Comments on: Goodbye Planner Pad Organizer, I Hardly Knew Ye

By: Nancy

Nancy — Sun, 08 Apr 2012 06:28:09 +0000

Does anyone know of an electronic version of Planner Pad? I feel like that could solve the space and mobility issues but keep the usefulness of the format.

By: Bob

Bob — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 20:59:56 +0000

I used Planner Pad for many many years with great results. My job demanded that I keep track of many many details, jobs, calls, events, etc., as well as the same for my personal life. It was the best for me that I found in all my working years. The only reason I stopped using Planner Pads was that I retired, sold my house, and went RVing full time. I miss my Planner Pad but it is much more than I need in retirement. I guess what I miss most is the 6 months planning calendar, as that is about all the calendar we use now in retirement. But thankfully I did find one on line that I use now.

By: Linda

Linda — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 17:59:49 +0000

I have been using Planner Pad for over 7 years now and I have to say that it is the BEST system of organization and scheduling for individuals that have multi-faceted job responsibilities/tasks. I have my assistant using the planner pad system as well and together we are accomplishing more, planning more effectively, and are more aware of timeline expectations in our department. It does take the commitment from the user to dedicate 15 minutes to forward data to the next week…however this allows the user to be more diligent and aware of their scheduled workload, adding new projects, determining the status of items that could potentially fall through the cracks but don’t because you are reminded of them regularly. I feel that with an electronic system it is easy to neglect tasks with the click of a button. With Planner Pad, you can’t…you have to address that task as you move it forward. I believe in the philosophy that if you pick up a task you are more readily to get it done rather than those tasks you can kick out of sight. I truly enjoy using my planner pad.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 16:03:39 +0000

Just had a very poor experience with their customer service – so dont expect too much help there

By: rickyspears

rickyspears — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 16:48:28 +0000

Elisabeth – I’m glad it works for you! It might work better for me know since I’m working with much shorter task lists than I used to. I’m currently keeping my task list in a draft mail in Gmail, so I still don’t think the Planner Pad is for me, but it was a great learning experiment.

By: Elisabeth Kuhn

Elisabeth Kuhn — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 20:40:18 +0000

I used to use the Planner Pad for years, and loved it. Why did I stop (temporarily). It was so BIG, yes, even the personal one weighs quite a bit and requires a rather big purse, and I had some back problems, so I was trying to lighten my load by using a much smaller calendar.

But I miss it, and I was just thinking of going back to it

I tend to like pen and paper planning, and I found it easy to add sticky notes if I did need extra space.

And the Planner Pad has been the only one that really worked for me — perfectly.

By: rickyspears

rickyspears — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 14:25:29 +0000

Jessi – I’m glad to hear the the Planner Pad is working well for you! I thought about using the desk edition (17″x22″), which probably would have worked well for me, but it just isn’t portable at all.

If you wouldn’t mind, I would love to hear more about how you shortened your next actions to fit in the 1-7/8″ by coordinating them with your “Action Support” file.

By: Jessi G.

Jessi G. — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 00:00:53 +0000

I’ve had really good luck with Planner Pad and GTD (since 2006), and just got my 3rd one in the mail today (new toy!). But then, I really prefer keeping my system very much on paper, as I have yet to splurge on a PDA and so need something portable. I do use the 7 columns as contexts–Agendas, Office, Computer, Projects (mini-projects or things my employees are working on), Waiting For, Home and Errands, as well as the built-in “Calls” column. I conquered the 1 7/8″ problem by making judicious use of my “Action Support” file folder in my workbag. (I even used the personal size in 2006 which is even narrower!) But if you have lots of next actions, need lots of detail associated with your next actions, and your NA’s don’t divide somewhat evenly into contexts, then the planner pad just isn’t going to work. But I love mine. The pages in the back are terrific for keeping track of my 10,000 and 20,000 ft+ levels and goals, as well as several types of Someday/Maybe lists. I’m headed back to graduate school in the fall–we’ll see if it still works when I’m not chained to a desk all day.

By: An Analysis of a Single System « The 2Time Mgt Blog

An Analysis of a Single System « The 2Time Mgt Blog — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 04:08:57 +0000

[...] See Goodbye Planner Organizer, I Hardly Knew Ye. [...]

By: rickyspears

rickyspears — Thu, 12 Jul 2007 18:07:33 +0000

Brad – Every time that I’ve reverted back to paper in the past, my productivity seemed to increase, at least initially. I guess that with each new try I’m finding out more about how I work and paper systems, or at least this one, is just too far from digital ease that it’s no longer a viable option.

I was thinking that you had blogged about the Planner Pad at one time. It was almost a year ago, here:
http://www.persistenceunlimited.com/2006/08/the-planner-pad-organizer/