Day Planner?

Anyone here use a day planner of some kind?

I've used a day planner since I can remember. I use an old school one, paper and pencil. Over the years I've tried many, many, different systems including electronic versions, but the good ol' 2 page per day planner style is what works best for me. I'm one of those people who writes everything down. I can't count how many times this has saved my bacon. My planner gets everything written in it; notes, places, people, phone numbers, etc.

One of the biggest obstacles people have in using day planners is picking out the correct size that works for you. I've gone from 8.5x11 all the way down to micro, and up and down again numerous times. I really like the 5.5x4.25 size (roughly A5 size) because a regular sized sheet of paper folds in half to this size so it can be kept in your notebook also. Over time though, I've found that size to be too big to carry with me everywhere (and if you don't carry it with you everywhere its value diminishes rapidly). For the past few years I've been using the A6 size which is roughly half-again as big (6.5"x4.25"). Too small and you can't get enough detail in it. Too big, and you won't use it as much. It's a tradeoff.

I've seen some people's planners which are literally works of art (some of them bordering on masterpieces). I love to doodle, and I've tried that route, but I wind up spending more time planning out the page layout than concentrating on the notes which need to be in it. There's a million different systems out there, and there's no "right" and "wrong" version. Some people use them more like a journal / diary.

Do you use day planners? If so, what kind / system do you use?

P.S. Once again, I have to acknowledge here; I am a self-professed pencil, pen and paper nut, so I may be biased. I think there's something deep inside my psyche which causes me to consciously avoid electronic gadgets like my phone for such tasks. I'm tryin to use my phone more, but it mainly serves as a support role for pictures and the like. It's kind of ironic...electronic systems is what pays the bills and keeps the lights on, but on a personal level, I'd rather use paper and pencil.

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
Anyone here use a day planner of some kind?

Yeah, it's called 'my Outlook calendar'. Having it on my phone makes things even simpler.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Anyone here use a day planner of some kind?

No such thing.
I tried that for a short while , years ago .
Found out :No such thing .

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

No....I pay my secretary for that.....

So does that count?

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

I use Office 365 for almost everything, so I use OneNote for tracking things and tasks and my Outlook calendar for everything else. I have dozens of reminders of varying intervals for all types of items and that would just be too unwieldy to use a physical planner for.

originally posted by: Gothmog
a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Anyone here use a day planner of some kind?

No such thing.
I tried that for a short while , years ago .
Found out :No such thing .

You're doing it wrong! 😎

a reply to: peter_kandra

I fully expected to see this response (generally).

That's all fine and good for appointments (I use outlook too), but how do you record what you do, the responses you get, and the notes you make for each of those appointments? And, then when you need to go back and look at what transpired last week, or last month, how do you find that easily?

Appointments are one thing, but keeping track of what happened with all those appointments is another matter.

Then there's the whole archiving thing with Outlook. I've worked out a system which is probably better than most, but archiving Outlook sucks! It really does.

ETA - And Gawd forbid you ever talk to someone (via email) about more than one subject! Try to archive that!!

I guess that I am old school.
I have three dry erase boards in my office, a call log that I hand write notes for all of my phone calls, a daily work log for tracking field employees, a 12 month accordion folder with upcoming jobs and 8 file folders in a stand on my desk with service orders for jobs that are ongoing and coming up in the current month.

I don't use Outlook much at all.

Oh yeah, I still have a Rol-a-Dex that I still use, in fact the company owner was looking through it yesterday to find someone's number.

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
a reply to: peter_kandra

I fully expected to see this response (generally).

That's all fine and good for appointments (I use outlook too), but how do you record what you do, the responses you get, and the notes you make for each of those appointments? And, then when you need to go back and look at what transpired last week, or last month, how do you find that easily?

Appointments are one thing, but keeping track of what happened with all those appointments is another matter.

Then there's the whole archiving thing with Outlook. I've worked out a system which is probably better than most, but archiving Outlook sucks! It really does.

ETA - And Gawd forbid you ever talk to someone (via email) about more than one subject! Try to archive that!!

That's the beauty of Office 365, you can take notes from a meeting or appointment directly into Teams (say for a business meeting), or to OneNote for something personal. You can then globally search from the Office home page portal across any of the apps.

As far as archiving, Office 365 has automatic archiving. You just set how long you want items to remain in your Inbox and anything older goes into the archive mailbox. Gone are the good old days of having to manage multiple .pst files. Unless by archiving you mean moving the emails to folders based on topics, etc. I still do that, but can search through years of emails to find something in literally seconds and almost always find what I need.

As far as file storage, I use One Drive for mostly personal items (with a linked folder on my computer) and SharePoint for collabration.

a reply to: peter_kandra

Gawd...you just had to mention the dreaded "MS Teams" word!

Teams sucks ass, especially when you have to work Teams from more than one domain. It might as well not exist! (I wish it didn't!). I have to work in Teams in at least (3) different domains. Try that sometime, and then report back on how much you like teams then! LOL!

Anyway, understood, and glad it works for you. That system doesn't work for me for a variety of reasons. OneNote was the closest I could get something useful, and I still like it for its flexibility. However, I don't (and can't) trust the cloud for anything.

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
a reply to: peter_kandra

Gawd...you just had to mention the dreaded "MS Teams" word!

Teams sucks ass, especially when you have to work Teams from more than one domain. It might as well not exist! (I wish it didn't!). I have to work in Teams in at least (3) different domains. Try that sometime, and then report back on how much you like teams then! LOL!

Anyway, understood, and glad it works for you. That system doesn't work for me for a variety of reasons. OneNote was the closest I could get something useful, and I still like it for its flexibility. However, I don't (and can't) trust the cloud for anything.

That's definitely it's biggest limitation currently...using it with multiple tenants. I do believe they are working on a generic O365 solution to more easily work with multiple domains as it's very common...especially for contractors, etc.

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
That's all fine and good for appointments (I use outlook too), but how do you record what you do, the responses you get, and the notes you make for each of those appointments? And, then when you need to go back and look at what transpired last week, or last month, how do you find that easily?

Salesforce, it syncs with Outlook.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

I'm old school too... if I didn't write it down, it didn't happen!

I use a monthly planner to keep track of bills because I can see all on one page what's been paid, what needs to be paid, and what's coming up to be paid. I use different colored ink for specific purposes as well, so that what I want to see jumps out at me. So much quicker and easier than electronics! I just ordered my new one for 2022. When it comes, I'll sit down and figure out my budget for the next year -- which bills need to be paid with which paycheck. It probably takes a couple hours to do initially, but it sure saves time and makes it easy to pay bills.

I use a weekly planner for everything else -- social events, home/yard maintenance and repairs, whatever comes up.

AND I have a small notebook in my purse for anything that comes up while I'm out and about.

I do use the "Notes" and "Reminders" on my phone for a few things... for example, I have the type of printer cartridges I use stored in there so I have it when I need it. But nothing I would worry about if my phone were lost or stolen.

I don't doodle though! My kids do. They like planners and notebooks too. My son uses electronics the most, but even he prefers good old pen and paper for some things.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Then there's the whole archiving thing with Outlook. I've worked out a system which is probably better than most, but archiving Outlook sucks! It really does.

ETA - And Gawd forbid you ever talk to someone (via email) about more than one subject! Try to archive that!!

Finally someone that has that same opinion. Nothing will be found ever again if it's archived with Outlook. The search in new outlook is horrible. I use a ticket system so all email traffic is tagged (by hand).

Some people in some companies will just reuse an old email, not change the title and mail a new inquiry. Not even deleting the old stuff, no it has all random things attached.

What I hate most is that it ALWAYS jumps somewhere into 2/3 down the list when I change from Sent to Recived. It's super confusing everytime, because the inbox suddenly looks completely different and then you see the old dates and scroll bar at a weird place.

I use my ticket system to track things down. It's not the best for schedules, but I have outlook for that. The rest I will either write on paper and later type in or just scan it directly into the ticket system when I am lazy.

a reply to: Boadicea

The kind I use has a monthly planner at the beginning of every month, and then 2 pages per day for each day. The left page is basically "to-do" and appointments by hour. The right page is a log of notes from the day. Then at the end of the month there's a summary page to log the major events from that month. I usually keep one month of pages in my planner, and then I keep the monthly tabs for the previous month and about 3 months out. That way I can see several months at a glance, both forwards and backwards. Works really well. I like it.

There's also an annual planner part with all 12 months on it, but I don't really use that because it's too small to really do anything with.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

That's all fine and good for appointments (I use outlook too), but how do you record what you do, the responses you get, and the notes you make for each of those appointments? And, then when you need to go back and look at what transpired last week, or last month, how do you find that easily?

I use excel. At one point I was taking care of both my parents and also used excel for them.
I have tons of notes, dates, photos. It is one of the best planners imaginable. Like your notebook my notes have saved me so many times. People don't realize how easy it is to forget dates and details.

Not to toot my own horn but I actually was responsible for physical and file management for a gigantic corporation, we're talking hundreds of thousands of records.
I used Access for that, but for home excel is fine.

I use my phone calendar and pen and notebook - just a college rule spiral. I use different colors of ink for different things/days. It's a personal system I developed with note taking in college. At the same time, pretty much anything finds its way into the current notebook wherever on the page - hence the inking system. I can find relevant stuff at a glance.

a reply to: JAGStorm

How do you use excel for that? Are days columns or rows? Or are they tabs?

Interested in knowing how you do this, and in particular how you plan out the future.

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
a reply to: Boadicea

The kind I use has a monthly planner at the beginning of every month, and then 2 pages per day for each day. The left page is basically "to-do" and appointments by hour. The right page is a log of notes from the day. Then at the end of the month there's a summary page to log the major events from that month. I usually keep one month of pages in my planner, and then I keep the monthly tabs for the previous month and about 3 months out. That way I can see several months at a glance, both forwards and backwards. Works really well. I like it.

There's also an annual planner part with all 12 months on it, but I don't really use that because it's too small to really do anything with.

I've seen planners like you describe, and I even tried using one like that years ago, but -- color me embarrassed! -- I found I confused and confounded myself. I have to follow the KISS method -- Keep It Simple Silly! My monthly (bills) planner stays at my desk. Even if I need to talk something over with my husband, he has to come to it, I don't take it to him. My weekly planner goes all over the house with me, sometimes even out of the house.

I have wondered if I should have a separate notebook to log home/yard maintenance and repairs, like the one I have for vehicle repairs. Actually, I know I should... I just never get around to it!