How to undo your to do list
Undo Your To Do
This week I was wrapping up for a two week holiday and wondering if I'd EVER get everything finished (we all know that feeling). So I decided it was time for a dose of my own advice from this article from last July...
Thirteen. One-three. 13.
That’s how many projects I had on my ‘side project’ list. Thirteen things, and that’s not including my full-time job, daily fitness routine, cooking, sleeping and well, living. No wonder I haven’t been sleeping well and have been feeling increasingly frustrated at myself that I wasn’t getting anything done.
In these situations, I try to coach myself like I would coach my clients. The first questions that jumped out were;
What are you trying to achieve? (define the goal)
Why is this important?
What is the priority (project)?
Why is this the priority?
How is this going to help meet that goal?
What do you need to do to start?
What does ‘completed’ look like (an important question for someone like me who will never see anything as finished)
So I made two lists. The first list was of all of those projects and ideas, this was to get them out of my head (and keeping me awake at night) and onto paper.
The second list decided the top three priority projects from the long list. I then plotted out the timelines for each of these three priorities.
Already I could see that there were some interdependencies in these projects; completing one would help kick off another and then together they’d form the basis of another. I could also clearly see that doing tiny bits of thirteen projects was like jumping on the express train to do-nothing-town.
Being a list-loving kind of girl I decided that the logical next step was to break priority project #1 into sprints and tasks. This will be my workflow for the next month as I work through this one particular project.
<Insert feeling of relief and order>
Seven Questions
STOP. [in the name of love]. When overwhelm and frustration are rife you probably aren’t achieving anything. Take time away from what you’re doing and ask yourself these seven basic ‘take stock’ questions;
What am I [actually] trying to achieve?
Why is this important?
What is stopping me?
How can I reduce / remove those things?
Who/what else can help me?
What is the first step I need to take to move forward?
What is my timeline?
Talk to someone, go for a walk, write a list, pet a cat, bake a cake. Do whatever works for you but getting out of that sink-hole is really important.
Further reading…
This article is the perfect antidote to my brain. I’m good at planning the bigger breaks with regular holidays and weekends away but I’m usually pretty ragged by the time I get to those because the micro-breaks don’t come to mind as naturally.
This was a great reminder of the science behind why these are important and the productivity and performance improvement that will come as a result. (Also a useful reminder that mindless scrolling through Facebook or IG are not good micro-break activities).
What do you do when it’s all a bit… much?
"...you live and die by your ability to prioritize. You must focus on the most important, mission-critical tasks each day and night, and then share, delegate, delay or skip the rest."
Jessica Jackley
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Want to see your management or leadership challenge addressed with helpful advice and resources? Email me at steph@stephclarke.com and let me know what topics you'd like me to include in future newsletters.
PS. I moved house last week and missed scheduling the newsletter for it's usual time-slot. I thought nobody would notice... so to the people who missed it yesterday - thanks 😉
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