I like this time of year. The air is cooling, and the kids are back in school. It just feels more calm. But before long, the holidays and year-end fundraising season will be upon us.
That’s why it’s important to look at your calendar now, before the chaos, and block out some Nonprofit Communicator Free Days (#npcommfreeday) on your calendar for the rest of 2014.
These are meeting-free days where you shut the door, don’t answer the phone or email, and stay off social media too. To the outside world, it looks like a vacation day, but you are actually working. The difference? You work on those priorities that always seem to get bumped to the back burner by the regular hustle and bustle.
Here are the kinds of tasks many nonprofit communicators choose to tackle on their Nonprofit Communicators Free Day:
- Working on your editorial calendar
- Getting your files organized
- Working on your database
- Cleaning out your office or tackling the piles on your desk
- Catching up on your reading
- Writing several blog posts or newsletter articles in advance
- Updating the evergreen content on your website
- Spending time with people who represent your ideal readers or donors or program participants to better understand their wants and needs
- Dreaming big about possibilities for next month or next year
- Working your way through some online training
Take a look at your calendar right now. Can you block out at least one day between now and the end of the year for your Nonprofit Communicators Free Day? Ideally, you are doing this at least once a month, but if that doesn’t work, go for once a quarter, and guard that day as sacred on your calendar.
In the comments or with the hashtag #npcommfreeday, tell us which day you are picking or what you’ll do on your free day.
