Focus and Prioritize
Productivity Coaching, Time Management Consulting and Leadership Coaching for business and nonprofits - get your most important work done. Collaborating with leaders and their teams to become more strategic, focused and productive. Leadership and Board Coaching, Strategic Planning Facilitation, Productivity Coaching and Time Management Consulting, Professional Speaker.
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Focus and Prioritize

22 Oct

Posted at 10:08h in Change, Focus and Prioritize, Productivity, Time Management

4 D's: Delegate, Delay, Delete, Do

Have you heard of the 4 D’s?  It’s a principle that has been circulating in my professional circles for years but has gained even more relevance in today’s workplace. Given the workload my clients face, there must be solutions beyond simply working harder and longer. Lately, I’ve been emphasizing the importance of the 4 D’s as a filtering tool to help prioritize tasks on their to-do lists.

Here’s what you need to know to help you use the 4 D’s to filter your tasks.  Look at your task list and for every single item on it ask yourself:

  • Can I delegate this?
  • Is this time-sensitive or can it wait?
  • What would be the consequences if I don’t do it?
  • Is this a priority in the coming week?

Delegate It

My favorite delegation quote is by Pierre Omidyar, the founder of eBay. He says that “five times 80% is much larger than 100% of me.”

Delegating is hard:

  • It takes time
  • It takes effort and planning
  • It takes patience
  • You have to follow up
  • Team members probably won’t do it as well as you at the beginning

But Delegating is Worth It:

  • If you’re doing someone else’s work, you aren’t doing your own work.
  • It improves the effectiveness of the entire team.
  • It provides opportunities for growth and drives engagement.
  • Best of all, delegating gets it off your plate.

My delegation process involves:

  1. Defining what to delegate.
  2. Identifying the right person for the task.
  3. Providing clear instructions.
  4. Maintaining open communication.
  5. Supporting the delegate while empowering them.
  6. Following up on delegated tasks.

If you can, delegate the task

Delay It

Not all tasks are of equal importance. To determine what can be delayed, consider:

  • The impact of postponing the task.
  • Who might be affected by the delay.
  • Whether approval is needed to delay the task.
  • If discussing the delay with someone is necessary.

Time is limited, so prioritizing tasks based on their impact and importance is helpful. If the task isn’t time-sensitive, consider delaying it.

Delete It

Ask yourself, “What would happen if I didn’t do this task?” Some tasks lose their importance over time or may no longer align with your goals or current situation. If a task is deemed non-essential, remove it from your list.

Do It

If doing something serves you, your goals, your business, or someone important to you and it is high impact then that’s a good reason to do it now.  Other reasons are the ones I suggest you use to help you prioritize your tasks – if you don’t do it in the next few days

  • You will miss a deadline
  • It will cost you money
  • You will let someone down
  • You will be embarrassed
  • You will let  yourself down

Productivity is about intentional action, so if a task is significant and time-sensitive, tackle it promptly to maintain efficiency. With intention, doing it now makes sense.  And that is what productivity is all about.

Unlock your potential with the upcoming audio version of Productivity for How You’re Wired on Audible! If you enjoy my blog, you’ll love the insights in my book, available now in print and as an ebook on Amazon. Don’t miss out—I’m excited to share these transformative strategies with you!

29 Jan

Posted at 10:12h in Change, Focus and Prioritize, Planning Tools, Productivity for How You're Wired, Stress Management, Time Management

Unlock Your Productivity

The last many posts shared with you systems for creating your path to productivity. I bet, however, your asking yourself “how do I make this part of my routine?” The answer is daily planning  and weekly planning. These practices help you learn a process that in time will go on autopilot and you’ll just do it. 

At the beginning, planning will take time and practice. As you get comfortable with the processes and integrate them into your routine, it will take less time and become easier. Start by scheduling an hour each week for weekly planning and five to fifteen minutes each day for daily planning. 

This is a true investment in your productivity and quality of work. You won’t know the value until you start doing it and feel confident and under control. When you miss a week or a day, you’ll notice the difference. You feel the stress, the worry of not knowing. There’s nothing like an out-of-control week to motivate you to invest the time to plan. 

Life isn’t perfect, however, and sometimes you’ll miss the planning blocks. That’s ok. The system doesn’t fail if you skip; it will be there waiting for you. The idea is to jump back in, catch up, and not lose traction.

Your Weekly Planning Checklist

Weekly planning is a time to review, assess, organize, and prepare for your upcoming week. The Weekly Planning Checklist provides you with numerous options on what to do during your planning time. As with everything productivity related, all options may not apply to you. Review and select the ones that will support your best work. Test and experiment, ultimately crafting a checklist of your own.

Here is the menu of options I share with my clients for Weekly Planning

  1. Review Your Calendar – is everything on your calendar that needs to be? Do you have to prepare for anything coming up? Does anything need changing?
  2. Essential Structures – add in relevant commitments from your Time Map and Essential Structures
  3. Process Loose Notes (physical and electronic)  and Papers – clearing the decks once a week keeps you from losing track of important things. Once you are caught up it’s not as hard.
  4. Clean up Computer – close open windows, pasting relevant links onto your task list.
  5. Update your Task List – read over everything so you don’t miss something important. Move items up, down or off.
  6. Triage Email/Electronic Messages – review, delete, clear out, file/label, prioritize – whatever system you have – be sure you know what you need to focus on this week.
  7. Clear Your Space – if this is an issue for you take the time to clear the surface on your workspace. Return your dishes/mugs to the kitchen, put your supplies away. Physical clutter slows you down.
  8. Goal Checking – check in on your Goals and Intention periodically.  

When to Schedule Weekly Planning

There are many good times to do Weekly Planning: 

  • Friday afternoon is a good choice for some. They have their plan for the upcoming week so they can relax over the weekend. Sometimes it becomes clear that they will need to work a few hours over the weekend to be ready for the week.
  • Others like to plan first thing Monday morning. This can get a bit dicey if urgent things tend to pop up. Monday morning planning is most successful when done early before typical work hours begin.
  • Many of my clients prefer to invest weekend time to do their weekly planning. They find it worth the weekend-time trade off to spend an hour on Saturday or Sunday morning, or even Sunday evening, knowing when they walk into their office Monday morning they will be focused and ready to work.
  • A couple of clients like to plan mid-week because of the cycle of their businesses. 

It doesn’t matter when you pick to do your weekly planning. What matters is that you pick a time and schedule it as a recurring event on your calendar. You are giving yourself the gift of time and setting yourself up for success by creating and integrating a routine to keep you on your path. 

Your Daily Planning Checklist

Daily planning focuses on productivity and planning Today’s Work. It targets key planning tools to support you in doing the right things at the right time for the day ahead.

Here is the menu of options I share with my clients for Daily Planning

  1. Review Your Calendar – is everything on your calendar that needs to be? Do you have to prepare for anything coming up? Does anything need changing? Complete calendared reminders.
  2. Check Task List – does anything need to move up, be added, or marked off as completed.
  3. Triage Email/Team Messages – does anything need to be added to today’s to dos?
  4. Plan Today’s Work – what are your priorities for today? Make an achievable “Today’s Work List.”  If you completed it you can always add more, but start off being realistic. 
  5. Other Activities – such as daily tracking, clearing your desks of projects you aren’t working on today, and review of mantra’s on inspiring quotes.

Scheduling Daily Planning – Morning Launch or Daily Wrap 

Investing five to fifteen minutes at the start or end of your day pays off exponentially. Planning creates awareness around your priorities and helps you focus on the most important work. As with Weekly Planning, this may take longer as you figure out your own process. Over time you’ll do it without thinking, and it really will only take you a few minutes. If you have unique habits or you use the block of time for processing email then you’ll want to add more time; however, the daily planning of Today’s Work can be done quite quickly.

The Morning Launch and Daily Wrap have the same elements, you simply are doing them at the beginning of your workday or at the end of your workday for the next day. Morning Launch is effective for those of you who do better planning at the start of your day. Daily Wrap is effective for those of you who prefer to prep for the next day at the end of the prior day.

Not sure which is best for you? This is a perfect time to experiment. Try one week of Morning Launch and the next week of Daily Wrap. Which worked best? 

  • Which one did you do more consistently?
  • Which one helped you feel in control of your day?
  • Which one lowered your stress?

Again, not all components will apply to you. Review and select the ones that will support you best. Test and experiment to craft a checklist you will want to follow daily.

My clients tell me time and again that when they do their daily and weekly planning they are less stressed and more proactive, and if they skip it they aren’t. Isn’t that worth a try?

This is an excerpt from Chapter 10 of my new book Productivity for How You’re Wired available on Amazon. Daily and Weekly Planning Checklist templates are included via the time tools link discussed in the book.

24 Oct

Posted at 16:17h in Envision Possibilities, Focus and Prioritize, Planning Tools, Productivity for How You're Wired, Time Management

My last blog post we discussed the importance of setting your goals and intentions. This week we move on to Step 2 of the Productivity Flow Framework: Time Mapping.

A time map helps you create a vision of how you want to spend your time. You can think of this as a vision board where you are creating a picture of something you aspire to, or as a budget for your time. This is useful for several reasons:

  • It forces you to think through how you are going to fit in time for the various priorities you’ve identified in your goal and intention setting exercise.
  • It helps you allocate your time most effectively — both at work and at home.
  • It shows you if you need to re-prioritize commitments.
  • It helps you see if your expectations are realistic and feasible.

When you create your time map you’ll want to consider any or all of the following: 

Morning Routine: Do you need time for the kids or pets, exercise, meditation, showering, getting ready, and eating breakfast? Or should you sleep as long as possible and only do the essentials to get to work on time? 

Work Time: 

  • Starting Time — How long is the commute? Do you read the news, peruse social media, check email? How much time do you want to spend on these tasks? Factor in these variables to determine your realistic start time.
  • Work Transitions — Are you magically going from one meeting to the next? Even in the era of Zoom, it does take a couple of minutes to make it to the next call. Oh, and you wanted to recap notes in between? And take a bio break. And grab a glass of water. Planning transition time is important.
  • Focus Work — When can you do your flow, creative, and cognitively taxing work? Can you block out interruptions and do it during the day, or is this better left to an early morning, late afternoon, evening, or weekend block of time? If you block two hours for focus time, does that include checking email, clearing your desk, getting a snack, or anything else you need to do to be able to attend to the work itself? Would it be helpful to build in ramp-up time?
  • Ending Time — When is your work hard stop? Being intentional about when to stop working supports you in developing realistic guardrails. 

Exercise: Do you like to exercise before, during, or after work? Do you need to plan in time for getting to the gym? Shower time? How often do you want to work out? How long are the work outs?

Self-Care: Do you want to have time to take care of yourself? Pleasure reading? Pedicures and massage? Yoga? Meditation? Alone time?

Friends and Family: Do you want time to go out with your friends or partner? How much time do you want to spend with your parents, kids, and family? What else do you want to add in?

Other areas from your Goals and Intentions: Do you need time for a second business? Extra learning? Professional development? Personal projects?

This is your opportunity to think through how you want to use the time you have. About how long transitions REALLY take. About how much sleep you REALLY need, how much exercise you REALLY want to get, and even about when you will take time to appropriately fuel your body with food. 

Start thinking about what matters to you.  Use a template from the book or design your own. What’s most important is that you take a bit of time to identify just how much time you have to “spend.” Time mapping empowers you to depict how you REALLY want to live. It is your opportunity to create a vision for what your ideal week will look like and your first step to living it. 

This is an excerpt from Chapter 8 of my new book Productivity for How You’re Wired available on Amazon. Worksheets and online templates are included via the time tools link discussed in the book.

10 Oct

Posted at 11:50h in Envision Possibilities, Focus and Prioritize, Planning Tools, Productivity for How You're Wired, Stress Management, Time Management, Tips for Easier Living

 

In my last blog post I explained the importance of setting your goals and intentions, and we discussed why adding intentions was so important. In my book Productivity for How You’re Wired, I share 3 different models you can use to set goals and intentions based on your structure preference. You can create your own plan by following the steps below.  Definitely do the first 3 steps. Steps 4 and 5 are optional based on “how you’re wired.”

Step 1: Identify Focus Areas

Focus areas are the spaces in which you want to spend the time of your life. In a financial budget you’d have areas such as home expenses, utilities, clothing, food, and entertainment. For your life’s Focus Areas these may be business/work, professional development, personal growth, self–care, family, spirituality, friends/social, volunteerism, service, activism/advocacy.

Step 2: Set Goals and/or Intentions
A few people can state their goals or intentions off the top of their heads. Most can’t.

If the answers don’t come easily to you start by developing your priorities (Step 3). Then use your priorities to back into your goals and intentions. While it goes against every rigid business planner’s process, completing your priorities first can help you see exactly what matters. Ask “what is the purpose of doing these things” (the priorities.) The answer will bring the goal or intention into focus. Keep your goals and intentions concise and clear. They cue you to remember. They do not need to include ALL the details.

Step 3: Determine Strategic Priorities
The next step is to figure out the three most important things you want to accomplish in each focus area. Your priorities should be actionable within the established time frame of your plan. The priority should identify what you will do.

  • Start with an action word such as plan, complete, strategize, or implement.
  • Be concise – provide enough detail so you understand what want to do, but not so much you can’t easily grasp the action.
  • When identifying your priorities, it is often helpful to prime the pump by ask yourself questions such as these:
    • What project, task or action is critical to my success/my organization’s success?
    • What do I want to accomplish?
    • What would I be disappointed with if I didn’t achieve?
    • What do I need to do to be who I want to be? 

Step 4: Create your Mission/Purpose/Success Statement

This is your WHY, your driver, what motivates you in work and/or life. If you know your WHY, add it now. If not, it often comes into focus as you complete the rest of the map. This step is optional. Add it if it supports you. Your statement should inspire you:

  • Use words that will reinforce what is important to you.
  • Define what success means to you.

Step 5: Plan your Quarterly Tactics

If you thrive in high structure and you’re excited about having a full–blown, step–by–step quarterly plan, this last section is for you. However, if the thought of doing this last step sounds dreadful, you’re best to skip it.

  1. Think the project through.
  2. Now put the project elements in order. Consider what steps must come before the others. You’ll probably identify a couple of things you are missing. Add those in.
  3. Estimate the time you’ll expect to spend on this element. A good rule of thumb is to double your time estimate.
  4. Now plug the elements into your quarterly plan.

Start thinking about what matters to you.  Use a template from the book or design your own. What’s most important is that you take a bit of time to identify how you want to “spend” your time.

This is an excerpt from Chapter 7 of my new book Productivity for How You’re Wired available on Amazon. Worksheets and online templates are included via the time tools link discussed in the book.

19 Jun

Posted at 16:41h in Envision Success, Focus and Prioritize, Planning Tools, Productivity for How You're Wired, Time Management, Tips for Easier Living

 

In my last post I introduced you to the Productivity Flow Framework featured in section 2 of my new book Productivity for How You’re Wired. Today we move to Chapter 7 where we explore the first concept of the framework – setting your goals and intentions.  Remember, the reason we do this is to clarify and commit to priorities – those things that take time yet YOU deem as most important.  

Many of my clients struggle to set priorities. When asked they simply aren’t sure about what is and isn’t important. Setting goals and intentions helps you clarify what is important – namely those things you want to achieve. Goals have a specific outcome. Intentions are more general and reflect how you wish to live. We look at how and why to integrate both into your plan.

Why Intentions and Not Just Goals?

Goals are useful in some cases. They just aren’t applicable for everything. Considering intentions (how you want to live) expands the value of this exercise.

Goals

A goal has a specific outcome: 

  • Make profits over six figures this year.
  • Complete the team on–boarding program by June.
  • Lose four pounds a month each month this year

The business world embraces the acronym SMART to define the best practices of goal setting. 

  • SPECIFIC
  • MEASURABLE
  • ATTAINABLE
  • REALISTIC  
  • TIME–BOUND

A benefit of measurable goals is that they help define achievement. If you know you want to make $100K for a period of time, then you also know when you have attained that benchmark. This takes a bit of pressure off the workaholic, type A, never-enough driver. It helps them to know it’s actually okay to slow down. Goals are great for certain aspects of your work and life. They’re just not the complete picture. 

Intentions

An intention clarifies how you wish to live. 

  • I work smart and give great service.
  • I live a healthy, happy life.
  • I give my best self to my family.
  • I continue to learn so I can help other leaders grow.

Intentions speak to your inner-self and bring meaning to the things you do. They can be aspirational, motivating you without the pressure of measurement. Intentions help you find success as defined by you.

Consider SMART intentions:

  • SOUL–FOCUSED
  • MEANINGFUL
  • ASPIRATIONAL
  • REASONABLE  
  • TRANSFORMATIVE

Goals AND Intentions 

Most people have both goals and intentions. To focus on one and not the other is addressing just a portion of what is important.

My clients tell me they need help figuring out how to get all their work done. In reality, work is only part of the challenge. Many say they would like to take time off without worry, spend more quality time with their families, and even have a bit of time for themselves. As you work through identifying your own goals and intentions, you may want to consider more than work. Remember, a key reason to improve productivity is to have a full and better life.

Success On Your Own Terms

When people think of success, most think dollars. However, when they clarify what success means to them, they typically find they are seeking something more holistic. The money part is more the vehicle to get to the life they want. 

Do you want to have time to take care of the kids or an aging family member and still have a career? What if you want to travel and still have your work? What if your success is defined by having time to give back to your community?

Success is not always about the money. Being intentional about what matters in the big picture of life helps keep you from falling into the trap of letting others define success for you.

This is an excerpt from Chapter 7 of my new book Productivity for How You’re Wired available on Amazon. Worksheets and online templates are included via the time tools link discussed in the book.

15 May

Posted at 17:59h in Envision Success, Focus and Prioritize, Planning Tools, Productivity for How You're Wired, Time Management, Tips for Easier Living

Today’s post summarizes Section 2 of my new book Productivity for How You’re Wired. I will provide more detail in future posts but we’ll start here –  with  the 30,000 foot view.  

The Productivity Flow Framework provides you with tools and context to help you achieve your goals and intentions and become your most productive, successful, fulfilled self. 

  • It is strategic. You are creating your process to work more effectively. 
  • It is a framework. It provides you context to work within. 
  • It flows from tool to tool. Everything impacts everything else, and helps you find flow in work and life.
  • It is customizable to your structure preference and productivity style. It reflects you.

Think of it as a picture frame. It holds the picture. The picture is you.

Goals and Intention Setting

We identify goals and intentions to clarify what is truly important. If you aren’t clear, or if too many things matter, you end up spreading yourself so thin that you are on that proverbial treadmill and it is only with luck the right work gets done.

By taking the time to clarify and create your own strategic plan, you are laying the foundation for doing the work that improves your quality of work and your quality of life. 

Time Mapping  

A time map helps you create a vision of how you want to spend your time. Think of this like a vision board where you are creating a picture of something you aspire to, or a budget for how you want to use your time. 

  • It helps paint a vision of what you want your life to look like. 
  • It helps you take the time to think through, and plug in, the various priorities you’ve identified in your goal and intention setting exercise.
  • It helps you see if your expectations are realistic.

Essential Structures

Boundaries come to life as Essential Structures; what you need to say YES to and what you need to say NO to to be your best self. The Time Map gives us clues and from it we are able to create a concrete list of

  • Winning Conditions – the nonnegotiable choices you make that you want to become habits
  • Guardrails – the things you must say no to in order to do the kind of work you want to do and be the person you want to be.

Task Prioritization

This tool is more tactical and directly impacts your day-to-day work. The central concept to take away from this section is the importance of sequentially prioritizing your work based on your goals, intentions, and essential structures. Most to-do list tools organize tasks by day or date. This is different. Organizing tasks by priority ensures you are doing the right things at the right time.

Weekly and Daily Planning 

Weekly and Daily planning makes being productive much easier. You can function without planning; however, without a plan, you can’t maximize your time or be focused and strategic, and you won’t ever be sure you are successful. 

  • Planning helps you use your time for the things that have the greatest payoff — your high-value work.
  • Planning ensures you are set up to use your time to act on the things you’ve deemed most important.
  • Planning gives you benchmarks to reach so when you aren’t working you can actually relax. 

The Productivity Flow Framework helps you build a solid foundation. And with this foundation you can delve into the tactics that will help bring your current situation into alignment with your vision for work success and a better life. 

Think of the framework as you would a border of a puzzle, the frame that links everything together. Just like a puzzle, with perseverance, you’ll get the full picture. Taking responsibility for your productivity is something only you can do.

This is an excerpt from Chapter 6 of my new book Productivity for How You’re Wired available on Amazon. Worksheets and online templates are included via the time tools link discussed in the book.