'Bingity bingty beep'
goes your phone as yet another Whattsapp text from some random group
pops onto your screen. 'Boip' another email enters your inbox. 'Plop'
the messenger drops a REAL letter on your desk. Your Skype
notification informs you that Adam in America has come online (you
never speak to him, but it is good to know he is online). The ticker
on your twitter feed keeps going as another one of the important
people you follow (in case they ever actually bothered to notice your
own posts) spews out some random comment about their breakup/new
single/world peace. Perhaps it is time to check Facebook again and
see if your news feed has changed in the last ten minutes. What about
Instagram and Linked In? 'Boig' goes your email...or was it the
phone? So busy. There is no time. So distracted. So unfocused.
We live in this
illusion of being busy and think that being busy equals results. Then
when an opportunity presents itself we are too busy to give it a
second glance. But are we busy or are we just distracted. With all
the extra sources of information and distraction in our lives it is
easy to think that we are solving the world's problems when in fact
we are getting nothing done. Being busy and working hard is only half
the equation. You should also be effective. Unless Facebook is an
effective part of your work (and you better have a good measure of
how much revenue you generate from spending time on it) save it for
another time or deactivate your account and watch what happens to
your time.
Rare are the humans
that can truly multitask. Sorry to break it to you there but your
mind is capable of a single chain of thought at one time. Need proof?
Think of the happiest event of your life. Now simultaneously think of
the worst. See you can't., flip flopping between the two does not
count. You can jump chains of thought but you can only ride the train
of your mind on one piece of rail at a time. That means every time
your phone rings while you are focused on your computer screen you
have to leave what you are doing, answer the phone, and then try to
recapture that molecule of neuronal firing you had five minutes
earlier. Voltaire said that no problem can withstand the assault of
sustained thinking. Sustained thinking people, he did not say 'the
assault of broken thinking'. If you find yourself jumping from task
to task every five minutes you will probably never get any of them
done effectively.
So how can we take our
'busy' and translate it into 'effective'.
You should have a
priority strategy. There are a number of strategies that work for
different people from simple numerical ranking of your to-do-list to
more complex time framed algorithms. I do not really care about what
you use but decide what is important and what is not. Here is one
that I use regularly. Take a piece of paper and divide it into four
squares. Label them: High Priority/High Urgency, High Priority/Low
Urgency, Low Priority/High Urgency, Low Priority/Low Urgency. Put
what you need to do into one of the boxes. Then start tackling the
first box. Not sure about what is high priority, here is a list of
things that should take priority from Emergingideas.com . Priority:
thanking people, doing the biggest task first, reading and writing
more, connecting people, producing results, being helpful, being
present, brainstorming, following up and following through, finishing
assigned responsibilities.
Invest time into
activities. Chunk out time to do things, enough time to bring you to
completion of the activity or to a set point. In order to get this
article out I need to chunk at least an uninterrupted hour to write
it out (that does not include the other chunks set aside for
brainstorming, the research, and conceptualising of the article). For
that hour my phone is on silent (real silent and not vibrate), my
secretary knows not to interrupt me unless the world is ending, and I
am alone in my little world focused on producing the best possible
article for you to read. See you didn't know that you were that
special.
If you absolutely have
to use social media then chunk it as well. Set aside the time to do
it, and set an alarm so you only spend the allocated amount of time
to the task of gossiping through news feeds. Treat emails with the
same contempt. Check them twice a day, once in the morning and once
in the afternoon, and less on weekends if at all. If it is really
that urgent the person will call you. Turn off your smart phone feeds
(it will save you internet cap), or switch them onto silent at least.
Control the volume of information coming at you, come up with
reporting strategies that allow you to keep tabs on your business
without micromanaging every order and task.
The successful are busy
but they never respond 'I've been busy'. Shift your perspective to
being effective. You will probably still be busy, but you will get
what matters done.
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