michigan informatics
Develop an Action Plan
Monitor your Energy Levels
Your body has natural highs and lows during the work day. Find the best time of the day when your energy is high and your concentration is at its best. Some people prefer to read all their news at the beginning of the day. Other people prefer to catch up on professional reading as a mid-morning or mid-afternoon break during their busy day. Match your priority tasks to your energy levels.
After reviewing all these resources and strategies, you need to develop an action plan for staying informed. An important part of the plan is to be realistic about what you can accomplish in the limited amount of time you have in your busy work schedule.
- In 5 minutes a day, you can read and act on one e-mail announcement listing or discussion list digest and peruse the table of contents of one journal
- With 1 hour each week, you could also read relevant abstracts and act on one automatically updated search
Keep in mind that you do not have to track all this information by yourself. Form an informal network with your colleagues to share information of mutual interest. For example, one staff member could monitor a discussion list and only forward on items relevant to the department’s current projects. You can have a colleague at another health department follow the local news and legislative issues while you offer to follow a topic of interest in the peer-reviewed literature. Establishing an informal network can save a lot of time and also bring things to your attention that you may have overlooked.
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