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How Do You Spend Your Most Valuable Currency:Time?

By Royale on October 28, 2010 in Habits, Lessons, Personal Growth

: Image by ToniVC via Flickr

Are you neglecting the things that matter? Do you think you are somehow different than the rest of us? That you have more hours in the day or can get more done miraculously if you just get organized enough? Let me tell you right now, FORGET IT! There is only so much any one person can accomplish at one time. We are told we can have it all, but that is nothing more than wishful thinking. Be honest. Where are you falling short?

This week I was given some tough love. After taking my bitter pill, I decided to open my closet metaphorically and share my dirty laundry. I am a chronic over-scheduler, over-committer and plate-overflower ( I just made that term up.) I know I am not alone in the disease to achieve. A wise and insightful person pointed out to me that I was already operating with my plate filled to capacity before my husband left for Afghanistan. How did I expect to absorb extra responsibilities into my life and not neglect some things that matter? I don’t really want to hear that. While I cringe at the term “neglect,” it may be an arrow that hits too close to home. She told me what is always, without fail neglected first is yourself, because you somehow feel as though you are not deserving of your place on the priority ladder. Then, although it defies logic we neglect the other things that matter most to us, usually family, friends, home and fun. In some unfathomable twist of brain logic we tend to spend time on those things that don’t really matter in the long term picture of our lives. Why do we do this I want to know? Maybe someone wiser than I can figure out that puzzle eventually. My marching orders are to figure out what really matters, place a premium priority and focus on those aspects of my life and cut back or delete those that don’t. I invite you, no; I implore you to join me.

Time is our most valuable currency, yet most of us squander it so easily.

What are the things that really matter to you?

What are the things that really won’t matter 20 years from now?

Are you spending your time in that order of importance?

What activities are you spending time on that don’t have a great return on investment?

Do you check your email first thing in the morning instead of taking time to exercise or eating breakfast with your family? I’m sure you’ll be glad of that when your health fails and your kids are gone.

Do you spend too much time on social media, email and news and information intake? Unless that’s your job, you will get better results if you spend your time on actually producing “work.” Those things are tools. Think of it in a more traditional manner. Would you spend 2 hours a day reading the newspaper or submitting press releases instead of making sales calls, product development or working with clients? If you’re at home, is Facebook more important than reading with your kids or making a clean and comfortable environment?

Do you spend more time “preparing and planning” than working. Either you’re an excessive planner like me, or you’re on the other side of the fence wasting time looking for things, straightening piles that shouldn’t be there in the first place, rushing for appointments that you forgot and playing catch up on emails that you should have responded to last week.

It’s not what we want to hear, but it’s what we need to open our eyes to the reality of how we spend our time. If you figure it out… please let me know.

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Are You Sabotaging Yourself: Top 5 Strategies to Set Yourself Up for Success

By Royale on October 26, 2010 in Habits

: Image via Wikipedia

You may be sabotaging yourself and not even realize it. I mean really who wants to interfere with their own success and cause more unnecessary stress? Apparently most of us do. Do you say yes to projects or activities that you don’t have time for? Do you plan more in your day than is humanly possible to get done? Do you stop to answer the phone or check email while in the middle of a project? Do you get sidetracked by co-workers, children or incoming information? Do you spend time on activities that are not essential? I have been guilty of most if not all of these productivity saboteurs at one time or another.

So what can you do to set yourself up for success at home or at work?

Stop sabotaging yourself!

My top 5 strategies to keep you on the path to an organized and productive day:

Set your top 3 priorities before you start your day – I cannot hammer this home enough. It is crucial.

Set aside an uninterrupted window of time to focus on your most important tasks( I recommend 60 – 90 minutes) – That means door closed, phone on silent, email checking disabled and IM turned off. At home it may mean children napping or otherwise occupied (pets too.)

Have your list of core concentrations in front of you (mine are posted above my desk) – Don’t have a list of core concentrations? Make that your priority for today. Use this list when deciding what projects or activities to say yes too. If it’s not on that list, the answer is no! That is unless you have an abundance of free time, in which case you wouldn’t be worried about being more organized, now would you? Also use it to set your priorities for the day or week.

Remember to work in blocks and take regular breaks – Fatigue is the number one obstacle to productivity. Your energy and ability to focus are impaired when you don’t take time to recharge throughout your day. As little as a few minutes to stretch, get a drink or step outside can work wonders.

Stop addictive online behaviors – Check email at specified times. Set a limit on time spent on social media, games, statistics/analytics and information intake. Set aside specific times and a set time limit for these activities. Those activities may be a part of your schedule, but they are generally not income producing activities.

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Critical Core Concentrations

By Royale on July 20, 2010 in Goals, Life Balance, Personal Growth

You must concentrate your focus on the critical core components of your life in order to increase your overall effectiveness.

This is a crucial strategy in your quest for improved productivity, efficiency and success. The first and arguably the most important step is to determine what your critical core concentrations are, or rather what you want them to be. Take a look at your goals or think about your long term plans in each area of your life. To give you a frame of reference; think about what you’d really like to accomplish or what’s important in the next three months. I recommend re-evaluating quarterly as plans and priorities change. Consider all the relevant areas of your life and work:

Self – mental, emotional & physical health – includes personal growth and creativity
Relationships – marriage, children, family, friends
Spirituality – in whatever definition that means to you
Community – local or global, contribution
Home – purchase and/or care
Career – job, business, education
Finances – income, investments, debt, retirement, etc.

To illustrate this, I am willing to share my personal and professional second quarter core list as an example:

Mental & physical health – Focus on increasing endurance and strength, eat to maximize energy and health, and take time alone every day to decompress.

Family – Focus on maintaining communications and reinforcing my relationship with my husband during military deployment and support and deepen the connection with my children.

Career – Focus on building my business, writing productivity and deployment books and building my reputation.

Finances – Focus on planning and conducting my savings and investment plans in a more disciplined fashion.

Friends – Focus on strengthening my network of support and companionship, both in-person and virtual.

Keep in mind that everyone’s list will be different and will vary depending on the life and work situation that you are currently in. My list will be different in 6 months and was certainly different last year. Also, many business owners create a separate list for their business as an entity in addition to their personal list.

Once you have this list save it, print it or write it on an index card, tape it to your desk, hang it on the wall, whatever you need to have a constant reminder. You will then use this list as the basis for setting goals, determining weekly and daily priorities and selecting which projects and activities make the cut.

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One Month to Live

By Royale on June 17, 2010 in Personal Growth

What would you do differently if you only had one month to live? Would you change jobs or leave relationship? Would you apologize or be more caring to others? Would you take a risk you’ve always wanted to take? Everyone’s answer will be different. The book One Month to Live: Thirty Days to a No-Regrets Life by Kerry & Chris Shook can help you answer those questions and guide you along that journey of changing the way you live your life.

From the book:

“Be brutally honest with yourself. Your time on earth is limited. Shouldn’t you start making the most of it? If you knew you had one month to live, you would look at everything from a different perspective. Many of the things you do now that seem so important would immediately become meaningless. You would have total clarity about what matters most, and you wouldn’t hesitate to be spontaneous and risk your heart. You wouldn’t wait until tomorrow to do what you need to do today. The way you lived that month would be the way you wished you had lived your whole life.

If you knew you had one month to live, your life would be radically transformed. But why do we wait until we’re diagnosed with cancer or we lose a loved one to accept this knowledge and allow it to free us? Don’t we want all that life has to offer? Don’t we want to fulfill the purpose for which we were created? Wouldn’t life be a lot more satisfying if we lived this way?

I’m challenging you to start living your life as though you have one month to live, and I’ve designed this book to help you. There are four universal principles in the one-month-to-live lifestyle: to live passionately, to love completely, to learn humbly, and to leave boldly. I’ve divided this book into four sections or “weeks” accordingly, and I encourage you to live these next thirty days as if they were your last.”

I find this book to be fascinating, thought-provoking and inspiring. Happy reading! What will you do with your one month?

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Are You Productive or Just Busy?

By Royale on June 16, 2010 in Time

Some can’t distinguish between being busy and being productive. They are human windmills, flailing at work, but actually accomplishing little. – Caroline Donnelly

Often it is very difficult to tell the difference between being busy and being productive. On the surface they can appear much the same. Whether you are rushing or focusing, surrounded by chaos or organization, never finish anything or are triumphantly checking tasks off with a righteous pen. Even if you are constantly busy; if you don’t accomplish anything then you are not productive.

People can keep themselves busy in many ways; spending all their time organizing and preparing ( some is good – too much is bad), talking on the phone , buried in email, visiting with people, surfing the internet or haunting social media outlets, dealing with other people’s problems, etc. However, indiscriminate, even scheduled busyness can often lead to frustration and feeling ineffectual if you are busying yourself with things that aren’t really important.

A great question to ask yourself is:

Are the items on your task list bringing you closer to achieving your most important goals?

If not, then take a really careful look at why you are still doing it! Being truly productive does not involve just checking things off your list or always getting a lot done. It involves pinpointing and completing the specific tasks or projects that will get you where you really want to go. If you want to maximize your success and get the most bang for your buck time-wise, then make sure that you are not wasting time on useless busyness.

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Questions to Ask When Prioritizing

By Royale on April 22, 2010 in Personal Growth

Prioritizing is an essential function of being productive in business – your own or your employer’s – and in life. It is an ongoing process that should never be static, but evolving and adapting to your situation, current goals and resources at hand. The mind process and outcomes will vary from person to person, but there are some fundamental questions that need to be answered.

Questions to ask when prioritizing:

How important is this task/project to my business, my employer or my life?

Is this task urgent or important?

Will completing this save me time in the long run?

Does this task have a deadline? And what are the consequences if I fail to meet that deadline?

Does this task affect others? Is someone else waiting on my response or action?

Will completing this task move me closer to business or personal goals?

Do I have readily available the resources necessary for completion?

Will completing this task save me money? Or cost me money if I wait?

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Are Your Goals SMART?

By Royale on April 14, 2010 in Goals

Specific: Goals must be very clear, not sort of vague ideas. We often set goals that are so generic, it’s nearly impossible to measure progress or successful achievement. You need to know what has to be done or what specifically the desired end result will be.

BAD EXAMPLE:

I want to lose weight – Well who doesn’t? What does that mean?

GOOD EXAMPLE:

I want to lose 20 pounds by September 1^st. I will perform a half hour of cardio and half hour of strength training per day, 5 times a week.

Measurable: Goals need to be measurable. They should be well-defined, concrete goals and must be in qualitative or quantitative terms. If your goals are not measurable, you will never know whether you are making progress toward their successful completion. Choose some unit of measurement that will allow you to see exactly how far you have come and how far away from the completion of the goal you are.

BAD EXAMPLE:

I want to be rich.
I want to be successful.

GOOD EXAMPLE:

I want to gross 1 million dollars and have a team of 5 within 3 years.

Attainable: Goals need to be realistic and achievable. Time and again, success or failure depends on setting practical goals. The best goals require you to stretch a bit to achieve, but they aren’t out of reach. Don’t set yourself up for failure by setting goals that are too high. You should consider your skills and resources available to help you achieve your goal. Creating goals that are not attainable is very disheartening and will only serve to discourage you in life.

BAD EXAMPLE:

I want to become a millionaire in 3 months (don’t we all!)

GOOD EXAMPLE:

I want to make an extra $500 per month.
I want to increase my savings account by $10,000 in 3 years.

Relevant: Goals must be relevant to your purpose (or your company’s.) Relevant goals ensure that you are directing your effort towards goals that are focused on your mission statement, business objective or overall strategic long-term plan in life. The goal also has to be relevant or consistent with your responsibilities, knowledge, skill set, and access.

BAD EXAMPLE:

I want to network more – Why? What does that get you? How?

GOOD EXAMPLE:

I want to build a charitable foundation that helps feed the homeless.

Time Sensitive: Goals need to have a time frame, milestones and a deadline. Having a set amount of time will give your goals structure. It also helps you monitor your progress. Not having time constraints attached to your goal triggers procrastination. Without an end date there is no sense of urgency, no impetus to take any action today. Without this component we are tempted to put the goal off for a later time and never get around to it; or it simply gets overshadowed by the day to day grind.

BAD EXAMPLE:

I want to write a book.
I want to start my own business.

GOOD EXAMPLE:

I want to write a book on financial planning and submit it to publishers 1 year from today.
I want to have a retirement account with at least $500,000 within 5 years from this date.

By spending some time towards making sure that your goals fit the SMART criteria, you will make your success much more likely.

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The Covey Matrix Can Help You Manage Your Time More Effectively

By Royale on February 1, 2010 in Productivity, Time

Welcome to part 2 in my series on Organization Systems. To read part 1, click here.

While I may be a GTD fan at the moment, I have not completely abandoned the teachings of the guru of time management, Steven Covey. 7 Habits of Highly Successful People may be the most influential time management book ever written. so it is defintely a worthy addition to any productivity junkie’s arsenal.

Human nature means that we instinctively act on tasks that are ‘urgent’, whether these tasks are important or not. That’s OK for the tasks that are also important, but the other ones are not necessarily the best use of your time and effort.

The Covey Time Management matrix can also be used to explain why taking action on goals sometimes gets into trouble. Goals are typically derived from dreams and desires, which by their very nature are not ‘urgent’. Goals are however VERY important and their enabling actions need to be elevated in priority over tasks that are not really important.

So as a tool for helping you prioritize your action items, start by identifying which part of the matrix each task belongs in, and then manage them according to the Covey matrix: