3 STEPS TO GETTING THINGS DONE WITH LESS STRESS

Are you feeling overwhelmed about the sheer magnitude of everything that you have to do? Does your inbox keep growing no matter how much time you commit to clearing it? Are you working long hours, prioritizing work above most everything else and still feel like you’re only getting by?

You’re not alone. This is one of the most common issues I hear in coaching sessions. 

First, why are so many of us feeling like no matter how friggin' hard we work, we’re still only getting by?

With most of us working from home, the already blurred boundaries between work and life have become even murkier. We were already having a hard time keeping work at work. Now that we’re working where we live, and living where we work, it’s darn near impossible. My husband and I for example have 3 kids at home aged 6 to 12, and between filling the role of chef, tech support, teacher, nurse and parent, it’s no surprise that we feel like we’ve gotten little actual work done most days. 

To add to the madness, disruptions are rampant - excuse me… doorbell... delivery number 3 today... ok, I’m back… where did I leave off? The reality is that disruptions leave us feeling exhausted and don’t allow us to take meaningful action on important project. According to researchers at University of California, workers are interrupted ever 11 minutes, and only resume their interrupted tasks after 25 minutes. And that was before dang COVID hit! What we also know from neuroscience is that “the costliest things we can do in terms of energy expenditure are shift, focus, and sustain attention” (Psychology Today) Here’s the bottom line, interruptions are a huge drain on energy.  Add the fact that we’re all living in front of our screens these days, and we can easily understand why we’re so bloody exhausted!

Further to this, the sad reality is that many companies have reduced resources during these uncertain times. They have either decreased the number of employees or tightened up budgets without necessarily scaling back deliverables. This leaves those still employed to take on more at a time of heightened general stress, uncertainty and competing demands. 

There’s a lot more that could be said here around technology, on demand cultures and an incessant need for unproductive meetings and the next shiny object phenomenon, but we’ll leave it here for now and turn our attention towards what we can do to start improving things. 

Let’s start with what it means to be productive.

Did you know that despite working less hours and having more time off, Scandinavian countries are amongst the happiest and most productive in the world? The happiest makes sense, but what’s up with the productivity?

I have come to believe, that leaders confuse productivity with the number of hours we work, not literally because we’re all smart capable professionals …but at some level we think we need to work longer and harder to achieve, impress and hold onto our “success”. 

Not so. What we need is space. Space to think and reflect, to clarify and organize, to plan and review, evaluate and categorize. We need to create more space, not more time. 

Here’s why: what happens now is that there’s a bunch of things on our to do list (found in several locations – sometimes even on toilet paper – no judging…can you spare a square?), meetings in your calendar, notes on your phone, ideas popping into your head, unfinished tasks around the house, articles (such as this one) adding to your to do list, your friends’ social media posts sparking more “shoulds”, notifications grabbing your attention … it all adds up to a noisy, crammed head, filled with unfinished business, stress about everything we need to do and guilt about what we have not yet completed. We feel out of control.

Sounds productive? Nope. Sound familiar? Maybe.

The bottom line is that it’s not about managing time it’s about managing your focus and attention. The only way to feel good about what you’re doing, is by knowing what it is you’re not doing, and feeling ok about not doing it right now. This requires conscious review and organization of everything that has your attention.

Here’s how to start improving things.

3 simple steps from “Getting Things Done” by productivity expert David Allen

1.     Get it out of your mind and onto paper

“The consistent, unproductive preoccupation with all the things we have to do is the single largest consumer of time and energy.” -Kerry Gleeson

Our working memory is a limited resource. In fact, it can only hold 1 to 2 things at any given time. In general terms, our brain is good at analyzing data but it not great at holding data. This is why it’s so important to record things in a ‘trusted system’.

Start with a master list of everything that needs to get done - personal, professional and everything in between. If you need to make a decision about it, resolve it in any way or take any amount of action (no matter how small), WRITE IT DOWN. 

Simply writing it all down will give you some relief… or scare you… either way it’s better to have it laid out in front of you, than having your brain using precious energy trying to remember it. 

2.     Decide what comes next

“There is always more to do than you can do, and you can do only one thing at a time. The key is to feel as good about what you’re not doing as about what you are doing at that moment.” - David Allen

For each of the items on your master list, clarify what needs to happen next and what outcome is required for it to be complete. Questions to ask yourself as you review each item one by one.

Is this actionable?

What is the very next thing I need to do to move this forward?

Does that complete it?

If not, define the outcome that would complete it and add this item to your master project list.

Every item on your list gets dealt with or categorized. 

The idea here is to deal with everything that occupies your attention by writing it down and then deciding where to park it. Is there something you can do about it now, do you need to schedule it for later, trash it, delegate it, park it in one of your sub-categories (David Allen offers 8 category lists including: projects planning, project review, maybe someday, and waiting for ).

The system works as long as you write everything down, categorize it, act on it and review it, which brings us to step #3.

3.     Reflect weekly!

This strategy works only if we keep our lists up to date by adding to them as things come in and review them weekly.  Without the ongoing “capturing system” and weekly review, things get lost, you start to worry about what you’re missing and you’re back where you started, stressed and overwhelmed.

The fundamental mindset shift is this: The best way to be productive is not to cram more into your day, it’s to be so present with what you are doing in the moment that you get more done in less time.

I would love to hear from you. Feel free to send me an email directly, a DM or post in the comments section below with your thoughts.

Best,

Lisa

Lisa is an Executive Coach, Founder & CEO of LDR Leadership Labs. For more from Lisa, join the LDR Leadership Community on LinkedIn at: www.linkedin.com/company/ldrleadershiplabs and sign up for the LDR Insiders Newsletter here.