Comments on: Business Courtesy – On Responding

By: Linda Ryan

Linda Ryan — Sat, 14 May 2011 14:20:38 +0000

Great topic Bob and it reminds me of Earl Nightingale’s (via Ivy Lee~an efficiency expert who was paid $25K for this idea by Charles Schwab) advice and is similar to what David (above) talks about. At night I make a list of ALL the tasks I need to do tomorrow. Then I choose the top 6 goal-achieving activities and put them in order of importance. Next morning i get to work on #1 and stay with it until it’s either complete, or I’ve taken it as far as I can. Then I move on #2 and so on. I may not get through all 6 each day, but it helps me focus on the most important tasks first. I actually had this sheet made into pads at Kenkos and I give them to clients as we work on time management, and most find it very helpful. It’s the best system I’ve found, and I’ve tried many. As Earl said “No one manages time; time can’t be managed. We merely manage activities”
Sorry for rambling here…too much caffeine this AM
PS. I am always impressed at how quickly you respond and it inspires me to do the same )

By: David Emil Lombard

David Emil Lombard — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 16:21:17 +0000

Great topic Bob. Who isn’t this relevant to? I work 2 hrs a day for Tony Robbins & Chet Holmes – Business Breakthroughs International, and there is a big piece on this in our CEO Mastery Training. I’ve taken it and my biggest breakthrough was definitely around managing myself in time. Here was my big take away.

1) Schedule ‘Got-a-minute’ meetings in your day for people to interrupt you and to take calls. 2) Have 2 or 3 at most scheduled times for email, as every email look takes an ave of 15 mins away. 3) Write your 6 (must be 6) biggest tasks for the next day. Next, figure out how much time they’ll take. FINALLY (and only then) assign times of the day to do them.

I am still learning to be consistent with this, but WOW has it changed my whole game. I’m talking like given me three times as much time.

Here is a detailed article by Chet Holmes himself on this for you and your readers Bob. If anyone wants further information they of course can connect with me: http://www.chetholmes.com/articles/timemanagement1.pdf

By: Lee Pound

Lee Pound — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 16:03:25 +0000

That was an excellent post, Bob. For most of us it is difficult to keep up with email and I have found that some emails and tweets may not get answered as quickly as possible. Your post made it clear that to keep our relationships we must respond and respond quickly. To answer or not is a conscious decision that we make with every message we get. It’s a decision we can change in an instant. Thank you for encouraging us to make the right decision.

By: Nadia

Nadia — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 15:40:49 +0000

I sure know first hand that you walk the talk. Had the proof today.

Thanks for following up to my emails (your co-workers did too, BTW) and for sharing this. When I got your message, I was working at the computer, trying to enhance my time management and inserting time slots to better answer to all my messages. This must have been some type of synchronicity.

Have a good day, Bob.

Talk to you soon.

Nadia

By: Bob Martinelli

Bob Martinelli — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 14:06:05 +0000

Bob this is a great repost. Thank for sharing it again. One thing I find interesting is many times the individuals that don’t return calls are themselves salespeople. Ironicly, they don’t have time to talk to another salessperson. According to the law of attraction, you receive what you send out. If people aren’t returning your calls we should make sure we are returning the calls of others.