The Newsletter

Issue no. 49|23 August, 2011

5 Things To Ctrl-Shift-K

When I was re-listening to the Manager Tools Development Podcast last week, I heard Mark say, “put a reminder on your task list once a month and ask yourself ‘How am I doing with family time?’”

Ctrl-Shift-K is the Outlook shortcut for a task. By using that, Mark suggests you check in with yourself once a month and see how you are doing on your commitment to leaving work on time and getting home to see your family.

That made me think. What else can we use Ctrl-Shift-K for?

Stay Connected: If you’ve listened to any of our casts on building a network, you’ll know we recommend using Ctrl-Shift-K to create a recurring task to keep in contact with all the people in our network. Just reach out each time the task comes up. You don’t have to “be a networker” to have a great network. You have to “stay in touch with [people].

Meet Your Objectives: In organizations we’ve worked in, objectives are set at the beginning of the year and never looked at again, until it’s review time. That’s a guaranteed way to miss your objective. Put them in a task list and make the task pop up at least once a month. When the task comes up, put time on your calendar to work on them in the next four weeks. Don’t wait longer than the first quarter to schedule a ping. If you haven’t started by then, it’s going to seem impossible.

Update Your Resume: We recommend you update your Career Management Document once a quarter. Just add the accomplishments from the last quarter, and when you need a resume, it’ll take no time to create. 30 minutes, once a quarter. To avoid panicky scrambling when a great opportunity falls in your lap.

Follow Up: Bad at remembering to ask about people's vacations, family events or operations? Create a task for the day or week after they return. Don't forget to look at your task list just before you go to a meeting or pick up the phone and you'll be reminded to ask how the event went.

Stay Regular: Any task which is tedious is better done more regularly. Take filing. Most of us file on our computers now, but those hard drives get as messy as our desks used to. Got a file folder called ‘stuff’ or ‘everything’ where you've just swept everything when you’ve needed to concentrate on the latest fire? Put a task on your list that recurs weekly called ‘filing’. Next time you’re waiting for the caffeine to kick in, spend 5 minutes filing. It's much easier done in small bites regularly. 5 minutes. FIVE.

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