a productive life will be a high-value task. Second, ask yourself, “Is this task one of the best ways I can get the results I’m desiring? In short, a task may be high-value because it yields a very high return.
There is a time management principle called the Pareto principle. Which states, “80% of our results come from 20% of our activity.” Try to identify those 20% activities that are generating your best results. These will be very high value uses of your time.
People gravitate toward any action that is urgent in nature. Resist placing urgent tasks on your five before Noon list unless they are also high value tasks. Otherwise, you’ll find yourself on a treadmill of being busy.
2. Not completing the purpose, priorities, and goals worksheets prior to using Daily Progress Report pages.
If you daily action plan is not driven by your own purpose, priorities, and goals, you find yourself living in someone else’s expectations. This can lead to resentment, unnecessary stress, a lack of feeling fulfilment and even burn-out.
3. Answering the question “Did I do what I said I would do?’ with a ‘NO’, but not figuring out why.
The whole point of this question is to prompt you to examine your day. If you answer ‘NO’, come up with ideas about what you need to do differently so that tomorrow is a resounding ‘YES.’ I will never forget the rush of joy and deep peace that came over me the first time I could honestly tell myself, “You did everything you said you would today.”
4. Failing to create your 5 before Noon list prior to the day beginning.
This was mentioned above, but is nevertheless, often overlooked. Set aside a few minutes at the end of your work day or evening to intentionally plan your most important activities prior to coming through the door of work; otherwise, they will most likely just get crowded out.
What makes something a high value tasks?
First, ask yourself is this task in alignment with my purpose, priorities, or goals? Any task that helps fulfill one of these core elements of a productive life will be a high-value task. Second, ask yourself, “Is this task one of the best ways I can get the results I’m desiring? In short, a task may be high-value because it yields a very high return.
There is a time management principle called the Pareto principle. Which states, “80% of our results come from 20% of our activity.” Try to identify those 20% activities that are generating your best results. These will be very high value uses of your time.
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