This week’s new tool to consider is The Weekly Review. It’s a time in the week where we can take a breather from the daily treadmill and look at what we’ve done throughout the week and what we have coming up. It’s a time to clear our head - write down the general housekeeping things like car maintenance, verbal honey-dos, and off-the-wall work ideas. It’s a time to go through our tasks and make sure they’re prioritized properly.

By using the created date on tasks, we can see what’s sitting undone and identify why - maybe something too complex or very low priority or maybe something we’re just not committed to yet but can’t delete either. We can identify why something may be too complex - perhaps we’re missing an expertise and either need to learn more ourselves or hire someone who can help us.

In the weekly review, we can keep our eyes open for unexplored opportunities. We can also trim the deadwood - get rid of tasks that we know aren’t needed.

My Weekly Review Agenda

My weekly review looks something like this:

  • When: Saturday night, after the kids are in bed
  • Where: In front of a big monitor, Nozbe/Trello/OneNote floating throughout the screens, post-its on the desk to go on the wall
  • Steps:
    • Go through the inboxes - virtual and physical - and see what’s accomplished. Celebrate the week!
    • Now look at what’s left unaccomplished:
      • Verify that priorities are set properly.
      • Verify that projects are still relevant.
      • Add new projects and tasks that have come up in this process.
      • Identify resources for tackling the complex tasks.
      • Remove any tasks or projects that may no longer be relevant.

This Week’s Review

This has been a long week, and the biggest positive that came from the weekly review was seeing the progress made and realizing that a decision I made last week is indeed the right decision. I was on the board for a local non-profit and recently stepped down, with my last meeting being last week and my last board event being this past Monday. I was hesitant about stepping down, but honestly, I have a lot of other things going on at the moment that require my attention, and it wouldn’t be fair for me to stay on the board if I can’t commit to them significantly. I will still be there for them and support them - but I know that I need to allocate my time properly for other goals to be achieved, which will unfortunately move me (physically) further away from the non-profit, making it even harder for me to support them and their needs. Seeing Monday’s event’s tasks all checked off made me realize my impact, which I will forever be grateful for having the opportunity to be on their board and to serve them again.

This week’s review helped me realize that some goals that I had prioritized to later are moving up in the priority list because - to quote Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist:

When a person really desires something, all the universe conspires to help that person to realize his dream.

As priorities on goals shift, so do the priorities of tasks. Unfortunately, this also means that my tasks are in a whirlwind of prioritization, as many goals are coming up at once.

So one thing that I hope to change or refine for next week’s weekly review is to identify goals and their priorities a bit better with more research as to what movement is happening and what priorities they really need to be set for.