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Improve your show-up rate by using a digital calendar and improve team work with shared calendars.

Join us in the 21st century and burn your paper calendar.

I analyzed my calendar over the past few months and found something shocking.

99% of no-shows didn't use a digital calendar.

Productive people organize their lives through digital calendars.

I find it fascinating how many people still use paper calendars

I'm not shocked anymore why people complain about time management issues if so many don't show up.

Digital calendars are the solution.

Time management is a solved problem, so why are so many still struggling?

It doesn't matter which digital calendar you use: Google, Apple, Microsoft, etc.

They have all the same features.

Just use one of them!

If you're still not convinced to use a digital calendar, here are my top 8 reasons.

I will also show you how to use your calendar to unleash its full potential.

8 Reasons How a Digital Calendar Makes You More Productive

1. Show-up Rate Through the Roof

Let's start with the obvious:

People using a digital calendar show up to their meetings.

In the past three years, 99% of my no-shows were not using a digital calendar.

I was shocked at how many people miss meetings regularly.

I thought some of them were pretty organized.

Still, they miss a large number of their meetings.

In my last company, people never missed appointments.

Everyone worked from digital and shared calendars.

It was so easy to collaborate.

There were still one or two people who missed meetings repeatedly.

We noticed they never used their digital calendars as agreed upon.

As soon as they started using the calendar, they never missed a meeting again.

The calendars even send you automated reminders, so you don't have any excuses.

2. Asynchronous Scheduling And Rescheduling

The biggest time wasters in every company I have seen are emails and phone calls.

A large chunk of emails and calls are about scheduling meetings.

Back and forth endless times.

I simply send the other person my scheduling link.

They pick a slot.

It appears on both of our calendars.

Done.

Let machines do what they do best.

I once signed up for a mentorship.

They had four emails back and forth to schedule the onboarding with a 15-minute call.

In that 15-minute call, we then negotiated when to have the 20-minute onboarding call.

We could have held the onboarding twice in the time it took to schedule it.

Productive people use scheduling links to schedule appointments.

You don't need a 15-minute call to find a hole in both calendars.

You don't need six back-and-forth emails to find a date.

Use a service like Calendly to schedule meetings asynchronously.

I am very selective about whom I give my scheduling link.

But, some people put their scheduling link in their email signature.

This made it extremely easy to schedule a call with them.

And they didn't need to do anything.

If you're the external contact for your company, this could be an excellent solution for you.

When I work with my team, the digital calendars make it easy to get time with me.

They see my availability directly in their calendar as an overlay.

They pick a slot that is still white.

3. Everything Is In One Place

I don't know how often I heard people say that they need to check their personal calendars at home.

Why don't you have everything on your digital calendar?

You can have multiple calendars in the same view.

This way, you always know exactly what is happening in your life.

Even better with mobile apps, you can access your schedule from anywhere.

There is no excuse for forgetting your calendar at home.

4. Never Double Book Again

I'm surprised by how many people have double bookings on their calendars.

How could you ever believe that you can be in two places simultaneously?

Please let me know if you figured out how to be in two places simultaneously; I would pay for that.

With digital scheduling, double bookings are impossible.

I send them my scheduling link if I want a meeting with someone.

They pick a slot that is still available.

The scheduling link only shows them slots where nothing else is blocked in my calendar yet.

End of story.

5. Take Control Over Your Time

There was a time when my calendar was a never-ending wall of meetings.

Every day, 7 am to 10 pm, fully booked.

I ate during meetings because there was no pause scheduled.

I had it purple on white in my calendar: I didn't have my time management under control.

Three rules fixed that over night:

Meetings happen only on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays.
Meetings happen only after lunch until 5 pm.
Meetings start at a full hour and last 45 minutes max. Breaks built in by design.

With these changes, I finally got time to do my work first thing in the morning.

I could spontaneously extend weekends by two days.

And I finally got breaks to go to the toilet between meetings. 😁

You can add these rules easily to your digital calendar.

There is no need for you to enforce them manually.

6. Share Relevant Information With Everyone

How often is someone asking you to send a Zoom link again because they lost it?

These are usually people who don't use digital calendars.

If you use digital appointments, you have the Zoom link right on the appointment.

Without digital calendars, sharing information for meetings is a big problem.

With them, you have an easy way and a single place to make information accessible to all.

I have three simple rules for preparing successful meetings:

Every meeting has a clear goal.
Every meeting has an agenda to discuss.
Everyone in the meeting knows why they are part of this meeting.

Most companies could cut most of their meetings right now without penalties.

Most meetings are pointless because no one knows why they're in it.

So easy to fix.

Next time you don't know why you're part of a meeting, decline.

You save yourself and everyone else a lot of time.

After their initial shock, they will respect you more for it.

7. Recurring Event Scheduling Made Easy

The time-blocking method was a game-changer for me.

And with my digital calendar, it was super easy to implement.

I simply scheduled a recurring block of time in my calendar.

Even if someone schedules a meeting in 2 months, they can't infringe on my focus times this way.

Great success!

In my last company, we used this feature to schedule our team breakfasts and game nights.

Everyone knew when they were.

No doubt about it.

8. Turn Off Your Brain

The greatest feature of digital calendars is that I don't need to think anymore.

I look into my calendar every evening to see what is scheduled for the next day.

Then, in the morning, I simply work through my day.

I forget appointments the minute I put them in my calendar.

My calendar will remind me when it becomes relevant.

Until then, my mind is free to think about the present.

Here are three more rules that help with this:

Meetings need to be scheduled at least 24 hours in advance.
Everyone needs to accept or decline the meeting before it happens (there is no maybe).
The digital calendar is the only truth we accept.

I have several of these shoot-and-forget systems in place.

I input some information, which bubbles up again when it becomes relevant.

Together, they create immense peace of mind and focus on the present.

These were my top reasons to work with a digital calendar.

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8 Reasons Why Productive People Use Digital Calendars