Lately I have been playing around with being more productive. Juggling many plates - like we all do - at times I have felt that sense of overwhelm that I am not getting enough done or that there is too much going on.
I tend to flit between running a marathon or spending the day in my pajamas - then feeling bad about that!! With some extra plates in the air - I was just starting to feel a little out of control.
As such I decided to focus on planning and organising myself better incorporating both my personal and work life into my planning. They have always been quite separate. Plan it out so that I can worry less. Plus get clearer on what I do and don't say 'Yes' to.
Working for myself - where sometimes worlds can collide I have been playing around with how I spend my time.
What are my rules for working?
When and how?
Plus how do I get the most out of my time?
I have been running my non negotiables for a while. ie These are the things that bring me joy.
- Tuesday afternoon horse riding with my coach.
- 4 visits/riding sessions to the horses.
- Watching my youngest play basketball. (I love watching him play - so fun.)
- Not working after 8pm. (unless I really have to).
- Only 1 - 2 after work events a week. (Otherwise I burn out).
- Having one full day off on the weekend. ie No work.
Now - I have always been a pretty good planner, I was a project manager, program manager and have run tech budgets up to $100 million. So I get it. Sometimes though it is just hard to run a team of 1!
As such I decided reach out to someone that I have been following on Linkedin for a while and get their help. They basically run a Quarterly plan for themselves that they have been sharing and this made a lot of sense to me coming from the tech world. This is a plan for the next 12 weeks then the next 12 weeks after that. (Something that tech teams that I have run - have done for a while).
Sometimes it is just good to have an outside persons point of view and brain storm with someone else. Sometimes when you have to explain yourself - you see things differently.
As such we had a session - doing a bit of a life audit, going through what I had on and working through what my 4 - 5 top priorities where. We focused developing these out into OKR;s - Objective, Key result.
Then we broke down each topic into the following areas - focusing first on one month. Then on what did I want to achieve in the next 3 months, then even breaking out further into the next 12 months.
PRIORITY INITIATIVES
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KEY RESULTS
Specific, Timebound, Measurable
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PROGRESS MEASURES
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ACTIONS
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IMPROVEMENTS
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I enjoyed the ability to not just focus on this week or this month but actually start to think longer term and plan it out.
But also it enabled me to priorities things as well and go ok - I don't need to focus on that this week - I have given myself to the end of Oct.
So this is a new way of working for me to reduce stress, track what I am doing and measure what I am achieving so I feel good about it!
I think running my own business plus having some family with health issues it has made me be a bit short term so it has been nice to plan out longer term!
Next week I will drill into the plans and the headings in a bit more detail xx
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