Time Management 156 - How to Com

Hello everyone, this is Helen Huang @ Organizing, based in Beijing, China. In order to better learn and practice the YiXiaoNeng Time Management System, after finished publishing 100 Chinese articles, I decided to continue writing and publishing a daily English article in another 100 days based on the "YeWuBin Time Management 100 Episodes" audio program. Today is the 156th day.

Today's topic is: How to Complete the Monthly Review

We'll continue talking about reflection in today's lecture. There are reflections of one day, one thing and a life divided by time dimension such as review a day, a week, a month, etc. Today we are going to talk about one of the dimensions - the "monthly review".

I have completed monthly reviews for over 40 months now. This allows me to review what I've done in the current month almost instantly by using the "second search" feature.  That is searching in a second. For example, I can instantly see all the events I completed, the places I went to, and the people I met, etc, in each given month.

I'm able to retrieve the history of each day quickly because of the habit of keeping a morning diary each day. I have kept a morning diary for over seven years, and four years doing it continuously, every day.

When I add my daily information into Evernote, the application will also allow me to retrieve the status and weather condition of that day's information for the year before and the year after that in merely a second.  It is really quite convenient. So I highly recommend using Evernote to store you diary and your daily activities.

Continuous recording events like these, preserves memories like birthdays.  But more importantly, it allows us to observe our progress over time and see what mistakes and habits we repeat and should work on. Recording allows us to look back and see exactly how we acted over time.  We can trend and understand our behavior.

We can look back on those memorable days only if we keep a record.  We can remember birthdays, anniversaries and special events. We can share thoughts with friends. You know your friends will be amazed at how considerate you are when they were remembered all the special days.

This monthly review is a good time to conduct a full summary of your own experiences over the last month.

First, determine which key words are most relevant and prevalent in the past month such as work, health, life, travel and so on. So you get to categorize the previous month in themes.

It's better to summarize your month in the context of your 20,000 and 50,000 meter goals and ensure you're on track. Make sure you are on track on your goals. Each month, check that your monthly activities are aligned with your annual goals.  Make sure they are putting you on the right path.

You know our memory is weak and our memory is unreliable and we easily forget things. Therefore recording is much more reliable and consistent, and allows us to look back over that time with objectivity.

Another advantage of the monthly review is that it gives us the opportunity to review and reinforce your goals.  It's impossible to achieve your goals without repeatedly reminding yourself of these goals over time, and the monthly review is a good opportunity to do that.

As time passes, you will forget the goals you've set unless you write them down and then constantly review them. Therefore, we should often review our own goals and review what we are doing to achieve those goals each day, each week and each month.

Drucker used to share a method of reviewing goals in his book: "Managing Oneself".  The method is called "Feedback Analysis", which is very popular in the European business community.

Feedback Analysis, First, he instructed us to list future goals from month 9 to 12. That's 9 - 12 months ahead. Then, each month review how your achievements in the past month relating to those 9 to 12 month goals and was getting us closer further away.

After 40 months of practice it by myself, I have achieved great breakthrough in my life.

Therefore we should not only keep a morning diary every day, but also complete weekly reviews and monthly plans.  Then, as Drucker said, continually review the relationship between your current activities and your long term goals. If there is no alignment of these short and long term views, then you are not coordinated in your strategy.

If you can use this systematic method taught by Yixiaoneng, combining theory, technology and tools, then you will gain a fresh and powerful perspective and regain control of your life.

Thank you being with me together today. Have a wonderful day!