Keeping Organized - Key to Being a Successful Event Planner

Hello Hello! I am back and ready for another great week! I had a wonderful weekend that included a fun-filled bachelorette party that I organized and wonderful dinner at a friends. I hope everyone's weekend was just as good :)

So I will just dive right into it. This is probably pretty obvious to most but one of the keys to being a successful event planner is keeping organized. It's really important to stay on top of all your event tasks and have everything in order. It is pretty much a prerequisite to be an organized event planner because you need to be able to juggle multiple projects and tasks. Without organization, you will most likely not meet deadlines, upset clients, lose business and have poorly executed events.

Here are some tools that I have used to stay organized and focused:

• Calendar - Having a calendar is essential for a planner. Put all your appointments and deadlines in the calendar. If you want to be super organized you can color code each calendar listing by the type of listing. Make sure your computer calendar syncs with your smart phone (if you have one) so you are able to put in appointments/tasks and check your availability on the go 
• Deadline List - You should have a list of all your event deadlines in chronological order. This gives you a visual of how much you need to complete before the event date. This list should be as detailed as possible. Make sure to check back on this list frequently and check off the items that you have completed.
• To Do List - At the end of each work day you should create a to do list for the next day listed in order of priority. This list will keep you on track to complete the deadline list and will help you not become overwhelmed.
• Contact List - To keep track of all your clients and suppliers make sure you keep a detailed contact list. This contact list typically can be created in Microsoft Outlook or something similar. Make sure to include all the necessary information - business name (if applicable), contact, position, phone number, email, address, website and any applicable notes
• File Organization - Create detailed titles for each file you create and place each file into the related event folder - ie."VolunteerSchedule_ABC2011Event.doc" goes into the Volunteers folder under the ABC 2011 folder. Files that don't have a detailed name and are scattered all over the place will create confusion and will become overwhelming. 
• Project Management Software- It may be good to invest in a project management software to keep your projects and deadlines organized, especially if multiple people are involved. I have used Basecamp in the past and it worked really well for me. 

Those are some of the tools I use but everyone has different techniques that work for them. How do you keep organized??

-Shira