Looking for a quarterly planner? Today I’m sharing my honest Full Focus Planner review. The short story – you’re gonna want to try it!
I’ve been an off again, on again paper planner user for years. While I love planning and office supplies, using a physical planner to keep track of appointments and event dates just isn’t practical for me. I much prefer having all of those important dates in my Google Calendar that I can access at home, at the office, or on the go.
Even though I have a digital calendar, I still love using a paper planner to plan out how I’m spending my time every day. It helps me use my time intentionally and gives me a central place for to-do lists and notes.
The 4th quarter of 2019 was jam-packed with projects and deadlines. And I knew going into it that I needed to get organized and stay laser-focused through Christmas. So I went ahead and ordered a Full Focus Planner to help me stay on track with everything. I’d heard awesome things about it and it’s a quarterly planner which was perfect to get me through the end of the year.
I’ll just go ahead and leave the spoiler here: I ordered another Full Focus Planner for 2020 and am obsessed with it! There’s no turning back, it truly has everything I need in a planner. It’s simple yet thoughtfully designed with goal setting and productivity systems built right in. This is my new planner of choice and I’m here to share my honest Full Focus Planner review with you today!
You might also like this post: The 7 Planning Tools & Systems I Use To Organize My Whole Life
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Full Focus Planner Review: Why I’m Obsessed And Think You Need One, Too
The quick overview
Full Focus Planner was created by Michael Hyatt who, if you haven’t heard of him before, is basically the king of the productivity world. I’ve read several of his books and regularly listen to his podcast and he always has such wise, thoughtful advice. His mission is to help people win at work and succeed at home and I really appreciate his perspective on bettering yourself in both areas.
This is a quarterly undated planner so you can purchase one at a time (great for trying it out) or get a set of 4 to carry you through the whole year.
The Full Focus Planner is the more grown-up, elegant big sister of the other popular planners out there. Instead of trendy cover designs with bright colors or motivational sayings, this planner is simple yet beautiful. Choose from a sophisticated color palette of solid-color cover options that are professional enough to take to the office (a huge plus!).
Speaking of taking this to the office, the size (6 1/4 x 9 1/4 inches) is perfect for tucking in my purse!
Instead of bulky coils or rings (that often look pretty tacky), the Full Focus Planner looks like a bound leather journal with high-quality paper and lay-flat pages.
The interior pages are a thicker paper that is a dream to write on. Black text on white paper with lots of white space for planning.
I also think it’s so awesome that there are video tutorials to go along with the planner! You’ll find tips for getting the most out of every page of the planner. You can check out the videos right here: Full Focus Planner Quickstart Videos
what’s Inside: Let’s Take A Tour!
Like I already mentioned, the Full Focus Planner goes far beyond your basic planner. It’s simplistic yet so thoughtfully designed. Here’s a quick tour of what you’ll find inside.
Weekly Preview
Okay, now this is my absolute favorite section of the planner and what really sets it apart from any planner I’ve used before. The weekly preview is a 4-page spread that guides you through the process of planning for the week ahead.
I’m not great at slowing down to reflect and celebrate my wins, so I love that the weekly preview includes space to document my progress, assess what went well and not so well, and uncover lessons learned.
I use this spread every Sunday night to get an overview of my week, figure out what tasks are top priority, and see what I have coming up. This section alone gives me a major productivity boost!
Daily Pages
These are the heart of the planner and each day gets two full pages. So much room for planning, right?
The daily pages include space for your 3 big daily goals, lots of room for your to-do list, a spot to time block your day, and a full page for notes. This is seriously the best daily planner layout I’ve ever used!
Goal Setting System
The Full Focus Planner has some awesome goal setting tools built right in! I love, love, love how it helps you break down your goals into quarterly and weekly action items and gives you space to track your progress.
I already use my Powersheets Goal Planner to create goals, but it’s nice to have a spot right inside my daily planner where I can easily refer back to my goals.
Monthly Calendars
Get a birds-eye view of the quarter ahead using these monthly calendar pages. I like using them to see what big events, commitments, and deadlines are coming up so I can plan ahead.
Rolling Quarters
This spread is a really cool concept that I haven’t fully utilized yet. The Full Focus Planner covers the next 3 months, but if you’re planning large projects further out then you can use the rolling quarter pages to create checklists related to a big project or goal.
Ideal Week
Oh my goodness, it makes me so happy to see this spread included! Pencil in a detailed ideal weekly schedule so you can use your time more intentionally. (Did you know I have a whole e-book on the topic of ideal weekly routines?)
Rituals
Another really neat section is the rituals spread. You can use this to outline your ideal daily routines. This is so nice to have right inside your planner!
There’s space for your morning ritual, workday startup ritual, workday shutdown ritual, and evening ritual. And of course you could rename these to whatever rituals are most important to you!
Quarterly Preview
This section makes transitioning between quarters seamless by ending each quarter with space to reflect on the big wins and lessons learned, collect all of the tasks left undone, and start planning for the quarter ahead. Then you pick right up where you left off with your new quarterly Full Focus Planner!
Notes
There are quite a few pages for notes tucked at the back of this planner, both lined notepaper and dotted notepaper.
Since there’s a full page for notes for each day of the week, I haven’t had much need for all of the notes page in the back but you may find them useful.
Index
I didn’t use the index my first time around, but I’m going to try it out in 2020. It’s essentially just a few pages where you’re supposed to list a topic and page number.
I could see this section being useful for many different things, maybe you keep track of the pages where meeting notes, books read, lessons learned, ideas to refer back to, learnings from courses/podcasts/books. It’s really up to you!
What’s the difference between the Classic, Executive, & Bold Options?
The three lines contain the same proven Full Focus framework for goal achievement and focused productivity, but with a different style to match the personalities of our consumers.
- The Classic has either an Oatmeal or Navy hardcover, and the interior has been given a cleaned up design.
- The Executive has a black European bonded leather cover with a cleaned up interior for a polished look.
- The Bold features the most changes with a fashion-forward exterior (in French Blue, Olive, Poppy, or Eggplant). While the Bold will still have the same Full Focus framework, the design of the interior is updated and printed in two-color.
Whew, clearly I have a lot to say about my planner ;). I hope you enjoyed this Full Focus Planner review. If you read all the way to the bottom of this post, I’ll assume this planner sounds like something that would be helpful to you as well!
Click here to check out the Full Focus Planners. I’m loving their newest Bold line and got the pretty eggplant color last fall and equally pretty French blue for Q1 of 2020.
Looking for more planning inspiration? Take a look at these blog posts:
- The 7 Planning Tools & Systems I Use To Organize My Whole Life
- Creating A 10-Minute Morning Journaling Routine For Self Reflection And Goal Setting
- 14 Goal-Setting Mistakes You’re (Likely) Making
- Powersheets 101: How To Cultivate Intentional Goals This Year
Have a fantastic day!
