by Mandy Green, Busy Coach
I want to share with you what has become one of my ultimate weapons. Something that has separated me from a lot of my competitors. This very powerful tool is something we all have access to every single day and yet most people never even use it or are not using it in the right way.
So what is this great personal development tool that can guide our yearly, monthly, and daily actions and could be the key to having your best year of growth and accomplishment for you individually and for your program?
It is your calendar.
How do you currently use your calendar? Whether you use paper or a computer calendar, do you use it just to record your to-do list of busy work like go to a game here, recruiting call there, pick up groceries, etc.
Or do you use your calendar to think bigger picture? If you are not doing so already, I want you to use the strategic 12 months that we are all given every year to grow and develop into a better coach, a better recruiter, a better leader, get healthier, etc. Bottom line, to achieve the next level of achievement for us individually and with our programs, we need to use our calendars more strategically.
I learned how to set up my calendar this way from Brendon Burchard, who is one of the best personal development trainers out there. In the training I did with him, he had me think about 5 different areas of my life where I could have significant growth and then strategically map out the next 12 months of my life. Those 5 areas were in skill development, health, fun, relationships, and joy.
I am more than willing to share how I did this in all 5 areas, but for now, this is how I took this training and applied to what we do as coaches in the area of skill development.
Ultimate Outcome: I was low on staff, budget, and time. I was annoyed and frustrated that every task pertaining to recruiting was taking so long so I decided to solve my own problem and come up with a solution. I wanted to have set up a better recruiting system for my staff and I by the end of the year. I set out to find a way to do each recruiting task more efficiently and done in a way so it could get broken down, analyzed, and improved upon to produce good predictable results.
This was the plan I had created for skill acquisition and month by month what I have been training my Recruiting Made Simple Group on :
January: Map out a year-long communication/recruiting plan
February: Learn how to speak on the phone and in person better with recruits and their parents
March: Subject lines that get opened
April: Creating standard operating procedures for yourself and your staff and myself.
May: How to ask better questions
June: My first contact message to get my responses up
July: Track our recruiting and team results
August: How to prepare your team to help recruit
September: Social Media Recruiting
October: Campus Visits
November: How to recruit the parents better.
December: Close the sale to get commitments Create a better way to manage my email.
When I was doing this to become a better recruiter, I would find a few books or articles to read on the subject for the month, I would find podcasts to listen to, YouTube videos to watch, and I would try to interview a few people on the topic.
The most critical part of executing this plan was that I scheduled it into my calendar. I time blocked 55 minutes of my day into my Busy Coach Daily Planner. I set my stopwatch and then I focused on nothing else but acquiring this skill to become a better recruiter. At the end of the 55 minutes, I took the last 5 minutes of the hour to get up out of my chair and did something physical so I could clear my head, refocus, and get my energy back up.
At the end of each month, I didn’t always completely master the topic, but I learned a heck of a lot and knew that I was getting better. At the end of the year, I was able to come up with a better recruiting system that was a lot of work to set up, but in the long run I am saving so much time and energy. I can measure and track results. We can smoothly transition if a new coach comes on board because we have a standard operating procedure for our recruiting tasks. I have checklists to reduce the time it takes us to do things and now nothing gets forgotten.
Utilize your calendar better this year by mapping out a 12 month skill development plan that will push and challenge yourself. Every single month set a monthly personal development challenge for yourself. Every 30 days make yourself a personal challenge to become a better person, coach, friend, or leader. At the end of the month you can look to see how well you did.
Want some help planning your year? Mandy Green has worked with hundreds of coaches to help them improve their recruiting and overall effectiveness as a college coach. Email Mandy Green at mandy@busy.coach to set up a strategy call.