Delegate

Meeting Prep For Managers- How To Look Good At Meetings Even When Your Employees Sabotage You

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Preparation is the key to getting the most out of meetings and making yourself look good. I’m sure you runIMG_3590 through all of your deliverables and make sure you’re already. As a manager often times you’ll rely on your team to bring key items to a meeting outside your team. You’ll even check in with them to make sure they are “ready”. But that’s not enough.

The problem arises when a staff member misunderstands their assignment and then you’re at a meeting faced with a choice of defending/explaining your staff even though he is wrong or having your employee (and you by extension) look bad.

The best solution is not getting into that position. Schedule a premeeting to go over the deliverables. Be sure you schedule it so you have enough time to react to any issues that may come up. The premeeting can even help you because perhaps your staff may have gotten it right but you didn’t. Do this for simple tasks also. The meeting can (should) be short. You don’t need to go over every inch of the presentation (though if it’s being presented to clients/key personnel you should), just enough to make sure you’re all on the same page.

Creative Commons License photo credit: David Boyle in DC

Enjoy, Motivation, Time Management

How I Beat Procrastination Today and You Can Too

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I rarely procrastinate. My secret? Self discipline, the usual tricks plus I try to live by “do more of what you like and less of what you dont.” Let’s face it if you enjoy something you wont procrastinate on it. But there was one project that I just wouldn’t start. It was important and each day I’d find a bunch of other productive things to do but not this project. So I tried to figure out why I’m procrastinating. Is it because I don’t have time? That’s true but I never “have time” and accomplish plenty. Is it because I don’t enjoy it? No, because there are some parts of this project that I do enjoy. I couldn’t figure it out.

Then I had an epiphany- the project was just too big. I could start of course but there’s so many places to start from. You cant just do a project. Then I quickly spelled out each tasks. Some of which were fun others weren’t. Now I can just check off the items as I do it. There will be tasks I don’t enjoy as much but those are just individual tasks and I can reward my self with fun tasks after.

This isn’t a novel concept and is the basis behind Getting Things Done‘s Next Actions. Break down big projects into small actionable parts. Actionable means something you can do something about. For example, create web site isn’t a next action. You break it down into brainstorm site sections, design theme, design home page etc.

Next time you find yourself procrastinating ask yourself why.

I finally got started on my big project. Now you start on yours. Let me know why you were procrastinating and what you did to beat it.

Take Away: Find the reason you’re procrastinating and work around it.

Automate, Passion

My Mother-In-Law’s Productivity Secret

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Recently, my family went to my in-laws for for a few days to celebrate Passover as is our tradition each year. When it came time for cake she brought out sponge cake and home made brownie. This may not be significant to you, but it was to me and my wife. My wife looks forward to a specific brand of sponge cake that is only made for passover. No other sponge cake will do. Brownie is my favorite cake and the passover selections aren’t great. She bought the exact mix my sister (who always makes great cakes) recommended a year ago. It was not only thoughtful, it was delicious.

So what is my mother-in-law’s secret for getting us exactly what we want after a whole year? She set herself up for success. Last year (and every year) she wrote down all these specifics so she wouldn’t forget and put it with her passover recipes. This year as she sat down with her recipe books to plan what ingredients to buy she came across this list (I’m sure it has much more- she buys the kids their favorites too). At that point it was almost easy (especially if she wrote down the stores that sell it). She just added it to her shopping list and now has grateful kids (and grandkids).

Lesson: Make lists and keep it where you’ll use it

Some people go to hotels for passover but not me where could I get this kind of service!?!

Motivation, Passion, Reduce Stress

The Day I Got Fired For Being A Mets Fan and What We Can Learn

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It was a Wednesday like any other. I passed by my CFO’s office and we began discussing the Mets’ previous night’s victory.

The HR director walked in and interrupted our conversation. “I thought you were talking about work. Are you a Mets fan?” he asked.

After I confirmed it, he said “We like the Yankees around here. You’re fired”. He proceeded to turn to the CFO and have the same conversation.

Of course this conversation was all in jest. Now the three of us have something we can jibe each other about.

Wouldn’t it be great if other work disagreement could be discussed as candidly without each side getting defensive?

Next time you’re in an argument (or about to get in one) ask yourself “What’s the best way to resolve this?” Often you’ll find avoiding the whole issue or agreeing to disagree can save a lot of ill will and time.

In the meanwhile I’ll be plotting my revenge against the HR director.

Time Management

The Fundamentals Of Time Management

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I always try to break down every concept to it’s basics. It makes it easier to learn and excel at. I’ve been eagerly following Francis Wade and his 2Time system as it breaks down time management to 7 basic habits: Capturing, Emptying, Tossing, Storing, Acting Now, Scheduling & Listing. I think these are core concepts that you should read about (see below) but are there more? What about delegating/followup?

He wrote an interesting manifesto “The New Time Management: Focus on the Fundamentals and Toss Away the Tips” which goes through the 7 fundamentals. Time management is a key component to success and these fundamentals certainly help with time management- check out the manifesto.

What else makes up the fundamentals of Time Management?

Motivation, Principles, Think

How To Be A Winner and Thanks For Making Me One

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As I mentioned, I recently entered a contest at ChangeThis– whose mission is to “spread important ideas and change minds“. My proposal “Stop Bring Productive, Start Being Successful” was selected to be voted on. The person with the most votes for their proposal gets their manifesto (long article) published. I was against 9 others with big ideas. Fortunately, with your help (Thank You) I won! The manifesto is coming soon. Here’s some of my take aways.

Think Like a Winner

Put your concerns aside and do your best. Confidence and determination are key. Think of a plan how to get success and do it.

Put Yourself in Position To Win

“You miss 100 percent of the shots you never take.”

Wayne Gretzky

If I had been intimidated by the other good ideas I wouldn’t have entered. As the lotto says- “you gotta be in it to win it” (not that I’m advocating playing the lotto). Take whatever cliche you want, the point is if you aren’t trying, you definitely wont win.

Look For Inspiration

By blog buddy Francis Wade of 2Time had entered a previous contest and won.

Ask for Help

You can’t win on your own. I asked Francis for some pointers. I asked my readers to vote. I asked my online buddies to vote. You all came through. Thanks.

Principles

Three Sure Fire Ways To Avoid Fire Drills

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No ones likes the last minute rushing and headaches that comes with an urgent project. Seth Godin has an intriguing post Managing Urgencies. He concludes, “a career putting out fires never leads to the goal you had in mind all along”. This is exactly the reason to “Think” before you do. Here are three ways to avoid fire drills.

Focus on quality

1. Think in advance– Think about the right way to do it before you start any project.
2. Double check– Double check all your work before it goes out.

3. Audit– have an audit procedure to make sure you did it right.

Reign in expectations

1. Don’t over promise– Don’t commit the world if it’s not required. Know what you’re capable of. See what you have the time for and do your best.
2. Educate your customer– Let your customer, boss, spouse know how long tasks typically take so they can set their own proper expectations.

Control your time

1. Don’t overschedule– If you have too much going on you risk getting into a time crunch and startign a fire.
2. Don’t let others schedule for you– Don’t let others automatically schedule you. Sometimes it’s something they can do themselves- teach them how.

Make it your goal not to get in fire drills and you’ll be less stressed and more productive.

Passion, Principles

Don’t Drop The Ball and Other Life Lessons From Opening Day

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Opening days marks the beginning of a new baseball season. There’s something special about opening day. You’ll want to make everyday opening day.

Fresh start

In a new season everyone has a fresh start. The bad teams can show that they’re better. The bench players can show they’ve improved and the rookies can show they belong. Unfortunately real life doesn’t offer us the opportunities to start fresh without dramatic change (switch jobs). The answer is to do something different. Launch something new. Give people the opportunity to show something new. Look at an old situation in a new way. Start a new tradition like going out to lunch with a coworker.

Don’t Drop The Ball

In baseball one of the fundamentals is that you don’t drop the ball. Most of the time you don’t have to do anything remarkable, as long as you do what your supposed. Part of what made Cal Ripken Jr. special is he showed up every day- ready to play. That’s 2,632 straight games without sitting. Today too many people are trying to do too much and don’t get the fundementals done. Keep track of your outstanding tasks and get them done and you’ll be ahead of most people.

Practice, Practice, Practice There’s an old joke of a man lost in New York City he asks a women “How do I get to Carnegie Hall?”. The reply was “Practice, practice, practice”. In order to do anything well we must practice, practice, practice. Players who have been playing baseball for their whole lives spend six weeks practicing before the season start. Then they practice all season. In the real world we need to constantly learn, to refine our skills. This may

Make this your opening day. Give yourself a fresh start to improve. Give your coworkers, subordinates, family member and friends a chance to surprise you. Forget the bad from the past. Even my favorite team can put the memory of a historic collapse behind them and start a new.

GTD

David Allen on GTD’s low adoptation rate and GTD 2.0

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I found a dated podcast of David Allen, the author of Getting Things Done (GTD), with Merlin Mann of 43folders.com. I highly recommend the book, it’s a cornerstone to being productive. In the podcast, Allen admits that there’s a very low adoptation rate of people who start with GTD and end up using it. They include:

Not easy to get started- Try to put yourself in an environment where the GTD language is spoken.

Getting more dimensions– Keep learning. Keep rereading. One answer he gives is GTD connect.
High level issues (20,000 & 30,000 & 40,000- feet)- if you don’t address your high level goals “your system will become flat”.

You’ll notice  these are exactly the issues that I discussed earlier with Don’t Get Things Done. I’ll keep bring more solutions to these and other problems with GTD.