Benefits of Writing Your Own Weekly, Monthly and Annual Reviews

When we reflect on what we have done, something special happens. Actually, there are two things. First, we better understand what we have done or learned. Second, our self-efficacy improves, that is, our belief in our abilities.

This post originally appeared on the RescueTime blog .

Self-efficacy is powerful because the more we believe that we are able to perform well, the more we do well to perform well.

Researchers have found that the practice of reflection makes it easier to remember what we have learned and also improves our work. In fact, there comes a point in our work or teaching when we learn enough that thinking about our experiences can improve our productivity more than further practice.

Research by customer service representatives found that those who regularly thought about their training performed 25% better on the final test than other trainees. They also increased their chances of getting the top grade for their service by 20%.

The funniest thing about this study, however, is that when they have a choice, most people choose practice over reflection. We seem to prefer making thoughts .

But reflection is good for us – whether it is tracking our progress towards goals or taking note of what we have learned, regular reflection helps us refocus and better understand ourselves.

Today I will look at three forms of regular reflection and how to implement them: weekly, monthly, and annual reviews.

Weekly reviews keep you organized

The Weekly Review is a chance to make ends meet, prepare for the week ahead, and reflect on short-term goals.

Lifehacker alumnus Alan Henry believes the benefits of a weekly review allow you to find time on a regular basis :

You will become more organized, you will never wonder if there is something you forgot to do or needs to work on, and you will never be afraid that you forgot something important.

If you find it difficult to sit down and reflect on your progress every week, you are not alone. For writer Chris Bowler, his weekly review was somewhat dangerous because it originally consisted only of a careful scrutiny of his task manager. As Bowler notes, to-do lists are not very fun to browse because they tend to include a lot of tasks we have to do but don’t want to do and things we want to do but can’t right now.

Since Bowler’s to-do list was disappointing, his weekly review also ended in the same way , making the task more difficult:

If [your] review is another chance to get upset, you will let it slide more often.

Bowler was able to improve his weekly overview by focusing less on his to-do list and more on his accomplishments in the past week and goals for the week ahead:

I used to get frustrated with my weekly reviews as they seemed mostly useless to me. Now I love this process and am looking forward to the exercise.

Since his regular weekly reviews, Bowler has been able to shake off bad organizational habits, such as setting arbitrary deadlines for all of his tasks so they won’t be forgotten.

Because I’m not good at my projects, I’ve developed a habit of setting a deadline to bring my attention back to the task.

Bowler’s reviews now include time to review your projects and plan your tasks for the week ahead, breaking this bad habit and keeping him more organized.

What to include in the weekly review

If you’re just getting started with your own weekly review, you may have to do some trial and error to figure out which works best for you. But first, I’ll give you a step-by-step example from author Michael Hyatt . The Hyatt Review consists of eight steps to help you keep your important business or meeting in mind and help it handle the stress.

1. Go through all loose papers. Some will require registration, others may require action, and some may simply need to be revised.
2. Sort your notes from the past week. All notes made during the week are reviewed for action, anything that requires follow-up, and any information that needs to be transferred elsewhere for more permanent storage.
3. Check out last week’s calendar. Check if there is a need for further action on past events.
4. Review your annual goals. This is where you start looking into the coming week. Review your annual goals and make sure the next step for each goal is planned and scheduled on your to-do list or calendar.
5. Review your calendar for the coming week. Check to see if any upcoming events require preparation and schedule a time to do so.
6. Review unfinished projects. Make sure the next phase of each project is planned and planned.
7. Review delegated tasks. Check all that you have delegated, or tasks for which you are waiting for someone else’s input, and take action if necessary.
8. Review your list sometime / maybe. Review your list of projects, ideas, and tasks that you would like to complete someday when you have time. This is your chance to pick something from this list and schedule it for your week.

The process may sound daunting, but with a checklist and a little patience, you can go through one every week. Not only does a Hyatt review help him prepare for the week ahead, it also ensures that nothing of the past week is forgotten or overlooked.

Monthly reviews to track progress towards goals

We all love to set big goals for the new year, but they are more likely to fail . On the other hand, it is easier to manage monthly goals. The Monthly Review gives you the opportunity to reflect on a longer period without being so extensive that it is difficult to understand.

According to the author and founder of Zen Habits Leo Babauta , the monthly review “helps me feel like I’ve achieved something in just a month and allows me to look at my life as a whole.” The Monthly Review is a good chance to set new goals, assess your behavior over the past month, and celebrate your accomplishments.

I’ve been writing and sharing my own monthly reviews for several years now, and I’ve found that the added transparency of sharing my feedback helps keep me accountable for the goals I set each month.

What to include in the monthly review

Buster Benson, creator of 750 Words , makes his monthly reviews easy . It includes the following main sections:

• Highlights from the past month
• Its current weight and any changes from the previous month.
• Result of reaching last month’s goal
• Goals (usually just one) for the month ahead
• Any changes to his code are a list of his values ​​and personal beliefs, which is revised monthly.
• Books, movies, articles, podcasts, or albums viewed in the last month.

Benson publishes his monthly reviews on Medium , so you can explore real-world examples of his template in action. For an even simpler template, Happy Black Woman’s Rosetta Thurman is the one for you. Her monthly review has just four steps:

1. List all the significant things that happened in the last month . It doesn’t have to be just your accomplishments – it includes any significant life changes or events in which you have participated.
2. Reflect on these three things from the past month: your biggest personal milestone, your biggest professional achievement, and your most valuable lesson learned.
3. Pick a theme or emotion that sums up the past month for you.
4. Set goals for the month ahead.

Of course, the best monthly review template will be the one that works for you. For more inspiration, my Monthly Review newsletter sends out various personal reviews every month. If you’ve already started your own monthly review, you can even submit it for inclusion in a newsletter.

Annual reviews give you a chance to think and reset

There is nothing better than a new year for thinking and setting new goals . Annual reviews tend to be longer than monthly or weekly reviews, simply because there is so much more to think about and a longer time frame to plan ahead.

But that shouldn’t make your annual survey overwhelming. Whether you take a week off in December to end it as entrepreneur and writer Chris Guillebeau , or complete it in the afternoon, your annual review should only cover what matters to you .

Maybe you want to reflect on your business or career accomplishments over the past year. Or maybe you enjoy setting multiple goals each year and then reflecting on your progress towards achieving them. Or perhaps you just enjoy making a list of your favorite books, movies, and TV shows over the past year, as I do .

Like any review, a personalized annual review is for you and should include whatever you find most useful . Even if it changes from year to year.

What to include in your annual report

Celes Chua from Personal Excellence Blog offers a six-step template for creating your own annual review:

1. Think about your biggest accomplishments over the past year.
2. Reflect on your most important lessons learned over the past year.
3. Rate yourself how well the past year has gone. You can give yourself a grade from F to A + or from 1 to 10.
4. Plan your goals for next year by asking yourself what you need to do to look back on this year as your best year ever, or giving it a 10 out of 10.
5. Plan any new habits you can develop to help you achieve the goals you set in the previous step.
6. Plan your next next steps to achieve each of your goals.

If you prefer to think more deeply about the past year, Leo Babaut has some helpful tips on how to find the details of everything you’ve done:

• Check your TripIt account or wherever you record your trips throughout the year to keep track of the trips you have taken.
• Look at all the files on your computer that were created in the last year to see what you’ve been working on.
• Check your Amazon order history and credit card statement to see where you spent your money.
• Read your notes and journal entries from the past year.

If you are using RescueTime , you may have a dashboard that displays all of your recorded time and productivity heart rate for the entire year. Or, if you like to keep all of your data in one place, you can use a service like Gyroscope or Exist (of which I am a co-founder).

You might not want to devote a whole week of your life to an annual review, as Chris Guillebeau does, but even if you spend half a day thinking about what you have achieved in the past year and what you want to achieve in 12 months, it can be clear. your daily plans. Guillebeau considers most of his successes as a writer and entrepreneur to be his annual review:

When someone asks how I can do “so much,” I always mention this weekly planning process. There is no hidden secret to working on many big goals at the same time, but taking the time to clearly define specific goals each year has helped me more than anything else.

If you’re reading this post thinking reviews sound like a good idea but too much of a hassle, you might want to try writer Laura Vanderkam’s approach to writing your review ahead of time . She says that writing the annual review at the beginning of the year will give a hint of what to work on.

I think the best approach is to plan great things, but be open to more wonderful things that happen that you didn’t know what to plan.

Vanderkam invites you to imagine that it is the end of the year and the year has gone well. Now write down three to five things that made this year so great.

This will tell you ahead of time what to work on. All you have to do is make this review a reality.

… Formulating what you find interesting and meaningful can help answer the question: “I have time, what should I do with it?”

If you’re ready to try out your own reviews, grab one of these templates and tweak as you go. You will find that your own needs change over time, and you dictate what kind of thinking will be most helpful.

Guide to Writing Weekly, Monthly, and Annual Reviews | RescueTime Blog

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