Time Management

When Perfection is a Waste of Time

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Even those of us who don’t label ourselves a “perfectionist” have our moments of obsession with getting something just right. We generally think that being a perfectionist is an admirable quality. However, in The Time Diet, it can also lead to massive amounts of unnecessary wasted time. There are times when perfection matters and there are also times when “good enough” truly is good enough. Knowing the difference is important in time management.

This week I have a research paper due for one of my grad school classes. Completing an entire original research study in one semester is generally considered to be an impossibility so my professor has asked for a rough draft to grade us on. She has stressed that this paper does not have to be close to final form yet, she just wants to see our progress. The perfectionist in me has had a difficult time with those instructions. I have declared myself  “done” with this draft no less than 8 times over the past week. I have saved the document, opened up an email to send it to my professor, and then decided I want to add one more quote or change one more word.

No Such Thing As Perfection

The problem is that this kind of perfectionism is a giant waste of time. In this case, my work does not have to be perfect and the relentless pursuit to make it so is not worth it. My time is far better spent finishing up other work. While I made countless edits to my draft, my other equally important work sat on my desk untouched.

No work will ever be perfect. There will always be something you can change, something you can add, or something you can fix. At some point, you have to just say enough is enough and move on. As I’m posting this blog, my draft is sitting in my professor’s inbox waiting to be read. It is not perfect. Even when I fix it up and submit it to a journal, it will still not be perfect. However, it is “good enough”, and right now that’s good enough for me.

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Top 5 Reasons We Procrastinate

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“I’ll do it later” is the enemy of time management and eliminates our control over our Time Diets. Why do we procrastinate? Here are the 5 most common reasons and what we can do to stop!

1) We Don’t Want to Do the Task

The biggest reason people put something off is because they don’t want to do whatever it is they have to do. When we don’t want to do something we become really good at convincing ourselves that we’ll want to do it tomorrow instead. In fact, we come up with fabulous excuses such as, “I’ll feel more inspired tomorrow” or “Tomorrow, I’ll feel more well rested and it will be easier” or “This will be first on my list tomorrow.” However, when tomorrow finally gets here, we don’t feel any more like doing the task than we did the day before. Don’t let yourself fall for these excuses.

2) We Like the Pressure of a Deadline

We’ve all felt that intense stress and pressure when we’re working up against a deadline. The problem is, some people thrive on it. How do those of us who work best against a deadline fight procrastination? Make your own deadlines! If you make your own deadline a few days before the real one, you still get the feeling of working under pressure without being in danger of actually missing your deadline! Afraid you won’t stick to a self-created deadline? Tell as many people as possible about it to help hold you accountable.

3) We Focus on Due Dates, Not Start Dates

When someone asks us to do something, the first question we ask is, “When would you like it to be finished?” The second follow up question we often forget to ask ourselves is, “When am I going to start this?” Without a definite start date in mind, we run the risk of putting a task out of our minds until the due date is staring us in the face. Saying you’re going to do something is not the same as planning when you’re going to do it. Never write a due date in your calendar without also writing a start date.

4) We Don’t Have an Idea

We’ll often procrastinate on creative tasks because we haven’t thought of the perfect idea yet. Here is the problem: You could spend a lifetime waiting for the perfect idea to pop into your head. Sometimes you need to just start writing. Your first idea doesn’t have to be perfect but at least it’s something! It’s easier to revise a mediocre idea than continue to stare at a blank page.

5) It’s a Habit

If you’ve been a procrastinator your whole life, it can be extremely difficult to break yourself of this bad habit. I’ve even heard people justify their procrastination by saying, “I’ve always procrastinated and I’ve never been late with anything.” That’s like saying that you don’t need to buy car insurance because you’ve never been in a car accident. If you consistently wait until the last minute to do things, you will miss deadlines. It’s only a matter of time. Not to mention the fact that procrastinating triples your stress level when “crunch time” comes around and you’re more likely to have a productivity crash afterwards from sheer exhaustion. Stop making excuses and start doing things now.

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My 100 Dollar Mistake

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The Time Diet Rebate

If it takes less than 5 minutes, do it now. I’m usually very good at following that simple piece of time management advice, but not in this case.

About two months ago my husband’s cell phone that he’s had for 6 years finally died so we went to the Sprint store to pick out a brand new one. After much deliberation, we decided on the HTC EVO. The price tag was a little hefty, but it came with a 100-dollar mail-in rebate (and the phone was just so cool!)

Now, let me say how much I hate mail-in rebates. Why would a company not just give me the 100 dollars off to begin with? Because they hope that I’ll forget to send it in and they can just keep their 100 dollars. That seems deceitful and mean so I usually don’t buy things with rebates, however… let me reiterate how cool this phone is.

When I got home, I should have filled out the rebate right then, but I didn’t. That was my pivotal mistake. Instead, I put it on the counter where it soon acquired other papers on top of it, which was later moved to the desk where it joined a sea of other papers and got lost. I just found the rebate yesterday and realized it expired. There goes 100 dollars!

The 5 Minute Rule

Why is such an easy rule so hard to follow? If something takes less than 5 minutes to do, it’s best to do it right away. There is no reason not to! However, these tiny little tasks are actually the easiest to put off. When something will only take us a few minutes, it is very easy to convince ourselves to just do it tomorrow. The problem is that when “tomorrow” gets here, we don’t feel any more motivated to do that little task than we did the day before. A small task that should have only taken 5 minutes ends up being forgotten or put off until infinite “tomorrows” and then inevitably comes back to bite us.

Here is my challenge to you today: find one 5-minute task you’ve been putting off and do it.  Make that quick phone call! Respond to that email! Change that light bulb in the bathroom! Don’t put it off until another tomorrow. You’ll thank yourself later.

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Using Time Buckets

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When we’re faced with 24 hours in the day and a long list of things to do, figuring out when to accomplish those tasks can be a bit overwhelming for our time management skills. Breaking your day up into 3 or 4 “mini days” is much easier to manage, helps you organize your time and keeps your Time Diet on track.

I like to call these mini days “Time Buckets.” A Time Bucket is a chunk of time in your day that you have available to complete tasks. In my head, I picture myself picking up a task from my “choose-to” list and actually putting it into whichever bucket it belongs.

When figuring out your Time Buckets, it’s best to look for natural divides in your day. They may vary from day to day or week to week depending on your schedule. For example, let’s look at what tomorrow, Monday, holds for me. I get to work on Mondays at 7:30am and I see my first class at 8:45am. This time is my “morning prep” and I call it “Time Bucket #1.” After my classes start, all of my time is devoted to teaching my students, so that time is already accounted for. I try to keep my lunchtime open and only use it for work if I really need to. I call my husband at lunch and chat for a few minutes. It is the “Dessert” in my day.

After the kids go home, I have until 4:00 before I need to leave to get to class at ASU. This chunk of time is “Time Bucket #2” When I get home from class, it will be 8:00. I then have a chunk of time from 8:00 until I go to bed. That is “Time Bucket #3.” I used to have 24 hours to figure out what to do with, but now I’ve narrowed that time down to 3 distinct Time Buckets that I actually have available to complete work.

Putting Tasks in Your Time Buckets

When deciding which tasks to put in which Time Buckets, you have to consider what your energy level is like during each of those times. You want to avoid completing your most difficult tasks when you have the least energy! I have the most energy in the morning during Time Bucket #1, so that is when I complete all the essential work for my job. During Time Bucket #2, I’m usually pretty exhausted, but I eventually catch my second wind. That is why I start off Time Bucket #2 with easier things, like catching up on the day’s email and/or phone calls. Then I move on to more difficult work for grad school. By the time I get to Time Bucket #3 in the evening, my energy is gone. I spend this time unwinding, eating dinner and doing a few easy household chores.

How are your Time Buckets divided? Yours will probably be very different from mine. Just remember to take into consideration your energy level during each chunk of time. We all have times in our day when we feel more alert. Make sure you are using that time to your advantage!

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Reassess Your Schedule

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Is all this stuff I’m doing really worth it? We don’t ask ourselves this question nearly enough and it is one of the biggest problems that lead to being stuck in a time management rut.

Our lives change from year to year, month to month and day to day. We try out new things, explore new ideas and rearrange our priorities. What was important to us two years ago may not still be important to us today. This is why it’s crucial to constantly re-evaluate the things we do and decide whether or not they are still worth our valuable time!

To see if something is worthy of a place in your schedule, you need to weigh the total time an activity takes versus the benefit it provides you. If you find that you’re not getting enough benefit from a task to justify the time you put in…then why are you doing it? It doesn’t belong in your Time Diet. That would be like indulging in a high calorie dessert that just wasn’t very delicious. What’s the point?

My Experience

My school district offers frequent professional development classes in the evenings. In the past, I have taken as many of these classes as I can. They are a great opportunity to learn new teaching skills and I’m able to put the small stipend we get for attending toward my grad school bill! When I saw that a new “Podcasting 101” class was being offered in March, I didn’t even think twice about signing up. Why not? I took these classes last year all the time. Here is the problem- my life is different this year than it was last year and I didn’t think about that.

Last year I was working on my masters, this year I’m working on my doctorate. Last year I was just beginning my journey in blogging, speaking and writing about time management, and now working on The Time Diet takes a significant amount of my time during the week.  Last year taking these district classes was worth it, this year it’s not.  Don’t get me wrong- I still really enjoy learning new things, but my evening time is now better spent working on my research papers and finding new speaking engagements. Theses classes are also offered in the summer when my schedule is far less hectic. That is when I need to sign up for them!

I failed to re-evaluate my priorities before adding another thing to my plate. I ended up spending 8 hours doing something that was not the best use of my time. I will not make that mistake again!

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Learning to Say No

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“No, I’m sorry. I won’t be able to do that for you.” Has it been a while since you’ve said that? Do you always find yourself saying “yes” to things you know you don’t have time for? You might need a refresher course in the ability to say “No.”

In time management, there are two ways to find more time:

1) Do the same amount of tasks more efficiently or

2) Do fewer things

We spend a lot of time focusing on figuring out ways to do #1, that we often forget that #2 is also an option. I’m not suggesting you go to your boss and inform him or her that from now on, in order to reduce your stress level, you will only be completing half of your job description. No, when looking for things to cut out, think of those extra favors that people ask you to do. We feel obligated to say yes to all of these things. We don’t want to let others down and we are afraid of destroying our image as a “super human” who can do it all. However, if you truly need to trim down your schedule in your Time Diet, you need to be better at saying no.

Here is the truth: nobody can do it all. Not even you. With excellent time management skills, you can accomplish more than you ever thought possible, but everyone has their limit. The next time someone asks you to do something “extra” that you know will take more time than you have available, use the following tips to help say No:

How to Say No

1) Be Prompt: When saying No to a favor, tell the person as soon as they ask you. It is tempting to say “maybe” in hopes that more time will magically open up in your schedule. This is not fair to the other person. Telling them No right away lets them know you respect their time and gives them ample opportunity to find another person to help them out.

2) Be Honest: You all know how much I loathe the line “I’m too busy.” If you have to tell someone No, don’t use “I’m too busy” as a reason. Remember, the person asking you a favor is also “busy” just like everyone else in the world. We make time for what is important to us and if this favor were absolutely essential, you would make time for it as well. Instead, say something like, “Adding this to my plate right now would really overload me. I’m going to have to say No to this one.”

3) Be Direct: Say No kindly but firmly and then move on with your life. Don’t continue to fall all over yourself with things like, “I’m so so sorry I couldn’t do that for you, it’s been a really bad time for me” or “any other time you need anything at all from me just ask.” Statements like this make you appear as though you don’t value your own time and are not in control of your own time management decisions.

It is also important to remember that if you say “Yes” to favors that you are realistically able to make time for, it makes saying “No” much easier when you need to. You need to find the balance of being the go-to person people can count on and being the person who values their own time and is selective of their tasks.

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Harnessing Unexpected Motivation

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Sometimes work just seems to take longer than it should. We may have eliminated all distractions and given ourselves ample time, but we just aren’t being as productive at a task as we know we could be. Why is this? It may be because we just aren’t motivated. Focused work is twice as efficient as unfocused work, but focused work that you are actually motivated to complete is the even more ideal scenario.

I’m not saying you will always be 100% motivated and excited to complete a task or that you should wait around for inspiration to strike before beginning anything. However, when you do feel particularly motivated to do something, it’s often best to just go ahead and do it, even if you had originally planned to complete something with a slightly more pressing deadline.

Adjusting Your Schedule

This past week was my spring break from both teaching and my grad program. I had a detailed plan sketched out of what tasks I needed to complete and when I planned to complete them. On Monday, I had planned to knock out some easy and tedious tasks first that were due right after break was over. However, when I woke up on Monday, I felt ambitious. I wanted to tackle the literature review for my research class. A literature review is the part of a research study in which you read as many published studies as you can that have already been written about your topic and then summarize them into one concise section that will eventually serve as the lead-in to your own research paper. I had really not been looking forward to doing this, and since my paper isn’t due until May, I was planning on breaking up this task into tiny little parts and spreading it out over the month of April to make it more manageable. Usually, this would be a great plan, however, here I was on a Monday morning actually feeling motivated to tackle this challenge.

Even though I had tasks on my choose-to list with more pressing deadlines, I took advantage of this surprising motivation and spent all of Monday and most of Tuesday finishing this literature review. I took frequent breaks to complete chores around my house and make sure I didn’t burn out on this heavy “Meat” task, but overall, I was on a roll for two days straight. By late Tuesday afternoon, my motivation was gone, but I had almost finished my task.

In our Time Diets, we work so hard to motivate ourselves to complete tasks we don’t want to do. We post our goals in our workplace so we remember what we’re working for. We break up big tasks into more manageable chunks and we remove all distractions so we are free to focus on our work. We are so good at manufacturing inspiration that we can’t forget to ignore when inspiration strikes on its own. I ended up finishing those easy tasks I had originally planned to do on Monday a little closer to their due date than I would have hoped, but I was still able to finish everything I needed to do without the risk of missing a deadline. Taking advantage of my surprising motivating to finish my lit review was the most productive decision I could have possibly made over my spring break.

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Planning for the Unexpected

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For the past month, I have been loath to touch any door handles, high-five any of my students, or take so much as a walk around the block without my hand sanitizer. Why? Because every single person I know has been sick in the past few weeks.  (That statistic may have been slightly inflated for dramatic effect.) We all know that getting sick is a huge drain on our time management and can definitely disrupt our Time Diets without careful planning. Never fear! Catching this year’s virus du jour doesn’t have to mean a pile of missed deadlines.

First of all, the time to start planning for getting sick is not when you are already bed-ridden with a temperature of 104. Part of maintaining a successful Time Diet involves creating your own deadlines so you aren’t waiting until the last minute to start an important task. As an elementary school teacher, I have to assume that I am going to come in contact with pretty much every germ imaginable on an every-day basis. This is why I try to finish any task at least 2-3 days before I actually need to. That way, if I get sick and am out of commission for a few days, I have less of a chance of missing any deadlines.

Stay Calm, Prioritize, Delegate

But what about when we run into something more than just a little stomach bug? What happens when a major crisis falls in our lap? Something like a severe illness or family emergency? Life doesn’t stop and we still have tasks to complete. How do we cope?  Your Time Diet doesn’t have to go out the window when an unexpected emergency comes up. Just remember 3 things:

1) Stay Calm– This is huge. Remember half the stress of getting it all done comes from worrying about getting it all done. In times of unexpected crisis, remember to breathe and don’t panic. Everything you need to do will happen. Worrying just breeds more stress and that is the last thing you need!

2) Prioritize– An unexpected emergency can often devour most of your time and you must realize early on that you won’t necessarily be able to complete everything on your choose-to list and that’s ok. The world will keep spinning. The trick is to prioritize so you are able to devote the precious little time you do have to the most important things.  It is important to note that the most important things are not necessarily always the ones with the closest deadlines.

3) Delegate– It is all too easy to develop “super-human syndrome” in which we think we have to do everything on our own. This is especially true in times of emergency or crisis! Let others help you! Maybe some Meat tasks are things only you can take care of, but what about all of your Vegetables? When people know you are out of commission for a little while and offer to help, they really mean it. Ask a few willing friends and family members to help take a few things off your plate. (If delegating in general is something you know you struggle with, check out this article: How to Effectively Delegate )

A few years ago, my husband was in an accident that landed him in the hospital….on the other side of the country….a week before our wedding. One minute I was crafting a guest seating chart, the next minute I was on a red-eye flight from Los Angeles to Washington D.C. with a woefully under-packed suitcase. All of a sudden, the million things on my choose-to list didn’t seem so important. My number one priority became making sure the groom made it to the wedding in one piece. My family and friends back home clamored together to finish the things I would no longer be able to do. They tied up the favors in beautiful ribbon, confirmed everything with the venue and finished planning the rehearsal dinner, but you know what? If they hadn’t, the world would not have stopped spinning. I took care of what was most important.

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There Are No Vegetarians in Time Management

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Have you ever noticed that when you have a big, difficult project looming over your head, you become suddenly motivated to do everything else in the world except your project? That pile of dishes in the sink? Let me get right on that! The stack of papers waiting to be filed? Sounds like a blast! Pretty soon, my home or office looks amazing, but my project still hasn’t been started. I surely can’t be the only person this happens to!

So, why do we do this? Big projects are Meat tasks. They are difficult, time consuming and require a lot of thinking. It is no wonder we often struggle to find the motivation to start tasks like these! However, most successful people can’t rationalize not working just because they don’t want to start something difficult. We want to be productive, we just really don’t want to start this Meat task. That is why we turn to our Vegetables! Vegetable tasks are much easier and more mindless to do. By filling our day with Vegetables we temporarily mask the guilt of not working on our more difficult Meat tasks. There is a great comic about this behavior here: PhD Comics (If you’ve never read PhD Comics, they are hysterical!)

The problem with replacing Meats with Vegetables is that feeling of productivity is only temporary. At the end of the day we still haven’t accomplished what we need to do. Remember, you need a balanced diet of Meats, Vegetables and Desserts every day in order to be productive.

The Time Diet to the Rescue!

So how do we fix this? Well, since we often view Vegetables tasks as a more desirable alternative to Meat tasks, use that to your advantage! When you sit down to start a Meat tasks, set a small goal for yourself. For example, if you’re writing a paper this could mean finishing the first page. When you’ve finished that goal, go do the most mindless Vegetable task on your “choose-to” list. This will keep you in “work-mode” but give your mind a break. Then, return to your Meat task with another small goal to work toward. Pretty soon, you’ll be far enough in to your difficult task that you’ll be in “the zone” and won’t need to take breaks as frequently. Remember, the hardest part of completing a Meat task is starting it. Once you’re on a roll, nothing can stop you!

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Beating the February Blues

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Well Time Diet readers, we all made it through another February. Is there something intrinsically un-motivating about this month or is it just me? Maybe that’s why it only has 28 days, because making this month any longer would just be cruel and unusual punishment. It’s a weird month. The “magic” of the winter/holiday season has officially worn off. Our excitement about our New Year’s resolutions has faded away and we are just ready for spring to get here and for it to stop being so cold. As a teacher, I really feel it because if there is anything worse than trying to motivate yourself through a slump, it’s trying to motivate a bunch of 10 and 11 year olds who seem to also have a major case of the “February Crankies.”

Finding the Motivation for Time Management

So what are we to do? We can’t reasonably expect ourselves to be 100% motivated all the time, but when we fall into a slump like this, productivity falls off the deep end. We become unfocused and our work seems to take three times longer to complete and that only worsens the situation. Unfocused work can throw your whole Time Diet off!

This is the perfect time to restate your goals. We’ve all heard the quote, “A goal without a plan is just a wish.” I believe that a plan without a goal is just as bad. Why are you going to work every day? What are you trying to accomplish? Having a clear-cut goal gives your day direction and keeps you on the right track. It’s not good enough to simply have goals. You have to constantly remind yourself of them. I recommend writing your goals down and posting them in a prominent place so you see them frequently throughout the day.

I revisited my goals this week, wrote them on a piece of paper and posted them on my desk. I wanted to share with you what I wrote on my paper:

Emily’s Goals

1. Be “Dr. Schwartz”

2. Treat each of my students like they are my favorite student

3. Book 20 new Time Diet presentations in the next 12 months.

4. Save enough money to buy our dream home

5. Finish my book

6. Make band the most meaningful part of my students’ education

Writing these all out caused me to reflect on why I do everything that I do. It gave my day purpose and led to the most focused, inspired day of work I’ve had in a long time. A lack of focus is the enemy of time management. Having defined goals is the first step toward regaining that focus.

So what are your goals? Make a public commitment to one of your goals by sharing one either in a comment or on Facebook. I can’t wait to hear what you’re working toward!

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