Happy 50th Mom, Rock on and thanks.

Life Lessons Learned from my Mom:

I started this Blog with the idea that I would hit 50 lessons for 50 years of Parkleigh and am now very content that these are the solid lessons learned from Mom, Happy 50^th.

In thinking about this project and during the process of writing all I could think about was how nice it will be when Matthew and or Hannah take the time to come up with half as many for me someday. Thanks for having such a huge impact in and on my life.

On the Business side of things

1. Cash is king: She always has it and I seem to always need more. Thanks for being there for me. Thanks for showing me the importance of living within your means and knowing where you are at all times.

2.Buy with Passion: I have never seen her dabble when buying for the store, if she is not excited about something, how can she expect the customers to be?

3. Delegate, Delegate, Delegate: With the right people in the right seats, delegation is easy and productive. From PA, she runs the store as smooth as can be and it’s because she knows the skills and values of those around her and uses them well.

4. Inspire, Educate & Entertain: Three magic words up on her office wall ,that have come to exemplify her approach to retail and running a business.

5. Give Purpose to people and things: Let employees share in the responsibilities of running the company and have them know how that piece is important to the whole puzzle and they are empowered to do great work.

6. Make 100 bucks look like 10: Never flashy, always humble and quite different from others in my life that could always make 10 bucks look like 100. I like your approach much better these days.

7. Be a stepping stone: I have seen many come and go in and out of the doors of Parkleigh over the years, and it is always amazing to see how proud she was to just have been a part of their lives for the time they worked together.

8. Treat people well: Duh. Great Catholic up bringing where you do unto other as you would have them do to you. Easy said, however she nails it. Always.

9.Hire great people: I have been with her while she was getting great customer service and let the person know, that if they were ever looking how great full she would be to have them on her team.

10.Know your numbers: what’s in the bank, what today’s sales were, what's due to vendors, what’s coming due, what’s coming in and everything else that paints a clear picture of where you stand. Every morning she is on the computer with pencil in hand putting the numbers in her filo-fax or calendar. Every morning.

11.Give Credit where credit is due: when a product is selling very well, it’s the vendor that usually gets the credit for making a great product, having good training and running great promotions and she is just great full to be a part of it.

12.Know your place: There is always someone out there bigger, better, faster. Just enjoy the journey.

13.Communicate your Vision: Her regular communication with staff, vendors and customers is amazing and impressive. Knowing the end result makes it so much easier for smart people of staff to help get you there.

14.Power of the Team: There are many tasks that could be done better, if she were to do each of them herself. Once. In the long run the power of the group is so much stronger than the power of one. Now that doesn’t mean she can’t be found in the basement at night checking boxes of merchandise in, a task she is seen doing often.

15. Go for it: probably a repeat of buy with Passion, but if you are going to do something, do it well and do it right.

16.Ingnore your competition: She knows who they are, but when the conversation goes towards the comp, she is usually the one to say, who cares what they are doing, just focus on yourself.

17.Ask for help when you need it, not when you want it: In 15 years of selling stuff to her, I have only seen her ask for something once, people were lined up waiting to be a part of helping at that point.

18. FISH: a great book she read many years ago and is still a part of daily meetings and culture at the store. Play and have fun are the favorites for both of us, thanks for that.

19. Develop your key relationships: Top Vendors, Bank, Top Customers and Senior Staff are the easy ones and the no brainer, but her magnetism to those 100% authentic people is amazing and what makes her and the store so unique.

20. Great systems: there is a process for everything n the store and it runs like a top as a result, even while she is sitting in her office 300 miles away. Always ahead of the curve with technology, always ahead of the curve with training, always ahead of the curve.

21.If it ain’t broke/don’t fix it: Now this is where she may have a fault, but she can get 110% of the life expectancy out of any tangible thing. Ask her someday how many miles that BMW had on it before it retired.

22.Follow the leader: There are clear leaders out there in this business, they have great systems, plans and skills. She learns them, trains on them, implements them and lives them. Crabtree comes to mind as the early teacher, many great have followed and she always was open to learning what those leaders were teaching.

23.Engage your customer: 2657 Facebook customers actively engaged, music on Sundays, cocktail parties for customers, monthly calendar, e-blasts, trunk shows, tastings and samples and so much more.

24. Active in the community: I am always amazed when she says to me, I have an opportunity to be a sponsor. My first thought is how great it would be for all customers to think this way. She lives to help and give back and is always humbled and honored to be able to do so.

On the Life side of things

25.Remain Humble: In all of her ups & downs I have seen her remain steady and humble, those simple upbringings in Fredonia are also some of the greatest memories in my life as well.

26.Give Back: and not just cause every time you give something you get 10 times in return. Whether it's helping out someone who needs it, donating to a great local cause or volunteering her time, I have seen the joy and peace each of those activities truly bring her and am often very inspired.

27. Have faith in something: I have often asked the question about religion and the conversation always goes to simply having faith in something and honoring that faith in whatever way works for you.

28. Smell the roses: slow down a bit, be in the present and smell the roses. It’s always the simple things that bring her the most joy and comfort.

29.Have Fun: I might do this far more than many others, thanks. Its even in her tag line.

30. Remember you can do it: simple words of encouragement form her all my life made just about anything I tried and wanted to do possible. Still today she helps guide me with these simple words, thanks mom.

31. Be proud of your accomplishments: Not always chest bumping proud, but to the degree that is appropriate. While being proud for me for what I have done, she also taught me how to be proud myself. I am proud that she can call herself an Ironmom.

32.Simple Things: repeating theme here for sure. I am confident that if she put the 10 most important things she owned in a bag, they would all have been around for a while and none of them would have cost much money.

33.Celebrate Family: She was an only child, I was an only child and she was a single mom for many years. Now with a big family around her it is cool and inspiring to see how dedicated she can be to so many. I am happy to share her some as well.

34. Live within your means: Never leveraged, always grounded and always there for me when I was not. Thanks mom. This more than any other lesson is the one I hope to pass on to Matthew and Hannah.

35.Get the most out of good things: I have always wanted the next best, bigger, faster out of many things and in the more recent past it has become so clear how different each of us are with this one. Damn she is so much more dialed in on the thing, thing.

36.Listen to yourself: Listen to what comes out of your mouth, hear yourself. Do you like what you are hearing?

37. First things First: why would you work on the things that don’t matter. That might be an actual quote.

38. Get’er Done: That may have been a PA bumper sticker, but I have never known her to talk about doing something without actually then going forward with making it happen.

39. No excuses: I don’t want to hear about all that other stuff, what can you do, what should you do, what belongs to you. Do that.

40. Be gentle: Treating people with respect and dignity and compassion have been one of her most admired traits. This would have to be one of the traits that Grandpa would be most proud of as well.

24 hours in the life of an Ironman.

Right up there with my wedding and the birth of each of our two kids, July 25^th 2010 is clearly around the top so far.

3 AM: Rise and shine, time to eat like there no tomorrow. 1500 calories is the goal amount to consume in the first hour. Why is it still so dark outside?

4 AM: Bags are packed, I am ready to go and getting very excited. So cool to see others in the hotel lobby already up and at it.

5 AM: arrive early and get numbers put on body, Glad to have kimberly with me as i get the numbers wrong, check bike and run bags, fill nutrition on bike and check tires.

6 AM Hang out water side with Kimberly as the sun starts to come up. Can I do this? Will I make the swim? How am I gonna run a marathon at the end of this? Lots of questions and lots of self talk, Wow I need my ipod turned up loud to drain the voices.

7AM Just saw my family right before getting in the water, that was some good energy blast and now KaBam goes the cannon and off I go, swimming with 3000 other people is like a human demolition derby.

8:15 AM out of the water, quick get the wetsuit off, now run ¼ mile or so down to the expo tents. Could they make it farther? Bike shoes on, helmet on, sunglasses on, race belt on, gloves on lets get on that bike.

9 AM: Hills out of town were no so bad, energy levels are high and I feel great. Now its time to fly down the hills towards keene at near 50 MPH, holy crap is that fast in the rain.

10 AM: 30 miles in on the bike and I feel great with an awesome first bike split around 23mph. Crap how come I have to pee again????

11 AM: Climb, Climb, Climb and then Climb some more. Headed to the top and am I only doing 7.5 MPH? at what slow speed do you just fall over?

11:30 am : Got to see my family after the first bike loop and stopped to give kisses to them, that always refuels my energy tank. They have now been here for 5-6 hours and this is the second time they saw me, they are awesome for sure. Team Kris rocks.

12: Downhill the second time is bitter sweet, its fun doing near 50 MPH for a few miles, but my legs know what it’s going to take to get back up and they are not happy. Eating lots of food on the bike is good.

1 pm: Flats feel good and I ma keeping good time. Hey wait there goes my friend Mark from Mooseman. I wanted to chat for a bit but it bathroom time again, wow this is getting on my nerves.

2 PM: Just before heading up the hills again I feel like I want to just get off my bike and sell it, first mental obstical of the day really gets the self talk going n a bad direction. I took a 5 minute break, chow some serious food and am now ready to climb and get this 112 mile ride done.

3 PM: Bike done and in T2 my legs are working still, holy crap I can still move around. Time for running shoes, hat and sunglasses. It was raining before and now its sunny, massive changes in weather up here in the hills. As I exit T2 I see the family and everyone looks so amazingly happy and awake, have I said how much Team Kris ROCKS?

4 PM: It took 3 miles to get my legs to slow down and now I have a comfortable pace that I am confident will last me the whole race without bonking and having to walk it off.

5 PM: Mile 11, who put this huge hill into town? It’s not killing me right now, but all I can think of is how hard it will be when I have to do it again at mile 24. Yuck, just walk and smile and say thank you to the people who came to cheer us on.. I get to see my family twice on the turn around and am feeling strong again.

6 PM: Running 9:30’-10:30 in between aid stations and walking all the hills and stations for rest, just keep moving and keep smiling is the thoughts in my head.

7 PM: feels better to run, but walking the hills has become necessary to get the job done, stick to the plan and make this happen.

7:30 PM Here comes that hill at mile 24 again and it just a nice walk to the top of the second of three peaks . Just after I started to run I see my family and this gives me all I need to run to the top. Just two more miles to go, out and back along the lake and this is all over.

7:45 lost track of time but I am sure I am not breaking 13 hours so I just settle in toa slow jog so I can finish.

7:53 As I turn into the stadium, I see my family first and am feeling like 100% again, then I see the clock at 12:54 and am going to finish in under 13 hours. Over the loudspeaker I hear, Kris Kaplan of Lexington Mass, YOU ARE AN IRONMAN.

8 PM: Found my family quick and got to get some serious love, I am an emotional mess of joy and just loose it with the sweat loving hug from my wife. This was awesome. Two weeks ago, I would have said never again, now I can’t wait to do it again.

Dreams do come true

In the weeks 8 weeks that led up to Lake Placid Ironman, if you had pulled me aside and asked me face to face how ready I was, you may have gotten a bit of hesitation from me. Going into that final stretch of build was a difficult one for sure. Right after Mooseman, a trainer that I was training hard with and set to run the race with decided she had had enough of long distance stuff. The last 4-6 weeks prior to the taper were 20+ hour workout weeks with 6-7 hour long rides on Saturdays followed by an hour long run and 12-20 mile runs on Sunday that took another 2-3 hours. There is no complaining at all, just hard to do by yourself after having someone right there with you. You race alone, so train alone is what a few people said. You race without music, so train without music. Wow some of these people are really hard core.

I made it to race day with no issues, I had great family around me, I was staying a great place and I had great wordsof encouragement from my coach about all the hard work coming together. Race day was simple, follow the plan.

For me if I have a plan, then amazing things can get done, short of a well written plan and I am all over the place. I woke at 3 am and felt great. I had called it a night sometime around 8pm the night before. At 3 am I started eating pre race food and the goal was to get about 2000 calories in me to fill up the tanks. I drink perpetum, eat hammer bars and a bagel or two with some orange juice.

Bags for the race are all packed, bike was dropped off along with bike gear bag and run gear bag the day before. No transition bag needed for Ironman races as each T has its own plastic bag with all of your needs in it hanging there in transition. I did have to bring my race number and stick it in the bag on race day morning.

I put on my tri shorts and shirt and then some warm dry clothes to hang out in until race time, after a cup of coffee, Kimberly and I head down to town in the hotel shuttle. We got there way to early so we headed back to the hotel, grabbed the truck and drove ourselves down so they would have a car to keep stuff at near the course. We got the second to last space and just in time.
Numbering was quick and easy, good thing I had Kimberly with me as when I was asked my number, I gave the wrong one and quickly got corrected. Now its time to just sit and relax and let the crowds start to form. Maybe next time we wont go so early.

At 630 ish I head to the water entry, luckily I see the rest of my family and get to say hello and give the kids kisses before I start. I am in a zone at this point and trying to stay focused on one theing and one thingone,

the first big buoy in the water. That is where I

amswimming to and nothing else matters. Iwas going to let the race start and hold back for a minute or two to let the 3000 plus swimmers clear out a bit, but the adrenelin kicked into full speed and off I went about 50 yards back from the start line.

Swimming for that first buoy that was ½ mile out was like getting in line for the train at penn station, only there was a lot more water. I got kicked in the eye, punched in the side, kicked in the side and had my feet grabbed. The worst is when I was coming up for a breath at the

end of a stroke and someone right next to me is starting his stroke with his arm hooked on my head and shoving it back under the water. Goodtimes for sure. I did not panic, ya can’t stop or you get run over and I decided I was just going to swim my race, stroke at my pace and go where I needed to go. The first 1,2 mile lap was faster than I expected, coming out of the water to run the beach at about 35 minutes. I felt confident and was very confortable with what was going on around me. Now back into the water and do it one more time. Second lap was a bit slower than the first, but I came out of the water around 1:15, got my wetsuit pulled off and was off and running to transition. I saw Rob pointing to where everyone was and I waved in that direction. I did not see anyone however and was just hoping they saw me. They all traveled a long way and I wanted to give them a good show.

T1 was not rushed at all, I relaxed and made sure I had everything I needed for the long 112 mile ride ahead of me. I was told they get your bike for you, but I came out of the water and T1 with a big pack and had to get it myself. Loaded with nutrition, gloves on, helmet on, shoes on and bike ready to go. Off we went to the familiar bike course and everything felt awesome. I had a plan to ride to a power number for each lap of the race. 190 for the fist 56 miles and 200 watts for the second and I am quite sure I came very close to those numbers. Maybe when I get a new power cord and usb devise fro my garmin, I will know just how well I did. My fors

t bike split was fast, felt great, but I knew I had to back it off a bit to save some leggs for the marathon. The 9 mile climb back into placid was comfortable and not too taxing for the first loop and i was starting to realize that I was realy going to get this done today. Just under three hours for the forst loop and I pulled into town, I stopped quickly to give kisses to my family as that always gives me an extra boost and off I went into the second loop.

The most common question in the past week or so has been what is was the toughest part and it realy came around hour 4.5 ish on the bike, you pass a sign that says mile 90 and quickly do the math that there are only 22 miles left, but most of them are up hill. It was all I could do to just keep peddeling, know ing that when I got back to the corner of (N and 86 to make that right hand turn there was nothing but climbing infront of me and the reward for each climb is another. I stopped, used the bathroom, ate some food and re-filled all my bottles and was quickly off and ready to get it done.

Climbing the last 11 miles back into town was more just a long slow ride than hard work, I didn’t want to stand and grind it out, I wanted to save my leggs for whatever they could give me on the run. It took me 6 hours and 20 minutes to finish the ride and I came off the bike with some solid leggs that seemed to be much better than I expected them to be.
The run started out faster than I was comfortable with, after getting past the downhill out of town, my legs were firing fast and it was all I could do to get them to slow, sadly I could not get them to fire fast again after I slowed them. The plan was to run 10:30 and I was not sure that I was going to be able to run the whole thing. I had convinced myself that I would run as long as I could and if 13 miles were covered it would not ne the worst thing to walk the rest.

My coach had given me a solid plan and it had done me well so far, so I just stuck to it and gave it a go. I settled into a 10:30 pace and decided I would walk all the steep hills and all the aid stations. In between each aid station was a mile marker so it seemed that every ½ mile I was getting a reward and that kept me going.

I got passed by these uber athletic types and or young hot and very fast girls who in turn created an opportunity to pick up the pace to enjoy the show a bit longer. I kept my legs moving in a run the entire time aside from the stations and hills and felt strong the entire way as I looked every volunteer in the eyes and thanked them for all their great work today, high fived every little kid that had his hand held out and smiled at everyone. The energy of the crowd was inspiring and great fuel, those cowbells really keep you going.

At mile 24 is the nasty hill climb back into town, heartbreak hill in Boston has nothing on this climb and I for sure walked every inch of the steepness, as soon as I started running again I saw my family for the last turn before the out and back, I was going to finish this race and I was going to do it right at the numbers I thought. The smile on my face was reduced to some tears, the legs were just doing their job of firing right, left, right left and it was less than one mile to go and it was so amazing hearing the crowd cheer. Coming down the last hill and turning into the finish areana was over the top and awe inspiring, I caught sight of my family and then turned to see the finish line, holy crap the clock say less than 13 hours and in 20 yards, 10 yards, 10 feet right now, Kris Kaplan form Lexington, Mass……… You are an Ironman.

When is the next one?????

why email sucks !!!

First there is this group of people driving around looking down at there smart phones at every opportunity they can?

Next there is the fact that only 10% of what you are trying to say comes across in the written word. 55% is lost when there is no body language, 35% is lost without tone.

Then there are those that are just walking around and doing the same, they even do it while they are talking with others. It seems that the tighter you are with someone the more likely they are to be glued to that email reading while you are around.

Workers are in their offices, responding to every email as they come in, how is it that they are actually getting any real work done?

There is tons of data out there that supports how unproductive email has actually made the work force, but that is not the big point.

First we had telephone break ups. Then some even went so low as to do it on the voice mail. The TMZ crowd will most likely text a break up and soon its not just going to be in a tweet, but in a re-tweet. There was even a movie with George Clooney, Up in the air where he went around the country firing people as an outsourced agent.

What is happening to people, when did the woosification of America hit us all so hard, we have become a bunch of passive aggressive maniacs and this needs to change.

Last night I got fired from a vendor that I have done business with on and off for 10 plus years, we have done more than 5 million dollars in business together and communication has been quite regular on the phone. An email came to me and here is the copy.

Kris,

Give me a call when you get a chance. I need to talk with you. We here at _________ after much deliberation and tossing and turning over the decision, have decided to give our 30 day notice. This has been a very hard decision. I really wanted to get the team to make the decision before the web meeting tomorrow and am sorry I am so late getting to you today. It would be very unfair for us to run thru the training and then come back with the final decision. Please give me a call and lets make it as easy as possible for all to transition out.

Thanks,

America, please never ever do this to someone. Get on a plane, skype them, pick up the phone and do it like a human being. Grow up, look up and do it like a man.

What are you Outsourcing ?

Today I tried to teach my 6 year old son about outsourcing and here is the scenario around a deal I made with him.

He gets an allowance of 5 dollars a week in an effort to teach him about the value of money and how to save for the things he wants. It's his money to spend as he wishes and he is not parting with any of it as of yet. He wants to get a really expensive Star Wars LEGO set and it has to come from his own doing. I also want him to learn to tie his shoe, but just don't have those patients for teaching.

The deal is that if he learns how to tie his shoes and does so for a week on his own then I will take him to the LEGO store and get him whatever one thing he wants except the Millennium Falcon or the Death star.

I told him to offer his camp counselor 20 bucks if he could teach him how to tie his shoes and if he could learn how to do it, I would take him to the LEGO store. His eyes lit up and I am sure it will be the first thing he asks next week when he goes to camp.

Wins:

• Matthew saves about 50-100 bucks of his money and gets the toy he wanted.
• I save the few patients I have.
• The counselor makes 20 extra bucks.
• The economy is that much stronger.
• Matthew will be so proud of what he learned.
• No more tying shoes for me.

I can hear the naysayers already, but the point is that outsourcing the small stuff can be cheap and easy and the end results can be far better off than if you did the yourselves. Think about all the time you can save to tackle some of the Big Dreams in your life. Don't sweat the small stuff, stay focused of the Big Dreams and all of it is possible.

Thinking about outsourcing? Try Odesk or Elance.

Peace out.

Kris

How much can i get done in one year?

I am sure there will be plenty added to this list and I will update on a regular basis as one more form of accountability. This years EO/EMP 2nd year class was an amazing 4 days of learning, sharing, inspiration and so much more. It was as if we had not been apart for a whole year and that our relationships had all grown along as they would if we were together for the entire time apart. There is a mix of personal and professional goals on this plan. The idea is not to see if it can get done, it's to get it done and return back for graduation year in a much better position than this year. It was humbling to see how much so many got done as it related to the program and i am truly inspired. So here goes.

2010/2011 Get it done list Kris Kaplan

• o Write and publish Mission/Vision/Values
• o Write and publish Painted Picture
• o Finish and distribute and implement One Page Plan @ KCO
• o Go see All Top Customers
• o Define and publish Bucket Program for Priorities
• o Complete first dvd set of learning French
• o Maintain QuickBooks in real-time 100% of the time.
• o 13.1 pace down to 7:30”s
• o Add 2 additional A-List Vendors
• o Hire 2 Additional sales reps
• o Get 100% alignment with Reps and all goal management
• o Family plan worked out (use 3 big questions, from Lencioni’s book)
• o Outline for a Book
• o Outline for a speech/program
• o NDA agreements in place with all reps and vendors and to all prospects
• o Master Listening Skills
• o Launch new website
• o Set up hootsuite for posts and tweets
• o Reports and programs @ KCO defined and published and placed in calendar
• o BOOKS: Dan Pink, Roy Spence It’s not what you sell…, Peak by Chip Conley.

How many things do you have to do?

I hear everyone tell me all the time that they have too much to do, too many things to get done, to many people to see and never enough time. It's like it's some fricken ego trip for them to share how busy they think they are. I am never impressed in the slightest. There is a saying that I really like and it goes something like this. stupid people talk about others, average people talk about things, great people talk about ideas and what is possible.

Make room for the possible and get some of that shit done, would ya. My guess is that you have so much more to offer and experience in life, and here are some tricks that should help in the process. Try a few, they just might work.

1. Top Five’s At the start of each day (or the night before) highlight the five most important things you have to do in the coming day. Do them first. If you get nothing else accomplished aside from your top 5’s, you’ve still had a pretty productive day.
2. Big Rocks: The big projects you’re working on at any given moment. Set aside time every day or week to move your big rocks forward.
3. Inbox Zero: Decide what to do with every email you get, the moment you read it. If there’s something you need to do, either do it or add it to your to do list and delete or file the email. If it’s something you need for reference, file it. Empty your email inbox every day.
4. Early bird gets the worm: Add a productive hour to your day by getting up an hour earlier — before everyone else starts imposing on your time.
5. One In, One Out: Avoid clutter by adopting a replacement-only standard. Every time you but something new, you throw out or donate something old. For example, you buy a new shirt, you get rid of an old one. (Variation: One in, Two Out — useful when you begin to feel overwhelmed by your possessions.)
6. Brainstorming: The act of generating dozens of ideas without editing or censoring yourself. Lots of people use mindmaps for this: stick the thing you want to think about in the middle (a problem you need to solve, a theme you want to write about, etc.) and start writing whatever you think of. Build off of each of the sub-topics, and each of their sub-topics. Don’t worry about whether the ideas are any good or not — you don’t have to follow through on them, just get them out of your head. After a while, you’ll start surprising yourself with some really creative concepts.
7. Ubiquitous Capture: Always carry something to take notes with — a pen and paper, a PDA, a stack of index cards. Capture every thought that comes into your mind, whether it’s an idea for a project you’d like to do, an appointment you need to make, something you need to pick up next time you’re at the store, whatever. Review it regularly and transfer everything to where it belongs: a to do list, a filing system, a journal, etc.
8. Get more sleep: Sleep is essential to health, learning, and awareness. Research shows the body goes through a complete sleep cycle in about 90 minutes, so napping for less than that doesn’t have the same effect that real sleep does (although it does make you feel better). Get 8 hours a night, at least. Learn to see sleep as a pleasure, not a necessary evil or a luxury.
10. Smart Goals: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely.
11. Eat the Frog: Do your most unpleasant task first. Based on the saying that if the first thing you do in the morning is eat a frog, the day can only get better from then on.
12. 80/20 Rule/Pareto Principle: Generally speaking, the 80/20 Principle says that most of our results come from a small portion of our actual work, and conversely, that we spend most of our energy doing things that aren’t ultimately all that important. Figure out which part of your work has the greatest results and focus as much of your energy as you can on that part.
13. What’s the Next Action?: Don’t plan out everything you need to do to finish a project, just focus on the very next thing you need to do to move it forward. Usually doing the next, little thing will lead to another, and another, until we’re either done or we run into a block: we need more information, we need someone else to catch up, etc. Be as concrete and discrete as possible: you can’t “install cable”, all you can do is “call the cable company to request cable installation”.
14. Slow Down: Make time for yourself. Eat slowly. Enjoy a lazy weekend day. Take the time to do things right, and keep a balance between the rush-rush world of work and the rest of your life.
15. Batch Process: Do all your similar tasks together. For example, don’t deal with emails sporadically throughout the day; instead, set aside an hour to go through your email inbox and respond to emails. Do the same with voice mail, phone calls, responding to letters, filing, and so on — any routine, repetitive tasks.
16. Covey Quadrants: A system for assigning priorities. Two axes, one for importance, the other for urgency, intersect. Tasks are assigned to one of the four quadrants: not important, not urgent; not important, urgent; important, not urgent; and important and urgent. Purge the tasks that are neither important nor urgent, defer the unimportant but urgent ones, try to avoid letting the important ones become urgent, and as much as possible work on the tasks in the important but not urgent quadrant.
17. Handle Everything Once: Don’t set things aside hoping you’ll have time to deal with them later. Ask yourself “What do I need to do with this” every time you pick up something from your email list, and either do it, schedule it for later, defer it to someone else, or file it.
18. Don’t Break the Chain: Use a calendar to track your daily goals. Every day you do something, like working out or writing 1,000 words, make a big red “X”. Every day the chain will grow longer. Don’t break the chain! That is, don’t let any non-X days interrupt your chain of successful days.
19. Review: Schedule a time with yourself every week to look over what you’ve done that week and what you want to do the next week. Ask yourself if there are any new projects you should be starting, and if what you’re working on is moving you closer to your goals for your life.
20. Flow: The flow state happens when you’re so absorbed in whatever you’re doing that you have no awareness of the passing of time and the work just happens automatically. It’s hard to trigger consciously, but you can create the conditions for it by allowing yourself a block of uninterrupted time, minimizing distractions, and calming yourself.
21. Do it Now: Fight procrastination by adopting “do it now!” as your mantra. Limit yourself to 60 seconds when making a decision, decide what you’re going to do with every input in your life as soon as you encounter it, learn to make bold decisions even when you’re not really sure. Keep moving forward.
22. Time Log: Lawyers have to track everything they do in the day and how long they do it so they can bill their clients and remain accountable. You need to be accountable to yourself, so keep track of how much time you really spend on the things that are important to you by tracking your time.
23. Personal Mission Statement: Write a personal mission statement, and use it as a guide to set goals. Ask if each goal or activity moves you closer to achieving your mission. If it doesn’t, eliminate it. Periodically review and revise your mission statement.
24. Reverse Engineering: A planning strategy that works from the goal back to your next action. Start with the end goal in mind. What do you have to have in place to accomplish it? OK, now what do you have to have in place to accomplish what you have to have in place to accomplish your end goal? And what do you have to have in place to accomplish that? And so on, back to something you already have in place and/or can put in place immediately. That’s your next action.
25. Tune Out: Create a personal privacy zone by wearing headphones. People are much more hesitant to interrupt someone wearing headphones. Note: actually listening to music through your headphones is optional — nobody knows but you.
26. Write It Down: Don’t rely on your memory as your system. Write down the things you need to do, your schedule, anything you might need to refer to, and every passing thought so you can relax, knowing you won’t forget. Use your brain for thinking, use paper or your computer for keeping track of stuff.
27. Gap Time: The little blocks of time we have during the day while waiting for the bus, standing in line, waiting for a meeting to start, etc. Have a list of small, 5-minute tasks that you can do in these moments, or carry something to read or work on to make the most of these spare minutes.
28. Single tasking: We like to think of ourselves as great Multitaskers, but we aren’t. What we do when we multitask is devote tiny slices of time to several tasks in rapid succession. Since it takes more than a few minutes (research suggests as long as 20) to really get into a task, we end up working worse and more slowly than if we devoted longer blocks of time to each task, worked until it was done, and moved on to the next one.
29. Habits: Habits are as much about the way we see and respond to the world as about the actions we routinely take. Examine your own habits and ask what they say about your relation to the world — and what would have to change to create a worldview in which your goals were attainable.
30. Triggers: Place meaningful reminders around you to help you remember, as well as to help create better habits. For example, put the books you need to take back to the library in front of the door, so you can’t leave the house without seeing them and remembering they need to go back.
31. Un-clutter: Clutter is anything that’s out of place and in the way. It’s not necessarily neatness — someone can have a rigorously neat workspace and not be able to get anything done. It’s being able to access what you need, when you need it, without breaking the flow of your work to find it. Figure out what is “clutter” in your working and living spaces, and fix that.
32. Visualize: Imagine yourself having accomplished your goals. What is your life like? Are you who you want to be? If not, rethink your goals. If so, then visualize yourself taking the steps you need to take to get there. You’ve got yourself a plan; write it down and do it.
33. Tickler File: A set of 43 folders, labeled 1 – 31 and January – December, used to remind us of tasks we need to do on a specific day. For instance, if you have a trip on March 23rd, you’d put your itinerary, tickets, and other material in the “March” folder. At the start of each month, you move the previous month’s folder to the back. On March 1st, you’d transfer your travel information into the “23″ folder. Each day, you move the previous day’s folder to the back. On the 23rd, the “23″ folder will be at the front, and everything you need that day will be there for you.
34. To Don’t List: A list of things not to do — useful for keeping track of habits that lead you to be unproductive, like playing online flash games.
35. Templates: Create templates for repetitive tasks, like letters, customer reply emails, blog posts, etc.
36. Checklists: When planning any big task, make a checklist so you don’t forget the steps while in the busy middle part of doing it. Keep your checklists so you can use them next time you have to do the same task.
37. No: Learning to say “no” — to new commitments, to interruptions, to anything — is one of the most valuable skills you can develop to keep you focused on your own commitments and give you time to work on them.
38. Un-schedule: Schedule all your fun activities and personal life stuff (the stuff you want to do) first. Fill in whatever time’s left over with uninterrupted blocks of work. Write those into your schedule after you’ve completed them. Reward yourself after every block of quality, focused work.
39. Purge: Regularly go through your existing commitments and get rid of anything that is either not helping you advance your own goals or is a regular “sink” of time or energy.
40. One Bucket: Minimize the places you collect new inputs in your life, your “buckets”. Ideally have one “bucket” where everything goes. Lots of people experience an incredible sense of relief when everything they need to think about is collected in one place in front of them, no matter how big the pile.
41. 50/30/20: Spend 50% of your working day on tasks that advance your long-term, life goals, spend 30% on tasks that advance your middle-term (2-years or so) goals, and the remaining 20% on things that affect only the next 90 days or so.
42. Timer: Tell yourself you will work on a project or task, and only that project or task, for a set amount of time. Set a timer (use a kitchen timer, or use a countdown timer on your computer), and plug away at your work. When the timer goes off, you’re done — move on to the next project or task.
43. Do Your Worst: Give yourself permission to suck. Relieve the pressure of needing to achieve perfection in every task on the first run. Promise yourself you’ll go back and fix any problems later, but for now, just run wild.
44. Put it in your calendar: Schedule time every week or so just for you. Consider the state of your life: what’s working? What isn’t working? What mistakes are you making? What could you change? Give yourself a chance to get to know you.

Make it Happen.