How many times have we been told, or told someone else, to get organized? What exactly does that mean? Is it extensive to-do lists, calendars (digital or print), or an endless sea of notebooks and post-it notes? Unfortunately, the answer is “maybe.” For some, the need for a paper calendar that contains a snapshot of hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, and yearly activities is essential, and they cannot function without it. For others, they may live in a digital world with notifications pinging them every minute, a deluge of alarms, tasks, reminders, and events. Finally, some may live in both worlds simultaneously.
When I started brainstorming about how to approach this topic, I must admit that I wasn’t quite sure where to begin. Do I start with my own process and fall immediately into the trap that everyone else does? Also, in full transparency, my method and process tend to vary in many cases from one project or topic to another. For example, I don’t start writing a budget on paper, I open Excel. At the same time, for other tasks, I might start writing either in Word or a Google Doc, or I might pull out pen and paper, although I have gone the e-ink route the last few years and find it far more productive.
So, what is the point of this blog then, and why is the whole idea of organizing for change so important? The why is that everyone encounters change. We all make resolutions for ourselves or are being told to organize our lives in every context imaginable. Clarity of purpose and thought is something that we strive for, even when we fall short. This blog, my upcoming YouTube channel, and various other content will be a way for us to explore together the world of organization. We will talk about the fact that being organized does not always mean being neat and tidy. A little bit of mess can often be the best thing to light the way forward.
The idea of messiness leads me to the last topic to be covered in this quick introduction. Change is often associated with disruption, discomfort, and sometimes intellectual or physical pain, but it doesn't have to all be negative. One more important thing about change is that it is almost always messy. There is just no way to anticipate every conceivable fork in the road. Sometimes, leaders must pivot, throw out a playbook, and start over. The more flexible your process and organized you are as a leader or in your daily life, however, the easier it is to clean up and move ahead, minimizing the negative elements of change.
I hope that you will come along with me on this journey. We will talk about different strategies for getting and staying organized, technologies that can be helpful (or serve as distractions?), and how to confront and work through the inevitable changes that we face. I will rely on some of my own experiences, ask you about yours, and share what I have learned from others who are leaders in many of these spaces.
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