The blog

The things we need to do are not only put on the to-do-list on our own ini­tia­tive. On the con­trary, we are often asked to do some­thing by others. 

It might be our boss who asks us to extract a cer­tain mate­r­i­al, it could be a client who asks for a quo­ta­tion, it can be all kinds of things. 

All too often we hur­ry and rush what is not actu­al­ly urgent. The con­se­quences are that we get stressed and work over­time with­out it real­ly being necessary.

Do you tend to guess? 

Ask your­self in all hon­esty, to what extent do you ask the per­son ask­ing you to do some­thing when he or she needs it? How often do you just make a guess and fin­ish it as soon as pos­si­ble just for the sake of it? 

To pri­or­i­tize accu­rate­ly, you need to be ful­ly aware of what is expect­ed of you. If you are just guess­ing, the prob­a­bil­i­ty that you make an incor­rect pri­or­i­ty and allow for more urgent and impor­tant mat­ters to be set aside for no good rea­son, increases. 

So, do not guess. If you are ambi­tious, you will prob­a­bly sup­ply the mate­r­i­al at an ear­li­er dead­line than what was need­ed or expected.

Do this

1. When­ev­er you are asked to do some­thing or get back to some­one with some­thing, ask ​“When do you need it?” 
2. If the per­son responds with ​“When can I have it?” or ​“As soon as pos­si­ble”, sug­gest a spe­cif­ic due date with­in a rea­son­able time-horizon. 
3. If you tend to over-achieve or if you are a time-opti­mist, add some extra time to the due date that first pops into your mind and which you intend­ed to suggest. 
4. Per­haps this will make you enter a ​“dead­line-nego­ti­a­tion” regard­ing when to deliv­er. Great, isn’t it! This means that you will agree on some­thing very con­crete and you will eas­i­ly be able to sched­ule the task in rela­tion to all the oth­er things wait­ing to be completed. 

And the effect is…

If you pose the ques­tion, it will be eas­i­er to do the right thing at the right time. And what can be more relax­ing than being sure of that?

How do you do it?

What´s your trick to spend­ing just enough time and ener­gy on a task?

Please leave a com­ment below.