A desk schedule pad can be used several different ways to a personal diary, as they can cast an over view of the month, week or day that creates a focus. At first impression they are a handy tool to have on your desk to jot down scheduled tasks and, fundamentally, that is their primary use, however they would be great for drawing together the tasks given to individuals to work to weekly or monthly schedules. Recently I went to a inspiring and deeply personal talk by entrepreneur Michelle Mone in which she admitted giving her kids and housekeeping staff KPIs to enable her to manage the house. It struck me that these type of planners are a good way of communicating regular tasks to small teams to see how they personally fit into a plan/environment. They can also be used to schedule and timetable events that happen every month/week to post up on a notice board. Used simply, they can be used as monthly/weekly wall calendars and daily pad tear offs could be pasted into a notebook to plan individual days or trips away
Getting creative with them, you could use each sheet for target or goal setting and scheduling when you want achieve. Each sheet might refer to an individual goal rather than a calendar month and enable you to plan regular tasks to achieve it. Those which contain a day timeline may also help you to analyse and improve your time management. The simple act of writing down how you filled your day will show you if you are being efficient and may help you analyse how you could improve. It might also be quite a good indicator to your boss that you have an eye on your individual performance.
I’m sure there will be other suggested ways to use these desk planners but on the whole It’s a good idea to think about how you like to plan your day. If you are a meticulous planner, you’ll need daily or weekly pads and if you like more of a general idea of your commitments, you’ll appreciate monthly pages. Also think about if you need a note taking section for when inspiration strikes. Then there is the pure vanity of having something that looks good on your desk – if you don’t like the way your planner looks, you’ll be less likely to use it!
Having just added weekly desk pads to the Pagemarker range there are even more possibilities to find new creative ways to schedule. Check out the smart black and white newspaper style desk pad range from seeso and the retro graphic cool planners from Paper ways:-
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