Best Laid Plans
Welcome to Best Laid Plans -- a podcast all about planning and the planning tools we love. From planning techniques and organizing philosophies to planners and notebooks, we cover it all. Host Sarah Hart-Unger is a mother of 3, physician, podcasting pro, and a lover of lists and all things paper! Listen in weekly for conversations about planning and productivity as well as product reviews and interviews with planning experts!
Episodes
In today's episode, Sarah tackles 5 listener questions and provides two pieces of listener feedback!
Question topics:
1) Planners to Track/Memory-Keep in Pregnancy
2) Daily planners without a timeline
3) Teaching kids to plan
4) Planner conferences (ie, Go Wild and others)
5) Concept of "syllabus" for your planning
Feedback:
1) Help for the Passion Planner user a bit embarrassed by her planner (but otherwise loves it)
2) Support fo...
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September 11, 2023 • 27 mins
The teacher planning episode is here! This episode opens with clips and tips from veteran teachers who share their planning tips and favorite products. Then, Sarah speaks with Hannah Taylor, an online history teacher with a passion for helping students plan well, no matter what their educational environment (virtual, home, or in-person).
Hannah discusses techniques and ideas for getting middle and high schoolers to plan well, with ...
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September 4, 2023 • 21 mins
In this planning adjacent episode timed especially for Labor Day, Sarah shares her favorite work tips, from strategizing to use vacation time well to creating an effective email strategy. Also: avoid bad pens at all cost :)
Episode Sponsors:
Jenni Kayne: Find your forever pieces at jennikayne.com. Listeners get 15% off the first order by using code PLANS at checkout!
Green Chef: Clean eating with ingredients shipped directly to yo...
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August 28, 2023 • 26 mins
In today's episode, Sarah talks all about the Hobonichi 2024 release, including what she loves about these planners, changes for this year, and more. She then discusses several Hobonichi-inspired brands, including:
Aura Estelle: https://www.auraestelle.com
Wonderland 222: https://wonderland222.com
Sterling Ink: https://sterling-ink.com
She then discusses the next round of Best Laid Plans Academy, sharing several testimonials from t...
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Sherri McConnell shares her patterns, techniques, and so much more at A Quilting Life -- and one of her passions is to help those who love quilting to find time to truly enjoy their hobby and craft! She chats with Sarah about her journey in crafting, the quilting planner she designed herself (!!)), and her suggestions for those looking to find more time to enjoy the things they love. Sherri is also a Best Laid Plans Academy member ...
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August 14, 2023 • 21 mins
In this episode, Sarah provides a guide to planning + thinking through Quintile 4! She touches on all aspects of planning this back-to-school season which can be jarring and a lot of moving parts for many! Consider listening to this with your notebook or laptop and pausing to start your own planning process.
Note: If you are interested in more in-depth seasonal planning sessions with Sarah in the future, Best Laid Plans: Planning Y...
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In this Q&A episode, Sarah provides her take on listener questions:
Q1: Planning during challenging life phases
Q2: Back to school planner recs for a pair of teen brothers
Q3: Planner matchmaking for a WFH mother seeking a BIG planner to manage both work, home tasks + homeschooling
Q4: Dangling tasks
Q5: Planner recs for a listener who loves BUT is embarrassed by her planner!
She also features several listener tips + follow ups fro...
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Today's episode is a little bit of a departure from the regular format - Sarah shares an interview Lisa Woodruff did with her for the Organize 365 Back to School Blitz! She discusses some of her favorite basic tips for planning (quintiles, retreats, routines + more) and they delve into some planning basics for the back to school season - coming sooner than we think :)
You can find Lisa (and sign up for her free Back to School Blitz...
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In part 1 of today's episode, Sarah presents 3 mini-reviews -- clearing out her to-be-reviewed stash!
1) Rad & Happy undated weekly planner
2) Passion Planner academic weekly + erasable pens
3) Performance Lab's Focus Planner (Australia)
Visit the show notes on theshubox.com if you are interested in winning one of these planners - just leave a comment in the show notes!
In part 2, Sarah discusses daily rituals and how they help est...
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July 17, 2023 • 21 mins
In today's episode, Sarah discusses the planning-adjacent topic of organizing and curating our spaces and stuff. She shares her history with organizing (being organized + clearing clutter has not always been a personal strength!) and prior influences, from Marie Kondo to Lisa Woodruff. Finally, she discusses her current challenges and plans to gradually work on further organizing and decluttering her home and spaces.
Episode Spons...
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In this Q&A, Sarah answers questions about:
1) Becoming more comfortable with setting longer term (monthly, seasonal, yearly) goals
Interested in setting your 2024 yearly goals with Sarah in FL? Visit: https://theshubox.com/courses
2) Paper sizes, weights, and pen types! (Paper Planner 101!)
Reference: https://goldspot.com/blogs/magazine/notebook-sizes-compared-and-explained
3) Planner matchmaking: "I am about to start medical scho...
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July 3, 2023 • 34 mins
In today's episode, Sarah interviews Stacy Mellem, a devoted Franklin-Covey user for over 30 years! Stacy shares how she's made the system work for her over the years, and why she believes planning is still important in retirement (or what she refers to as her "jubilacion" (the Spanish word for retirement, which really does sound better!).
Franklin-Covey Planners: https://store.franklinplanner.com (this podcast is not affiliated, j...
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June 26, 2023 • 26 mins
Sarah discusses her prior hesitancy around planners with rings and discs, and then delves into her current unexpected love for the Inkwell Press Disc Bound Planner with 2023-24 inserts, as well as the advantages that come with a planner where everything is movable!
Products mentioned:
Cover - hard cardboard or vegan leather
Weekly inserts (vertical or horizontal layouts) - 140 lb paper, bright white, colorful but professional/muted...
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June 19, 2023 • 25 mins
In today's episode, Sarah revisits her own summer planning and discusses how she shifted her goals to reflect current priorities and time pressure. She reminds listeners that sometimes planning can mean downshifting in one area to focus on another, and that while we can do a lot - we cannot focus on every area at once.
Then, a mini-review of the Mark's Log Diary from JetPens. This book is super cute and has some unique features, bu...
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June 12, 2023 • 26 mins
Life update episode! Sarah shares what is going well this year, and things that have been more challenging -- plus an update on which of her 2023 planners are still in use at the almost-6-month mark!
Episode Sponsors:
Earth Breeze: Liquidless earth-friendly detergent sheets! Right now, listeners can subscribe to Earth Breeze and save 40%! Go to earthbreeze.com/plans to get started
Jenni Kayne: Classic, cool, and comfortable - truly...
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It's a June Q&A episode!
Questions:
1- Small portable planner to track migraine-related details?
2- Ways to deal with photos + memory keeping (esp with a newborn)?
3- Planner/collection system to deal with family's increasingly complex medical needs? (Mentioned: https://www.jetpens.com/Lihit-Lab-Bloomin-Pocket-Folder-A4-8-Pockets-Pure-Blue/pd/33404; Organize 365 Warrior Mama Binder)
4- Recs for kids' planners for school (if the sch...
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This episode is all about the ways we might think about planning and curating our summers, from travel to reading lists to work projects to media and more.
In addition, Sarah announces the launch of her Digital Detox Mini-Course! This is a 4 week course designed to help you change your screen time habits. If you are fighting digital distractions and spending more time on screens than you want to, this course is for you.
Find out mo...
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May 22, 2023 • 30 mins
In this month's guest episode, Sarah chats with Monica Packer about habit formation, perfectionism, self-compassion, and more. Monica is the host of the About Progress podcast as well as a coach and mother of 5, from ages 3 months to 11!
You can find Monica's work here: https://aboutprogress.com
Thanks to Jenny Eversole from Style Space (https://stylespace.com) for connecting Monica + me!
Episode Sponsors:
Earth Breeze: Liquidless...
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May 15, 2023 • 34 mins
This episode starts with two follow ups:
1- Follow up to the listener wanting a potentially custom planner with to do/timeline on left and notes on right:
Passion Planner Daily:
Etsy as a great place to purchase custom sheets or pdf layouts
Or, make templates yourself -- check out courses on creating printables from Lindsay Ashworth (atouchofla.com/learn)
2- Follow up on the heart to heart screen time episode
(Episode is here:...
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May 8, 2023 • 30 mins
In today's episodes, Sarah shares tips + tricks she's learned over the years (from residency training to her current role as practicing physician) to help increase efficiency in her healthcare role.
From charting to managing synchronous chat messages to communicating results, she covers several practices she has used to increase her engagement and allow for more time/focus on patients (and less on the EMR!).
Please note, this are h...
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