Coach Dan Foster

A few years ago, my friend and coach, Barry Engelman shared with me the discipline of creating margin in my schedule. He explained how many leaders fill every moment of every day with appointments and other obligations, leaving very little time to respond to a situation that requires their immediate attention.

In the past I have shared with you the importance of working from a priority management plan. One of the key elements of a successful priority management plan is dedicating time in your schedule to focus on targeted areas for professional growth and development. This routine is what coaches refer to as ON TIME. Unfortunately, it is an important block of time that often gets pushed aside or never scheduled by professionals. However, the professionals that do make and keep a commitment to ON TIME regularly are much more likely to succeed in reaching their long-term vision for success.

Every year in July my team and I take time to reflect on the first half of the year and all it has brought forth. Reflecting on the past is not something we do as often as we should. Perhaps the past is full of pain or sorrow and the thought of remembering the struggles and challenges is too difficult. Often though, we don’t reflect because we just don’t take the time. We are so caught up in dealing with the tyranny of the urgent we forget what we were doing just a few hours maybe even minutes ago. This year I’ve asked my team to reflect on the first half of the year and I’ve provided them with the following five questions to help them in this process.

There comes a time in most of our lives when we look at our most important relationships and realize that they are not where we hoped or once enjoyed them being. We could each create a long list of the reasons why this occurs from a failure to communicate regularly to simply life being too busy for us to slow down and meaningfully connect. Whatever the circumstances, we know that something is not right and that a change is needed in order to restore the relationship.

Recently, I blogged about how the American work force is feeling burned out and stressed like never before in history. The ability to “stay connected” to work while at home or on vacation has increased the risk of living a life out of balance and constantly under pressure to respond others needs.