Asking, "How can I help you?" just after you answer your phone with "Hello," is a great way to keep phone calls from getting extended by lots of friendly but unrelated conversation. You can aim to control your time by managing how much time you spend on the phone. In order to get right down to business you could use the line above to uncover why you were called. It is important to be diplomatic and in control. If this line is uncomfortable try some of these:

• What can I do for you?
• What’s on your mind?
• Is there a goal that you are working toward that you need me to contribute toward?
• Hi, I need to keep this short so let’s address your reason for calling then catch up if we have time.

For other interruption interceptions, search ‘interruption interceptions on productivitycafe.com.

John Trosko talks about another great way to keep meetings short at his blog, Organizing LA. There he suggests removing seats from a meeting room and hold the meetings standing up. Click here for the article: John’s article. Bravo John ~ it’s a great idea for a change of pace too!

We’ve all been in meetings that seem interminable. After a while we aren’t really listening and when it’s over we might wonder, "Do I have any follow-up to do from this meeting?" Below are some solutions to the interminable meeting.

If you’re the one facilitating the meeting.

• Set a specific start time
• Start on time. By following this guideline everyone will learn that your meetings offer good stuff right from the beginning.
• If someone arrives late, carry on. Do NOT make everyone else wait while you bring the newcomer up-to-date. By avoiding backtracking attendees will learn that they want to be on time in order to participate fully.
• When you set the meeting, list how long the meeting will last. This allows everyone to plan the rest of their day. I have found it effective to say, "We’re aiming to get this meeting done in one hour so we’ll have to finish this topic and move on."
• Ask someone else to take notes so you’re free to keep the meeting moving.
• Send an agenda of the topics to be covered and who is responsible for the various elements by listing their name or initials next to the topic.
• Conclude the meeting by summarizing the follow-up items and who is responsible. Often it’s good to do that in the last few minutes of the meeting. Sometime it’s necessary to do this step via minutes.

If you’re attending a meeting called by someone else you want to maximize the effectiveness of your time invested.

Ok, so it’s Monday and the day for me to post a GTD article. And, my post today is more of a question. To get right to it ~ what value have you gotten from being at GTD Connect member? I have been paying my $48 per month for about 6 months and seem to be getting about $4.89 of value. The occasional new article is okay. The quarterly teleclass is okay. The periodic interviews with people using the system can shed some light on new things. But I don’t think it’s a great return on investment for me so far. I’m going to figure it’s because of something that I’m not doing well. Maybe there’s part of the system that I should use or use more effectively. Would love to hear the comments from GTD Connect readers on how to leverage my investment to the max.

What are you doing at 5:00pm on Friday? Here’s our productivity event for the weekend: go play! Playing is one of the greatest stress relievers ever. It distracts us, makes us laugh and sometimes leads to full-time cheerfulness. Playing allows the back of your mind to work through things that need resolution or the next step invented. Meanwhile the front of your mind grins ear to ear.

The type of play that I’m talking about is lighthearted, engaging and carefree. If you take your golf game seriously, that’s not play. Be light. Think of your childhood and what you did when directed by your Mom to ‘go out and play’. Or, follow young kids and do what they do. For me mountain biking is my play time. I just started mountain biking last fall. I feel a rush when motoring along between trees. I am amazed by climbs over roots and rocks that would be impassable on my road bike. We bikers cheer raucously for each obstacle cleared by our biking buddies & ourselves. Oh, and, I haven’t come home so muddy in decades! (maybe that’s the best part)

Are you tempted to delete this post and keep on doing what you’ve been doing on weekends? Avoid this temptation and go out and play! (and let us know what you did in the comment section on Monday).

For a lot of us the Daylight Savings programmed in our clocks is wrong. Yep, the start and end dates for daylight savings were programmed into some software programs, clocks, and other date aware things on the “old” schedule. That schedule is changing this year, as you probably heard a while ago. What you might not have recorded is the new dates. With the ‘Spring Ahead’ date being just around the corner, here’s a reminder.

In order to be prepared check your time-sensitive programs to ensure synchronization with the national time change.

The changes in Daylight Savings Time are as follows.

Daylight Savings Time in 2007:
Start date: March 11, 2007 (Second Sunday in March), 2:00 AM
End date:  November 4, 2007 (First Sunday in Nov.), 2:00 AM

In previous years:
Start date: First Sunday in April
End date: Last Sunday in October

[Thanks to reader David for helping me read my calendar... Nov 4 (not the 7th as originally posted) is corrected. And he adds:]

Final note: most software operating systems, cable tv systems, cell phone clocks and many other time/date keepers will automatically update your clock as long as they have regular the fixes and patches installed.

One of the perpetual topics for humorists is "he forgot my birthday". Yep, lots of people feel they’re in hot water because they don’t get the gift or card sent on time. Imagine the reaction you would get if you remembered your parent’s anniversary every year. How about the positive response your remembering someone’s big promotion anniversary would elicit? And, to flip the table, how do you appreciate being remembered on your birthday?

This topic came up as I was coaching an executive (Rudy) and his assistant (Deb) to improve their work as a team. The exec wants to recognize the birthdays of the other C-level folks on his floor and to be prepared to express appropriate sentiments should there be a death in the extended family of his team members. 

We established a standard organizing procedure (sometime known as a standard operating procedure, especially in the military). Here’s how it works.

• Rudy is going to select a card that he will send for birthdays and another that is a sympathy card.
• Deb will buy a large stack of each of these cards.
• On the 25th of each month Deb will prepare the cards for birthdays for the upcoming month by addressing the envelopes and putting the ‘to mail’ date where the stamp goes. Then she will put them in Rudy’s ‘to sign’ folder.
• On the ‘to mail’ date Deb stamps and sends the cards. She remembers to mail them because she uses a weekly ‘to do’ folder where the cards are held until mailing.
• A sympathy card or mass will be addressed by Deb immediately upon learning of a death. Rudy will sign it and send the within 24 hours.

I have found having one style card that conveys your personality is a convenient way to reduce the time consuming trips down the card isles. Rather than spending lots of time searching for the perfect card and trips to the cards store, use time to write a personal note in the card-of-the-year.

Use your electronic calendar to track annual events. Have them color coded and/or in a specific data field in the address book. You can run a report for ‘annual events’ to get the upcoming holidays. Or, if color coded, you can simply glance at the calendar to find birthdays.

Microsoft has a short and powerful little course to help you get tracking: MSFT Birthday lesson

This is the first weekend specific post here at the Cafe. It’s about the ‘better life’ part of our offerings. I will write about weekend ideas to entertain you, to fulfill you, to think about something different or to think about same things differently. It’s to keep you exploring, add adventure, and spice things up a little bit.

Let the fun begin!

This weekend take someone to breakfast. My recommendation is that you take your kids – just you and them. Get up at a fresh hour (don’t worry, the kids are used to getting up early). Find a local place with a counter and sit on the stools that spin. Order whatever and be sure to let them know you’re making this special time because they’re special. (ok, maybe you should take your spouse out if you missed Valentine’s Day – because s/he is special too! No kids in this case.) For those without kids how ’bout a niece or nephew? an elderly neighbor? a friend you haven’t seen since you moved out of the old neighborhood?

Bon Appetit!

In the last post Saving Style Impacts the impacts of being a keeper, collector, sharer, recycler, finisher, and streamliner (both positive and negative) were illuminated. Today we look at some ways to update your saving style because you can the amplify the useful parts of your style and modify the limiting aspects. The bottom line is we want your current style to work for you!

Keeper Update
Keepers generally benefit by a two-fold approach to updating their style. One part is to set keeping guidelines. A few key questions guide keepers to keeping less. Those questions are:

1. Is there a legal / tax reason to keep this?
2. Does this help  me do my job better now?
3. Does this enhance my life?
4. If I didn’t have it anymore, what’s the worse that would probably happen?

This leads to the second part of the keepers’ style update. Apply the guidelines first to incoming things then go back and apply them to things kept in the past. Your piles & files didn’t bulge overnight; give yourself time to update your style if you’re a keeper.

In the last post Saving Styles Defined the keeper, collector, sharer, recycler, finisher, and streamliner were illuminated. Today we look at some of the impacts of the styles because you can then view your saving and discarding of things from a useful vantage point. In the next post I give some ideas for modifying your style if your current style isn’t serving you.

Keeper
Pro: Probably has everything he could ever use. Can be the ‘go to’ guy when you’re looking for a missing document or particular type of bolt & nut.
Con: Probably has more than he and 5 other people could use. Sometime is quite cluttered and unable to find the thing(s) he has so ends up buying more. Might waste a lot of time and have a lot of frustration in the hunt for things.