Written by: Janet Macaluso, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
We're almost through January. Does your calendar reflect your 2023 aspirations? Or, are you living your one-precious life based on automated calendar software, outdated assumptions, or others' agendas?
Regenerate Your Calendar To Reflect Who You’re Becoming...
Free your energy to focus on what's important now ‒ to you and your stakeholders with this audit:
Do meetings have specific goals that align with your purpose and strategic direction? Will the meeting build your stakeholders' capability to achieve their aspirations? (Either directly or indirectly).
In a world of complexity and change, we need more exploratory dialogues. Are meeting conversations a free-for-all? Do you use an underlying structure or Thinking Frameworks to manage ambiguity? Or does the loudest voice prevail?
Do you talk for 30 or 60 minutes because that's what the computer automatically scheduled? Do you need more/less time? Or are you living your life based on an automated calendar tool?
Consider holding a "stand up" meeting. Notice if the conversation is more focused on what's core when you're on your feet vs. bums. Could you schedule a walk and talk?
Ask yourself if you'd lose any personal goodwill, connection, or nuance if you wrote an email or picked up the phone vs. calling a meeting.
Identify the calendar items that someone else invited you to. Do you know the Desired Outcomes and the relevance of your being there? Don't outsource control of your time ‒ understand others' rationale for inviting you.
What percentage of your week/month is unscheduled? Have you blocked important "Thinking Time" to process, plan and strategize?
Look at your regularly-scheduled meetings. Do you need to be there? Could you send someone else on your behalf (so they grow from the experience)?
As you scan your calendar, sense your gut and upper torso (where emotions hang out). Identify the calendar items you look forward to. How can you schedule more of that work?
If you had to remove one calendar item, which would it be? Your answer can inform you if you need to make changes.
Now, a challenge. Consider sharing this with your team - ask them to add to or edit the list.
Then test this for one month: Start every morning reviewing your list and commit to doing the one thing that:
you've avoided
scares you
will build your next-stage potential
This calendar audit is just a snippet of the practical work inside the Third Line Mastermind. (Yet we go much deeper on underlying patterns, hidden paradigms, building new capabilities...) Learn more here.
Janet Macaluso, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
After a 25-year corporate career developing executives, teams, and organizations, Janet founded Learning2LEAD, a Regenerative Leadership Development practice based in Cambridge, USA, and Malaga, Spain.
No stranger to personal regeneration, Janet reinvented herself from a college dropout to a flight attendant and aerobic instructor to an award-winning coach and global executive with three academic degrees.
Janet created Learning2LEAD to reflect on the life, legacy, and impact she wants to leave. Applying modern science and ancient wisdom, Janet stewards successful mid-life change-makers, leaders, and rabble-rousers ready to transform their "1st-half" successes into "2nd-half" significance.
Whether in virtual workshops or leadership hiking retreats in Spain, Janet nudges clients to move toward their Best Future Self Now - so they can do the same for their people and places. Her mission: To Ban Average!
