Strategies for the New Year: Get more out of your career and life
Starting a New Year with high expectations and no strategy can lead to disappointment. If you’re ready to get more of what you want out of your career and life this year, take control. It’s time to be accountable for your actions and create new habits. The following simple tips will help you get started.
Write down everything. Have you been frustrated by things slipping through the cracks? The remedy is to stop trying to remember everything or hoping what you need to do gets done before it’s too late. Everything is not equal. Take all your “to-do’s” out of your head and list them. When everything you need to do is in front of you, you’re better able to prioritize. The next step is to to plan out all tasks. Consider any action that takes time. This approach works for personal and professional activities. But your “to-do” list without a commitment won’t help you execute. So the third step is to put everything into your calendar.
Use your calendar for home and work. Your calendar is an essential tool to use for more than planning your work or a vacation. Adding ALL your known commitments will give a realistic view available time. Once confirmed dates are blocked, you can plug in all the remaining tasks around them. Calendar the time required to research and prepare for interviews or other meetings/presentations. Include time for follow up. Set timelines for all milestones you’re not facing an incomplete project or missed deadline.
Scheduling is … far more important than having good intentions.
Look out, not down. Stop getting caught up with unimportant tasks just because they’re easier. Instead, push less critical projects to specific future dates. This change allows you time to get to more important or pressing issues without letting anything slip through the cracks. Not everything is an emergency, although leaving things to the last minute can create one where none existed. Scheduling is a critical piece of planning and is far more important than having good intentions.
Be realistic. Everyone has 24 hours in the day. Pretending there will be time “later” is only a form of procrastination that prevents optimal outcomes. Look carefully at your commitments and make adjustments before things go south. Reprioritize and reschedule every day. Planning out projects (again, personal and professional) and examining every step allows you to block the right amount of time. Coming in ahead of schedule or getting a running start on a project frees up more fun time later. Don’t wait until everything snowballs at the end of the week.
Make time for what is important to you. Plan around standing commitments like work or school. Schedule time for the activities that are most important to you. Don’t expect free time to miraculously appear for that ski trip or your business plan revision. Schedule the time and stick to it.
Get out of your own way. Stop blaming everybody else for not getting things done. Problem-solve. Delegate. Rethink your processes. Say no. Say yes to the right things. Get more out of what you want for your career and life. Stop procrastinating and take action!
For more career advice, check out my webinars on Goal Setting – Getting Focused, Making the Most of the Next 3 Years and follow me on LinkedIn and Twitter.
