Today I stumbled across a blog post from a year ago where Ron Healy suggests creating a “Temporary Whiteboard” to carry about. The “whiteboard” is created by laminating a sheet of white paper! Sometimes simple ideas really are the best. You can’t get much simpler than that!
Ron suggests having parallel lines on one side which can be used for:
- multifunction swimlane
- activity diagram
- sequence diagram
- class diagram
- hierarchical chart
- system & subsystem diagram
This is such a good idea. As I commented on Ron’s blog – I’m a Business Analyst and I have been been using a daily plan made the same way for years and it didn’t occur to me to extend the idea.
I have two “plans” which I use which you can see in the picture. There is an A5 size one which is punched with two holes so I can have it at the front of an A4 ring binder and an A6 size one which I keep at the front of my Time Manager.
The layout of my plan is based on the forms I used to use in my Time Manager, but I like to remind myself of the “Elephant” and “Frog” tasks I am dealing with at the moment.
Once way in which I differ from Ron is that he uses dry wipe markers. On the other hand, I use a permanent marker and then wipe the plan down with alcohol at the end of the day when I am planning what to do the next day.
More simple ideas: What do you keep in your toolkit?
“Simple ideas” got me thinking about the Business Analysis or BA “toolkit” I carry around with me. For at least some of my working life I needed to use public transport, and that encourages you to carry the minimum you need.
My toolkit contains:
- Laptop
- Laminated plan
- Diary
- A4 ring binder to contain the current notes
- Pack of Post-It notes
- Pack of file cards
- Foolscap or A4 wallet folder to hold loose bits together
- A4 spiral bound notebook
- Whiteboard Markers
What do you keep in your toolkit?