Use Lists
Become Organized

It is hard to believe, but some people hardly ever use lists to become organized.

To me, that is one of the main reasons they are not organized.

Every Friday the engineers in my office meet to set the next weeks surveying schedule. The surveying is either construction staking or topographic work. The engineers are more or less in charge of their own projects and know what needs to be done in the field.

So the meeting is to decide what field crews go to which projects, on what days and for how long.

Sometimes there is a lot of discussion when there are multiple projects that need to be done on the same day.

I keep a small yellow pad of paper in my desk that is just for the surveying that I need to be done.

So, as clients call and request surveying I just pull out the pad and write down the name of the project, what needs to be done and the survey crew chief who is most familiar with the project if it is job that has been started.

So I am creating a running list each week. Then I just add the work that did not get done this week to next weeks list and throw away this weeks list at the end of the week.

It is really simple, but very effective.

Here is an example of what my list looks like:

SURVEYING LIST 9 -20 - 9-24

1) Carroll
Mick
footing recertification

2) Lodge
Jim
stake storm

3) WOW
Jim
topo

This simple list is all I need to keep track of my surveying work. It is just the name of the project, the survey crew chief who I want to do the work and the what type of surveying is needed. I do not add all kinds of details unless it is important.

If times are slow I may only have one surveying project.

During busy times, I may have up to 10 projects that need surveying work.

All the other engineers and manager's have some type of written list of their surveying needs.

Except for one engineer.

The engineer who needs help to become organized.

He just comes to the meeting without any list. As we are discussing the surveying he just goes by memory.

Now, I know that most people can remember most of what they need, but not everything.

The other day we went through the schedule and had finished the schedule and were nearly done going through the drafting list when he said, oh yeah, I forgot about this other job.

WTF!

I mean, we had just spent an hour of discussion to get it all set up and now he remembers. We had to backtrack the meeting and spent a lot more time to rearrange the schedule again.

What he needs to do is have a list so he knows what is what and what he needs done.

The guy I am talking about doesn't even do this and this is so simple.

So every meeting he normally throws things off for all of us.

This engineer has an extremely messy office and seems to work chaotically.

He could start to become organized with my simple list idea.

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