Where are the addresses, phone numbers & email addresses of people you’ve met  in the last 6 months? Are business cards in a pile that is rubber banded together?  Have you noted contact information on random pieces of paper that are now in any number of places? Do you have some of your contacts written into your paper address book and some into that Palm software that came with your Treo? Do you have the classic rolodex on your desk – with a mix of hand-written information and business cards stapled to the rolodex cards?

Consider some of the benefits of using an electronic address book on your computer:

• You have one single source for finding someone’s phone number.
• You can search your address book when you’re not sure of the person’s last name. Perhaps you remember his nickname. Enter that piece of information in the search function and viola – you’ve found him.
• Your office, counter, and brief case are tidier.
• You avoid the stress of remembering where you put that piece of paper with her number on it.
• You save time by instant access to a person’s contact info.
• You can save face by including a VIPs spouse’s name or assistant’s name with the VIP’s name.
• You can categorize contacts to aid you in future efforts such as sending holiday cards or mailing to business associates with personal contacts excluded. This makes you look good and is fast and efficient.
• You can remove contacts without messing up your whole address book as we did with paper address books and erasers or re-writing.
• When writing a letter you can copy and paste an address rather than retype it.
• When you’re traveling to a particular city you might retrieve all your contacts in that area and decide to meet up with someone you haven’t seen in a while.
• With a tailored set up you can dial right from your address book rather than picking up the phone and using the key pad. This requires your phone to be plugged into the computer and will not hamper normal use of the keypad on the phone. For those spending a majority of the day dialing, this can be a great time saver in dialing and ensuring you’re always dialing the right number.
• You don’t loose opportunities by phone numbers that are m.i.a.

Maybe you see the benefits of using an electronic address book and are not implementing it because you’ve got such a large collection of papers, business cards, etc. that the task is too daunting. Read again tomorrow for ideas on getting your electronic address book up-to-date. 

As many Productivity Cafe regular readers will recall, I have been on the path to getting my eyes corrected with surgery. I had PRK done last Thursday and that is why you’re just hearing from me again today. The surgery went well and has a 5-10 day recovery period. I’m at 75% visual functionality. I’m thankful that I can type this with my eyes closed… I will proofread it with my eyes open, however.

The title of this entry ‘Guilt vs concern as motivation’ is rooted in my thinking about you the last 5 days. I wrote one article that was delivered while I was sleeping off the surgery. Meanwhile I had Friday @ 5 ready in my head, just a few keystrokes from getting put in an article, and I just couldn’t get myself to the keyboard to do it. I felt disappointed to miss my usual delivery schedule. Did I feel guilty? Well, somewhat because this is so closely associated with my business.

On one hand having guilt and concern as motivation pushing us toward our deadlines is good. It gets us to meet our deadlines. Sometime fear is another motivator – another negative motivator. On the other hand, enthusiasm and passion are much more positive motivators. In reality we move back and forth between the negative motivators and the positive motivators. And, with vision and purpose we can have more positive reasons than negative reasons to meet our goals.

If you’re in a job working with a topic or in a function that you really enjoy, emphasize those positive characteristics. Move away from the aspects of your job that you don’t find motivating. Do this subtly if they’re not critical functions. Do it purposefully by planning an alternative such as off-loading the part that doesn’t suit you with your management. You see, being motivated by passion and interest will naturally mean that you’re more productive and contributing with ease – and happier.

Yesterday we summarized the benefits of using an electronic address book. Chances are that you have at least one free software address book program that was included with your PDA, part of Lotus Notes or Microsoft Office, or perhaps with your computer itself.

Today we’ll address (pun intended) getting the contact information into your address book. There are some shortcuts that leverage electronics and there is a fact that some of your contacts will have to be put in manually.

Back in November 06 I covered the Cardscan produce from Dymo. This powerhouse can read business cards and put the information in the appropriate fields such as mobile or cell phone into

college student

a few per day

collect them

address grabber

One consideration to make as you prepare to get your electronic address book up-to-date. That consideration is complementary software that you might want to use. For example, you might want to use Quickbooks. Quickbooks has an import feature and you’ll want to be sure that it can import the format that your address book can output. If a software package’s import feature isn’t compatable you might want to cut and paste into your address book and the other software package at the same time. It’s better to plan this out a little before you start because it could save you a lot of time or effort in the end.

Is saying, "No" difficult for you? When you’re asked to take on one more thing is it irresistible? Do you feel a sense of obligation and say, "Yes?" Are you thinking, "Now how will I get this done?" as the words, "Yes, sure!" are coming out of your mouth?

Here are some ideas for you to add to your answer arsenal that will either allow you time to decide whether you can really do the thing or to get out of doing it.

• "I would love to help you but I can’t see into next month with the long list of things I need to do now. I regret that my answer has to be "No."
• "Thanks for asking me, I am involved in so many projects (fill in the blank) that I can’t take on another. I suggest you ask _________ as she’s well suited to that sort of project."
• "As much as I’d like to work with you and that team, I’m afraid I must say, "No." I am honored that you would think of asking me."
• "If I take that on, I won’t be able to deliver for at least 4 months ~ would that be suitable?"
• "That’s a terrific opportunity. Could I get back to you in a couple of days after I have a chance to review my calendar & list of things to do and talk with my boss about your request?"
• "I appreciate you asking me. Could I sleep on that and get back to you?"

Try some of these phrases, adjust them to suit your style and personality, and keep your schedule more clear for the really important stuff.

If you regularly notice that deadlines or milestones are suddenly due today or tomorrow you probably have a pretty strong reaction to the realization. Usually people clear their calendar and focus their effort on meeting the deadlines and milestones and feel a lot of stress. Sure, some of us feel we work best with a short time allotment. We say, "I work best in the short time before a deadline." And, sometime mistakes, missing background, or terse weighing of options accompany short time allotments, too. The later is not so good for our reputation and can impact a whole group’s progress negatively.

You might find that using your calendar reminders would help you stay ahead of the pressurized time crunch. The popular calendar systems all have the alarm features including Microsoft Office, iCal, Lotus Notes, and Google Calendar.

When you have an event, deadline or milestone tied to a date, put the event on your calendar for the deadline. Evaluate how much time you need to really prepare – maybe you need to write a draft, sleep on it, then revise it. Set an alarm. In the example you could set the alarm 3 days before the big day. That reminder would alert you to get to work and get the draft done. Then, snoozing that alarm for 1 day will remind you to finish the revision and turn it in on time.

We’re all so busy that reminders we send ourselves can give us the nudge we need to avoid some stress by being up against deadlines.

It’s been just a month since I introduced Jim to you. For Jim’s intro, click here. A couple days ago we got together in his office again. The list of things to do is a page long and he is regularly dropping the things at the top, the completed things, and adding others to the list.

However, the one item from 7 years ago concerning his father’s estate had made no progress toward the top of Jim’s list in those 30 days. Jim confessed that his siblings don’t know the estate matter is undone. His wife doesn’t know the estate matter is hanging out there. It seems you and I are the only ones that know. [You can be sure Jim's name isn't Jim - it's changed here to protect his identity and avoid the possible embarrassment should family members find out.]

Jim said, "Its boring work, simply a, b, c, and the work will be done." We talked about why that was languishing and being ignored. The conversation turned into banter and I challenged Jim, "Since it’s so easy why don’t you get started now? After all, you’re going to call the lawyer and have to leave a message – you never get through to a lawyer in a first call." It’s an easy first step.

Leo at Zen Habits compiled a long list of blogs that have a productivity focus. Productivity Cafe is honored to be near the top of the list even though there is no particular order. You might want to read Leo’s ‘about’ as he’s in inspiration for major life changing decision including: quit smoking, start running (which led to running a marathon), having 6 kids (sounds like a long term goal), and more!

See PCafe here: List of Top 50 Productivity Blogs. It’s also a good source to find another voice that talks to you in a manner that impacts your productivity.

You ask, "How can I be more productive?" ~ get some R&R so you’re ready for work on Monday! Rest and rejuvenation are the intentions behind Friday @ Five entries. Often these are inexpensive and low key because you recharging your batteries can be more easily achieved without running around and doing, doing, doing. Most Friday @ Five entries are geared to do with your family or friends. You can always click on the category in the right bar here titled "Friday @ Five" for more ideas.

My #1 suggestion for this weekend is in recognition of Earth Day 2007 (Sunday 4/22/07) is to watch The Discovery Channel Show: PLANET EARTH. You will be amazed by the photography in this 11-part mini series. In HD and on a big screen this program is eye-popping. On regular tv it is mesmerizing. This series took 5 years and talented camera men to film. These camera experts had to also be spelunkers (cave explorers), scuba divers, high-altitude climbers, fliers, and have nerves of steel. An episode guide is here: click. In many areas Planet Earth is available on demand through the local cable provider so you’re not necessarily locked in to 8pm Sunday night… but you won’t want to miss it once you see any single episode. The series finale is this Sunday.

Other Earth Day links you might want to explore:

World Wildlife Federation

The Nature Conservancy

Wilderness

Forgetting my PDA/planner had the makings of a bad day. Tuesday I was heading to the eye doctor, a ’special’ eye doctor at 9:45 who is 35 minutes from my home. After the eye doctor I was having lunch with Jen – a client I’ve known for a couple of years who has become my friend. From there I was scheduled to meet Jim for another session at his office for the balance of the day. It was going to be a long day on the road but I was prepared with my notes on Jim’s progress, my book for waiting around the doc’s, and a list of people to touch base with while I was driving. I even had time to make a travel mug of my favorite morning beverage Constant Comment Tea. I was ready to roll.

About 7 minutes from my house, I reached for my Treo to dial Sandy. No Treo. I dig and dig in my bag, No Treo. I dump everything on the seat next to me. No Treo. So I ask myself, "Do I go back and get the

If all your projects expand to fill the time allotted to it is that a good thing? Most people would like to get their projects wrapped up in the shortest amount of time provided they can still give it suitable attention and produce good work. Sometime, projects seem to could be done in a much shorter amount of time. Does any of this ring true for you?

Many of my clients are motivated by using a timer. Perhaps one of these reasons will motivate you:

1. Use a timer that counts up to see how long you spend on a task or project. For example, how much time do you devote to email first thing in the morning.
2. Race the timer. After monitoring your time use, try to reduce where you can by setting the timer for 10% less time for the same type of task and race the timer to be finished. I have found this to be a good limit for how much time I spend refining a letter (as many times as feasible in the 10 minutes alloted to writing it).
3. Motivate yourself to start a daunting task by assigning yourself a 15 minute minute window to get started. Do not be distracted in that 15 minutes. Because you can do almost anything for 15 minutes this is a good time segment. Many times timer users do one 15 minutes session and are ‘on a roll’ then do another and another. They use their own ‘mind game’ to beat procrastination.
4. You can use the timer for rewards too. Perhaps after finishing a task you get a 15 minute walk in the fresh air.
5. Use a timer at home… give kids 15 minutes to clean up or finish up before dinner. Let them be responsible for meeting the deadline set by the timer. Avoid having to repeat yourself by training them to time awareness. Give them the gift of time management skills by starting young.