More Than an Organizer

When Stephen R. Covey wrote The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People in 1989, he never dreamed it would become one of the best-selling business books of all time, with more than 12 million copies in print and still a top seller. In the early '90s, Covey merged his operation with FranklinQuest, makers of Ascend software. The new company, FranklinCovey, set out with the singular goal of building the industry's dominant Personal Information Manager (PIM). With 500,000 users, PlanPlus for Outlook puts them close to that goal.

Released in September 2002, PlanPlus is an addition to, not a replacement for, Outlook, Microsoft's ubiquitous e-mail and task management tool. PlanPlus helps you tighten your control over daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly planning. It's based on Covey's approach to planning, which emphasizes vision, values, and goals--our "compass"--over activities, appointments, and obligations--the "clock."

Shifting the focus of Outlook

Among the many additions the software makes to the desktop PC version of Outlook are a daily journal, a master task list, a slew of useful improvements to daily tasks, and well-designed screens for goals, roles, and weekly planning. PlanPlus also adds four audio and video wizards that coach you on writing a mission statement, honing your values, etc. Fans of the Today screen in the desktop PC Outlook program will admire the new PlanPlus version: it adds a weekly lesson on time and life management skills. But the software's real coup (and prime selling point) is the PlanPlus Home screen, which integrates your calendar, daily and master tasks, e-mail, and daily record into a single, unified interface, sans clutter (Screen 1). There's even a Thought of the Day feature. (My favorite: "A goal is a planned conflict with the status quo."--Hyrum Smith)

Screen 1: The PlanPlus Home screen on the desktop PC integrates your Outlook calendar, daily and master tasks, e-mail, and journal into a single, unified interface.

The net effect of these features is simple, if subtle: they shift the focus of Outlook away from simply organizing the information in your life--your schedule, contacts, e-mail, etc.--to organizing your life itself--your goals, your vision, your values. It's a shift away from the "who, what, when, and where" of your daily routine, to the "why."

Features added to Pocket PC Outlook

Most important to Pocket PC users are the features that PlanPlus adds to Pocket Outlook's Tasks and Calendar screens.

The enhanced Tasks screen is more robust, now allowing you to create a prioritized daily task list by ranking your tasks in A1, A2, B1, B2 format (Screen 2). This offers greater precision than Microsoft's overly-simplistic high-medium-low option. You can still sort your Tasks list by status, priority, title, or category. But now the status of each task is marked by an icon that lets you know where things stand with a glance: a bright green dot for a task in progress, an arrow for a task delayed, a hand with a checkmark for a delegated task, and a plain, unchecked box for a task you haven't started. All in all, these are welcome improvements to one of the Pocket PC's most used applications.

Screen 2: PlanPlus lets you prioritized the Tasks list with greater precision, and adds status icons that let you know where things stand at a glance.

Users on the move can also keep a master task list on their Pocket PCs (Screen 3). This is great for pie-in-the-sky ideas you haven't begun yet, like writing that novel or learning Tibetan. When the time comes to act on one of these tasks, you can move it from your master task list to your daily tasks with a few taps of the stylus. This lets you keep your daily tasks clear of the clutter of future dreams until it's time to act on them. Even better, it lets you keep those dreams close at hand, so you can remember to schedule the time it takes to make them a reality.