--- tags: A2, 02, Foundations --- # Plan your week Top performing sales professionals have one thing in common: they're in control of their time ⏰. Jumping into your week having a clear plan and structure is crucial to ending the week feeling productive, and not like you've been jumping around from task to task randomly. &nbsp; ## Best practices for effective planning There's a lot of literature on how to plan an effective week. In fact, there's arguably too much! Ultimately, **what's key is that you understand the importance of planning your week and test, test, test until you find a method that works for you**. Below, we share: - Our selected best-practices - A list of the best reads out there from sales experts so you can pick some of their best practices. - Our favourite video introducing the concept by Jeff Shore &nbsp; ## Hyrise Best-practices Based on our experience and all the literature we've reviewed, we've tried to narrow it down to the two most basic elements we believe are crucial for effective weekly planning: ### 1. Block all your activities into your calendar Choose a calendar app and let it become your source of truth. It should be your cornerstone for organizing your week. Make sure that EVERYTHING scheduled for the week goes into your calendar. Even if it's personal. That way you can make sure there will be no overlapping commitments and nothing will be forgotten. This frees up your mind to focus on tasks at hand and be present. Here are some examples of things that should be scheduled: - Your morning workout or walk - Time with your kids - 1.5 hour block for cold calling - 1 hour block for lead research - 10 minutes between meetings to write follow up emails - 15 minutes in the morning to plan and readjust your day - 2h blocker for grocery shopping Get the idea? ### 2. Identify your core objective for the week and block slots to achieve them At the beginning of the week (or end of the previous one, depending on when you do your planning), ask yourself: - What do i need to achieve by the end of the week to make sure it's a successful one? A cool experiment to try here: imagine you were going on vacation the next month and this was your last week - what would you need to have done before you leave? It really helps bring out your priorities! Once you know this, schedule blocks of time into your calendar for the week to make sure you achieve those goals. Here's a sales example: Let’s say you have a goal of 10 discovery calls per week (two per day), and you need 100 prospecting calls a week (20 per day) to achieve them. Once you know this, estimate the number of prospecting calls you can do in an hour, then go to your calendar and schedule and block specific timeslots to ensure you can get them done 😉 &nbsp; ## Key concepts Jeff Shore is one of our favourite sales professionals. He covers his best practices to plan a successful day... check it out! 👇 {%youtube zt_cJimq55w %} &nbsp; ## Selected reads - [How to build a sales calendar using block logic](https://www.pipedrive.com/en/blog/how-to-build-a-sales-calendar-using-block-logic) - [5 ways to effectively schedule your sales week](https://blog.tallannresources.com/blog/5-ways-to-effectively-schedule-your-sales-week) - [8 steps to building a model sales week](https://thesalesblog.com/2011/07/09/8-steps-to-building-a-model-sales-week/) - [Salesforce - Scheduling the ideal sales day](https://www.salesforce.com/resources/articles/ideal-sales-day/) <style> body > .ui-infobar, body > .ui-toc, body > .ui-affix-toc, body > .ui-community, body > .document-footer { display: none !important; } </style>