(L25) Pen & Paper Conquer All

The goal-setting program I have chosen to stick with is pen and paper. I have chosen this method mostly because writing something down seems more final to me than typing it into a computer does. Writing my goals and dates on a calendar in a planner helps me not only remember what I have written, but it helps me keep my everyday tasks and my long-term goals all in one book inside my purse. My goals, plans, deadlines, my successes and failures are all with me all the time. When I open up my planner to remind myself of an event, I also remind myself of what I am ultimately working towards; it helps me decide which social events are going to be helpful to me in the long-term, and which ones are going to be a waste of time. My written planner allows me to check my mental hierarchy, even when it is the last thing on my mind; this has been immensely helpful to me in order to keep myself on task.

(L20) Goal Setting & Organization

I have (kind-of) adopted the Nozbe application for these reasons:

Nozbe is a goal setting and tracking application, complete with a calendar, and multiple other categories to organize your to-dos. There is a tab for categories, and another (separate) tab for projects within (or unrelated to) those categories. This iPad (and I believe iPhone) compatible application also allows you, with payments, to add other members to your account. These people can view your goals and achievements, as well as being able to make theirs visible to you. However, in an attempt to be extremely organized, the app seems to have sacrificed some of it’s user-friendliness, and I found myself jumping tab, to tab, to tab, trying to get everything in the place that I wanted it. This application, while being a good fit for some people, was not necessarily a good fit for me, as I ended up wasting most of my time trying to figure it out and organize it correctly. So, although it was not a terrible application, I think I will stick to my good old planner notebook. It has a calendar, daily spots for writing in goals/appointments and such, and is chalked full of sticky notes for my own organization. I am simply more of a pen and paper type of gal!

Calendars and Scheduling : Dayviewer Vs. Apple Calendar (L11)

My task this week was to choose two calendar applications (or online resources) and play around with them for a few days; get a feel of them and then decide which you would be more likely to use and why. I chose to compare an online application titled Dayviewer, and the automatic (comes pre-installed in the iPhone) Apple calender.

   

 

Now, I am going to have to be honest, I am slightly biased in my decision to use the Apple calendar rather than the online Dayviewer. The Apple calendar is what I have been using for years; I am much more comfortable with this format because it’s what I’m used to. However, that being said, I still probably would’ve chosen the Apple calendar even if I had had no experience with either, simply due to it’s user friendly and easy-to navigate set-up. Others may also refer to this set-up as more of a break-down, seeing as Apple offers multiple categories of calendars, and simple steps to set up events and reminders. This includes Calendar, Home, and Work – as well as being able to sync these different calendars with your Facebook and various other accounts to include birthday alerts and Facebook events automatically as well. Dayviewer is slightly less user friendly, with a confusing amount of options and a lack of explanation. The webpage has almost too much going on. Once ones begin to understand the layout though, they will find that many of these options are useless to some. Contacts, and messaging options for other people inside of the Dayviewer community. Unless one was using this deliberately with other people in a group form, these would be virtually unnecessary. This was the case for me. I did however find that there were some extra categories offered for personal organization that the Apple calendar lacked; some of these being Notes, Tasks, Events, Payments, and Online Chats, as well as being able to navigate between either your Personal, or Shared calendars. One thing that I found very useful about Dayviewer was that on the right, about a third of the page is a section titled “What’s Coming Up”. Here all of one’s upcoming events are listed in a to-do list manner; the user can decide to show the next 5, 10, 20, or 50 upcoming events in their schedule. Seeing every event in this manor was useful to me personally. The deciding factor between which one I would be more likely to use was accessibility. Both are electronic, but only Dayviewer absolutely requires internet for access. Also, the only reminders that Dayviewer can send to me are through my email, which is not a very direct way to reach me. I cannot rely on an email the way I can rely on an alarm reminder through my cellphone, which I am rarely caught without. The Apple calendar offers alarms on calendar events as well as secondary reminders of this event at an earlier (or later) date decided by you. The Apple calendar is direct and efficient; it works better with my lifestyle.