Backward planning
Start from the fixed deadline, list what has to happen before it, then work back
Take the hour something has to happen, list everything that must come first, put a real length on each piece, then count backward until you reach a start time. The military teaches it. What falls out is a wake-up time and an order of operations rather than a to-do list, which is why people use it on ordinary mornings to stop the day being renegotiated every day. It also kills the plans that never fitted, because the arithmetic runs out before the list does.
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- Nick BareDoes it
Hybrid athlete · Bare Performance Nutrition founder
Learned it in the military and kept it. Fix the hour something has to happen, list what needs doing before then, work back through how long each piece takes, and the wake-up time falls out of the arithmetic. That is why his alarm sits at 5 a.m.
Source: BPN: Nick Bare's 3 Tips for a Better Morning Routine
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