Planning Projects at Your Business

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For years we’ve been following the lightweight to-do/project management app GTD (Getting Things Done) Agenda. They provide a helpful newsletter every once and a while and I thought I would repost as it’s definitely worth just a few minutes of your time – and give GTD some link love!

Quote: “If you fail to plan you are planning to fail”

Planning, seen as an ongoing process which focuses on the results and not the individual elements, as measures of success, might add real value to individual projects, business plans and even such events as planning a wedding or a party. A well-constructed and thought out plan will help you decide what to do within a context i.e. what your vision is and what success will look like.

When devising your plan, remember there are two simple questions you need to answer: where do you want to go, and when do you want to arrive there? Answering these questions about the destination and the time-frame helps
you to plan the ‘how’ process.

Keep your plan simple, the more complex it is, the more likely it is to go wrong. You can think of it as a chain - because a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, so make sure there are no weak points in your plan. And the more clear indicators you include to allow you to measure progress towards your goal, the better – and stronger - your plan will be.

When you set out to achieve a goal, it’s very important to write down your plan. The written plan is a guide to which you should look daily, then examine your progress and, if necessary, adapt your plan accordingly. Every plan must allow for flexibility. And along with flexibility goes personal commitment: a plan is only as effective as your commitment to follow it through.

Generating a plan is easy. Putting it into practice can be hard because early on there will be setbacks, discouragements and upsets. The type and seriousness of the obstacles you encounter will vary in proportion to the ambitiousness of the goal, which is why your complete commitment and self-belief are so important. Occasionally you will come up against an obstacle so great that you genuinely believe you can’t overcome it. But there is no obstacle you cannot overcome if you are sufficiently determined.

If you really get stuck, look at how other people have dealt with similar setbacks. You’ll never be the first person to have encountered a particular problem. Study the strategies used by those who have accomplished what you are seeking to achieve. Learn from their experiences and be inspired by them. Whatever worked for them, whatever made them successful, may well work for you. Make the study of other people’s  approaches part of your plan.

“If you want to be a great dancer study great dancers, if you want to be a success, study successful people”

*** And if you want a complete tool to manage your goals and projects, Gtdagenda is always at your service as your
trusted system, accessible via the Web and via mobile Android and iPhone apps.

Similar Posts:

• Planning Effectively for Projects with 5PM
• GTD Agenda, Android App