Welcome Joan of BusyBodyBooks to my site!  You hear me talk about it all the time, but I seriously LOVE my planner!  I use it to keep all my posts, series, etc straight and can’t imagine blogging without it!

Whether you telecommute and/or run your business completely out of your own home office it’s vital to define your daily/weekly/monthly goals, commitments, To-dos and have all handy to stay on top of your progress with: customers, projects, key personnel and their responsibilities, as well,

Before starting my own business I was lucky to step into flowing office systems that were remarkably easy to follow. But as an outside printing sales rep it was my responsibility to stay on top of my own customer’s on-going projects to both make sure that their always time sensitive production was on schedule and then be able to communicate this effectively to them.

Since I spent most of the time “in the field” my lap was more often my office and my rather small Filofax binder became my bible. My contacts and my calendar were pretty typical but my projects needed their own system.

Using Filofax’s plain, horizontally ruled pages I drew simple vertical lines to create a grid: columns designated as my client’s projects and rows assigned the standard stages of print production. In teeny tiny boxes I recorded dates and notes to keep me up to date with the on-goings back in my office and printing plant.

Pre-cell phone, as I made my way through NYC visiting clients or canvassing for new, with rolls of dimes and quarters for calls from the nearest phone booth (remember those???), I easily accessed my grid for updating clients on what was happening with any given project. My grid was my life-saver. When a client called I could relate the good news (OK, sometimes bad news) concerning progress – when to meet me on press, what was being messengered to their office and when, when to expect delivery, etc. – all from a phone on the street!

After my son was born, my grid was even more important. At first, while working from my home office, I relied heavily on my GRID and stayed up on and in touch with everything and everyone. And then another column was “born”, named for my son “Jake”. For years to follow I would continue ducking into phone booths, now even more frequently, to call in and sync with our son’s and nanny’s schedule.

While I of course owe much my success to all of the personnel I worked with over those years, the then DIY system I devised provided years of growth of volume business from key accounts, time to identify and nurture new accounts – and gave me peace of mind knowing that Jake too was okay and on his schedule.

My paper and very portable office system still serves me well – it’s no longer my very own Office Management System – it’s now been incorporated into BusyBodyBook® organizer products shared with thousands of very busy people worldwide.

Joan Goldner

About Your Time

Publisher of BusyBodyBook Organizers