When I face a problem, I always start digging for the root problem - and - for the reason behind the whole problem branch I went down while searching for the root problem.
Well, this is nothing special and nothing new, pretty every psychologist does that with his/her patients.
What I understand now is: Searching for the reason of a problem is only relevant when the reason is still "alive" - if the source producing the problem is still "leaking".
Here is an example:
If you discover that you have a particular mindset that blocks you from being successful (such as "I am not strong enough, to do this or that" or "I am not intelligent enough for finishing university", ...), you might start digging how the hack you got to this prejudice or convintion.
The first question should be: Is this something old or is this mindset something that still gets fed by continuing (daily) experience?
After you got aware of a blocking mindset, you are already winning. If it is a relict of old times (maybe if you got punched by a stronger highschool peer or whatever) then you can be more efficient by not digging too much into the reasons. The reason is not that relevant any more if the reason has "fallen out" of your life already).
Showing posts with label Perfectionism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Perfectionism. Show all posts
2012-11-08
2012-07-17
Controversal opinion on the 80-20-Rule
Some people tag me being a perfectionist. Reflecting this, I can see three reasons why perfectionism may make pretty good sense - and those three reasons sometimes make me go further than stopping at 80 % (see e. g. earlier post "When to give up"):
Related posts: When to give up, Information Overflow, Principles over Rules.
- The 20 % you are leaving out, ignoring or simply not further investigating are often causing 80 % of the troubles you are experiencing later.
The pareto principle (80-20-rule) is being applied to current status quo without doing risk analysis of the future and here is where this time management tool lacks. I have experienced so many times and spent so much time fighting with big problems caused by tiny flaws in algorithms, strategies or project plans that I learned to think twice before stopping a thing at 80 %.
- Nowadays many products or services are delivered at a quality level according to "good enough" standards.
Businesses survive today by offering the same product at better price or offering a better quality. If you cannot deliver at best price you must offer better quality. This means to go further than "just being good enough".
- Not to give up often is the key for outstanding results.
In my work following the 80-20 rules often is applied by following a different path. Mostly, first you try something in a way that would be the most effective, most performant and most elegant way. Then you face troubles, start workarounds and finally choose another way of implementing the desired working result - which of course - then lacks usability or performance. Looking around then you find yourself with results that others may deliver at same or lower price or work. My experience has been that in many cases I did not give up in getting the most elegant solution to work. That often payed off in the long-run only, but with the additional good feeling, that I did it right.
Related posts: When to give up, Information Overflow, Principles over Rules.
2009-02-13
Slowing down
It was for many years that I got into full-speed action immediately when I saw the need to take action or when somebody needed help or when somebody had a great idea and I wanted to support it.
When the first signs from health and frustrations about stress came up, I noticed that somehow there must be an end of this madness. There was the feeling deep inside that I should slow down. I changed some style of work, for instance:
As I wrote in my previous post "How to instantly change a habit", sometimes all you need is the one kick-a** reason to change. And I found even multiple such reasons now to slow down.
You can work wonders and cause miracles by speeding up to 200%, running full optimizations to your own mental and physical machine, but (please relax and read slowly):
Related posts: How to instantly change a habit, Reduce the stress factors, Dynamic activity, In the present moment, How to be happy, Change hype, How to eat less, Urging to forge at full speed, Total cost of commitment, Know better and act on it, Razor sharp focus, Speed.
When the first signs from health and frustrations about stress came up, I noticed that somehow there must be an end of this madness. There was the feeling deep inside that I should slow down. I changed some style of work, for instance:
- Better planning (Schedule everything to be done).
- Be well prepared instead of working on current pressure.
- Don't act immediately on a new issue or idea - instead take time to analyze, research and find an optimum solution.
- More efficient multitasking.
- ...
As I wrote in my previous post "How to instantly change a habit", sometimes all you need is the one kick-a** reason to change. And I found even multiple such reasons now to slow down.
You can work wonders and cause miracles by speeding up to 200%, running full optimizations to your own mental and physical machine, but (please relax and read slowly):
- You will be exhausted after a shorter or longer while working on full throttle - and then you are done: Health problems (back, heart, ...), frustration, mistakes and so on trigger a vicious circle. You will not be able any more to feel inner happiness.
- At the end nobody will show compassion with you having done so much, instead everybody says that if you are on stress, it is your own fault (and somehow this is true)!
- It will be impossible for you to get important deep and detailed impressions of the present moment. It causes misinterpretation and wrong judgment of the current situation!
- It is much more important to take the right action than doing anything quickly. Taking action to fast, you can screw up things completely. So take yourself enough time to evaluate a situation and decide!
- Stress shortens your life! So you do not win anything being on speed.
Related posts: How to instantly change a habit, Reduce the stress factors, Dynamic activity, In the present moment, How to be happy, Change hype, How to eat less, Urging to forge at full speed, Total cost of commitment, Know better and act on it, Razor sharp focus, Speed.
2009-01-21
Crying for attention
After reading some articles on the net the first days this year I gave up the hope for the rest of the year that quality of news and articles get any better. The first days of the year began worse than ever with subject lines trying to get my attention and while reading the appropriate article I left the site disappointed and full of anger because the headlines where near completely exaggerated if not wrong (in the way that it either didn't match the article's content). I lost a lot of time reading completely unnecessary stuff....
The problem: Everything and everyone is trying to get your attention.
Companies, products, problems, groups, persons, ... - everything is crying for attention. Look here, look there, you must read, watch or have this and that.
The reason: You are a potential customer and you should be motivated to buy and consume products, services and information.
We are often annoyed by advertisments or by the behaviour of salesman when they are trying to catch our attention and get us as customers and often we see a company or a system as the annoying element. But there are people behind trying to earn money. It is the same as in a room where a group of people talk. The noise gets louder and louder because everybody needs to increase the volume to get heard. The advertising "volume" and amount increases with the time. But why can't we simply ignore all that stuff? - Because "Knowledge is Power"! Knowing the important things pushes you in a better situation in general. You have more control, save and earn more money, be happier - in general you be more successful having more of the important knowledge. This is the reason why we don't reduce information intake drastically. And the problem is that what shouts loudest is not always the most important.
The solution: Improve your ability to focus and the ability to ignore what does not matter.
Easy said, hard work to be implemented - and I can only give you some considerations that hopefully help you sorting the things out. So think of the following before starting your information intake:
Before you start consuming:
Related posts: The mismatch problem, Spam thoughts, Who cares?, Information overflow, In the present moment, Get focused with 3 questions, Total cost of commitment.
The problem: Everything and everyone is trying to get your attention.
Companies, products, problems, groups, persons, ... - everything is crying for attention. Look here, look there, you must read, watch or have this and that.
The reason: You are a potential customer and you should be motivated to buy and consume products, services and information.
We are often annoyed by advertisments or by the behaviour of salesman when they are trying to catch our attention and get us as customers and often we see a company or a system as the annoying element. But there are people behind trying to earn money. It is the same as in a room where a group of people talk. The noise gets louder and louder because everybody needs to increase the volume to get heard. The advertising "volume" and amount increases with the time. But why can't we simply ignore all that stuff? - Because "Knowledge is Power"! Knowing the important things pushes you in a better situation in general. You have more control, save and earn more money, be happier - in general you be more successful having more of the important knowledge. This is the reason why we don't reduce information intake drastically. And the problem is that what shouts loudest is not always the most important.
The solution: Improve your ability to focus and the ability to ignore what does not matter.
Easy said, hard work to be implemented - and I can only give you some considerations that hopefully help you sorting the things out. So think of the following before starting your information intake:
- Is this really new to me?
Often we read something that we already have considered to be this way. Reading what we ever thought to be this way is confirmation of our considerations and we love that. So ask yourself if you really need so much confirmation from outside about your own opinions or considerations. - Can this have the potential to change my life?
Think whether this book, article, advertisement has really the potential to change your life. Ask yourself consciously: Is it very probable that this information changes my life? - Who could be behind pushing that information and what could be his intention?
The same information can be provided in very different words and manners. It usually depends on the author and his intentions how information is prepared and manipulated. So the question about the author and his intention can be of relevance for the reliability/quality and the importance of the information. - Watch your needs and then the market.
Often information is brought to you to make you consume something you might not have known that you needed it. Don't watch products and find their importance for you, instead you should do it the other way round: Focus on your needs and search for solutions/products/services that could help you achieving your goals or improving your life quality. - Information can be wrong!
Don't rely too much on information in general. Just because some economy analyst is saying that economy is bad should not cause you to get in panic about loosing your job. Such an information can already be wrong because the parameters used for measuring economy could be theoretically a good indicator but mismatching practical experiences in the real world (See "The mismatch problem"). Especially information about the future should also be considered as "nice thoughts" only. And there are either authors knowingly producing wrong information to misslead you. - You are always missing information.
When searching for information (e.g. while comparing different products or services or when you worry about current politics or economic changes in progress) you should give up the desire to know everything. There is always some doubt remaining. This should not mean that you shouldn't search and read information. But after you collected a certain amount of knowledge about the issue, consider to stop when it doesn't make more sense getting more information. - Rely on "common sense".
Often relying on your intuition and common sense leads to a good decision without the need of reading a bulk of information. So the cost performance ratio is often much better if you just rely on common sense. So before you go to research for making a decision think if research is really convenient. - Ignore articles with crazy titles.
My experience is that those articles with the most crazy title do have the most unnecessary content. Maybe because without the crazy title nobody would read it. I am glad that those authors help me identifying unnecessary information by giving crazy titles. Here an example from today's science news (freely translated): "Mistaking apes are humanly" or another from an english IT news channel: "Buddha Machine Wall Plays Relaxing Ambient-Loops".
Before you start consuming:
- Search for hidden costs.
When you read or hear about special offers then keep in mind that there are usually some hidden costs that are not mentioned in the advertisements. Advertisements usually exaggerate the efficiency as well as the economical factor of the product or service. And sometimes they are very hard on the limit to be a straight lie. - Consider the total cost of ownership (TOC) of the product or service.
Even free services can produce costs - not necessarily "just" money. Even if you consume free services maybe on the internet there is some maintenance effort coming along (regular password changes, dealing with several notification mails, keeping profile data up-to-date and so on). - Will this make me more happy than just hanging around relaxing?
Has this product or service really have the potential to make me more happy instead of just doing nothing? Doing nothing and just relax and enjoy the present moment can make very satisfied and happy. Don't underestimate this (see "In the present moment"). - What other activities are dropped when consuming this product or service?
Consuming itself consumes time - time that can't be created from nothing. Instead your time and attention is moved from something else to the new point of interest. Choose consciously what to drop and if. Maybe buying and playing the new computer game drags your attention away from your family. Consider carefully if you really want that.
Related posts: The mismatch problem, Spam thoughts, Who cares?, Information overflow, In the present moment, Get focused with 3 questions, Total cost of commitment.
2009-01-16
When to criticize
A number one tip for positivity that helped me already a lot during the first days of the new year:
Don't criticize when you don't have a solution at hand!
This means that you either should not come up with critics when you would know a solution but don't know a person who has time and the know-how to implement the solution! When you don't have a solution that can be implemented NOW, then probably things are currently in that awful state because no better solution available yet. Just search for a solution and solve the problem yourself or be patient and accept that the world is not perfect!
Further, you should keep in mind to never criticize a person as a whole - just criticize a specific behavior or a particular strategy!
Related posts: An eye for an eye, Spam critics, Positivity barricades, Success with optimism AND pessimism, There are no problems, How to be happy, The power of intention.
Don't criticize when you don't have a solution at hand!
This means that you either should not come up with critics when you would know a solution but don't know a person who has time and the know-how to implement the solution! When you don't have a solution that can be implemented NOW, then probably things are currently in that awful state because no better solution available yet. Just search for a solution and solve the problem yourself or be patient and accept that the world is not perfect!
Further, you should keep in mind to never criticize a person as a whole - just criticize a specific behavior or a particular strategy!
Related posts: An eye for an eye, Spam critics, Positivity barricades, Success with optimism AND pessimism, There are no problems, How to be happy, The power of intention.
2008-12-04
One-Way Ticket
While moving through your life you face several opportunities and in every situation you have a lot of choices. Often you want to leave choices open as long as possible.
Comparing a situation with a room you may see many open doors but you don't know what will happen when you go through. Those doors may be labeled and colored in a very attracting way and you feel hard to choose.
What then happens often is that you want to just do a few steps through at least the most attracting doors, lurking at what is in there (for you). You want to keep the opportunity to take another door. When you look back in the room you were in, you want the other doors to be kept open.
But the truth is, that the doors are not static, they do open and close dynamically. Depending on the situations doors may open and close slower or faster. I do think for instance for business strategies doors are opening and closing in weekly or monthly rhythms while during an emergency in the hospital it might be seconds. So you are not in static rooms, you are on a dynamic journey hoping on and off trains or planes.
Once you decided hoping on a train it does not make sense to jump off in the wildness between two stations. And you cannot expect that returning to the last station you will find the same opportunities you faced before.
And you cannot tell what would have happened if you would have taken another door or train because situations change and you may never face the same set of opportunities again. On the other hand when you move on you might arrive at points where you also would have arrived taking other paths. However, you never can really be sure how it would have been taking other routes.
What to learn is:
Comparing a situation with a room you may see many open doors but you don't know what will happen when you go through. Those doors may be labeled and colored in a very attracting way and you feel hard to choose.
What then happens often is that you want to just do a few steps through at least the most attracting doors, lurking at what is in there (for you). You want to keep the opportunity to take another door. When you look back in the room you were in, you want the other doors to be kept open.
But the truth is, that the doors are not static, they do open and close dynamically. Depending on the situations doors may open and close slower or faster. I do think for instance for business strategies doors are opening and closing in weekly or monthly rhythms while during an emergency in the hospital it might be seconds. So you are not in static rooms, you are on a dynamic journey hoping on and off trains or planes.
Once you decided hoping on a train it does not make sense to jump off in the wildness between two stations. And you cannot expect that returning to the last station you will find the same opportunities you faced before.
And you cannot tell what would have happened if you would have taken another door or train because situations change and you may never face the same set of opportunities again. On the other hand when you move on you might arrive at points where you also would have arrived taking other paths. However, you never can really be sure how it would have been taking other routes.
What to learn is:
- Evaluate the opportunities (have a look which doors are open) and take yourself the appropriate time (depending on the speed the doors are opening and closing).
- Take a decision
- Don't waste time in trying to figure out if it wouldn't have been better taking another door/train/route because you cannot reproduce older situations.
Choo choo trainRelated posts: Decision planning, Direction over goals, 2 major mistakes, Getting older.
Tuckin' down the track
Gotta travel on it
Never comin' back
...
2008-09-16
Stop the service
The problem: People loading you with work.
Many like to be important and many do hard work at lower levels. For both the opportunity of being a manager is sugar on their ego. Those who usually do hard work at lower levels are often argued if something is not done (fast enough). They like it if they can play the other role once a time.
What I am talking about here is not (necessarily) boss related. There are a lot of other people also trying to load you with work who are on equal level as you are.
And the worst what than can happen: They complain that you are not performing enough.
Such situations usually cause anger and litigation with collegues, family members (yes even your wife/husband or even children can load you with a lot of work).
The reason: They got used to your assistance, your helping hand, your support.
People find out quickly from whom they can get easy help to solve their issues. Those who have a helper syndrome are easily found by those who are looking for patronage. And people like it to be helpful and to achieve a lot of goals. But this can exhaust your power.
The solution: Stop the service.
I do not mean that you should refuse any support completely. But from time to time it is important to set or raise the limits - for you and also for the others. This is different from learning how to say "No" because the problem I am talking about is usually addressing something you already accepted somehow earlier and you get utilized. Maybe you accepted to give a little help and slowly the issue grows up. So you are already in the middle of something.
If you just stop when a thing grows too big and you feel to get utilized then others get the opportunity to notice their exaggerated request for your support.
When to temporary refuse: When family members or important colleagues are asking too much in too few time then usually a temporary refuse is the appropriate action. Retreat for a while and use the time for relaxing, personal development or for your hobby. Depending on how penetrating people are demanding your services the longer you should refuse.
When to completely refuse: Some people might simply got used to the fact that you are a friendly person always trying to help. If they do not play an important role in your life and you are not expecting a big change in this then it is better to stop completely supporting them if they get too cumbersome and annoying.
It is always better to simply stop the service than quarreling and arguing about your occupation and engagement!
Related post: Setting borderlines, Stake your claim, How to rebuff somebody, Scoundrel days, Productivity limits, The family.
Many like to be important and many do hard work at lower levels. For both the opportunity of being a manager is sugar on their ego. Those who usually do hard work at lower levels are often argued if something is not done (fast enough). They like it if they can play the other role once a time.
What I am talking about here is not (necessarily) boss related. There are a lot of other people also trying to load you with work who are on equal level as you are.
And the worst what than can happen: They complain that you are not performing enough.
Such situations usually cause anger and litigation with collegues, family members (yes even your wife/husband or even children can load you with a lot of work).
The reason: They got used to your assistance, your helping hand, your support.
People find out quickly from whom they can get easy help to solve their issues. Those who have a helper syndrome are easily found by those who are looking for patronage. And people like it to be helpful and to achieve a lot of goals. But this can exhaust your power.
The solution: Stop the service.
I do not mean that you should refuse any support completely. But from time to time it is important to set or raise the limits - for you and also for the others. This is different from learning how to say "No" because the problem I am talking about is usually addressing something you already accepted somehow earlier and you get utilized. Maybe you accepted to give a little help and slowly the issue grows up. So you are already in the middle of something.
If you just stop when a thing grows too big and you feel to get utilized then others get the opportunity to notice their exaggerated request for your support.
When to temporary refuse: When family members or important colleagues are asking too much in too few time then usually a temporary refuse is the appropriate action. Retreat for a while and use the time for relaxing, personal development or for your hobby. Depending on how penetrating people are demanding your services the longer you should refuse.
When to completely refuse: Some people might simply got used to the fact that you are a friendly person always trying to help. If they do not play an important role in your life and you are not expecting a big change in this then it is better to stop completely supporting them if they get too cumbersome and annoying.
It is always better to simply stop the service than quarreling and arguing about your occupation and engagement!
Related post: Setting borderlines, Stake your claim, How to rebuff somebody, Scoundrel days, Productivity limits, The family.
2008-09-08
Hunting for degrees
Lately I was decluttering one of my drawers when I faced some older certificate of a course I attended. I can see that nowadays you get those everywhere. You get them already for attending presentation sessions where you don't have to accomplish a single exam.
But sometimes when I look into the newspaper on the job advertisements I can see that some new kind of degree is often requested. Even here in Austria they have some good sounding new titles - "new", because they haven't been there when I was passing by (from about 1992 to 1996). They sound good but I do not have an idea for what they stand for.
From time to time in our company we are searching for some new IT professional. And it happened already sometimes that we hired some Microsoft Certified Professional. But often it turns out that these people do have their knowledge only from those courses made especially for getting through the certification exams and this often has only a few in common with the knowledge you need for real world projects.
And the mania does not stop there. There are people "collecting" degrees and certifications and they decorate their rooms with those! For some of them getting a specialist in something and get up working moved completely out of view.
I do think that their are some kind of degrees which do mean that you are facing a person that is well prepared for specific real world scenarios. But the way how is dealt sometimes with those degrees and certificates is often exaggerated.
While hunting for degrees people often forget that the two important factors are:
A lot of courses are a time waste and you should carefully choose which degrees you want to achieve. If they don't present content that matters, than don't waste your time there!
Have the focus on gaining knowledge that improves speed or quality of what is your job or what you want to do. Improve those parts where you can gain money from.
Even if everything is labeled with very cool names, basically the same jobs have to be done as earlier. But unfortunately the main goal to transfer as much knowledge as possible is often not the first priority. There are either certificates you can buy (maybe sometimes the answers to the test questions and sometimes maybe the complete certificate.
So watch out to accumulate knowledge that is relevant for your job or daily life and gain experience working with it. In reality there is no substitute for this process.
Related posts: Who cares?, 101 posts or how to improve step by step, Knowledge is freedom.
But sometimes when I look into the newspaper on the job advertisements I can see that some new kind of degree is often requested. Even here in Austria they have some good sounding new titles - "new", because they haven't been there when I was passing by (from about 1992 to 1996). They sound good but I do not have an idea for what they stand for.
From time to time in our company we are searching for some new IT professional. And it happened already sometimes that we hired some Microsoft Certified Professional. But often it turns out that these people do have their knowledge only from those courses made especially for getting through the certification exams and this often has only a few in common with the knowledge you need for real world projects.
And the mania does not stop there. There are people "collecting" degrees and certifications and they decorate their rooms with those! For some of them getting a specialist in something and get up working moved completely out of view.
I do think that their are some kind of degrees which do mean that you are facing a person that is well prepared for specific real world scenarios. But the way how is dealt sometimes with those degrees and certificates is often exaggerated.
While hunting for degrees people often forget that the two important factors are:
- Knowledge and
- Experience
A lot of courses are a time waste and you should carefully choose which degrees you want to achieve. If they don't present content that matters, than don't waste your time there!
Have the focus on gaining knowledge that improves speed or quality of what is your job or what you want to do. Improve those parts where you can gain money from.
Even if everything is labeled with very cool names, basically the same jobs have to be done as earlier. But unfortunately the main goal to transfer as much knowledge as possible is often not the first priority. There are either certificates you can buy (maybe sometimes the answers to the test questions and sometimes maybe the complete certificate.
So watch out to accumulate knowledge that is relevant for your job or daily life and gain experience working with it. In reality there is no substitute for this process.
Related posts: Who cares?, 101 posts or how to improve step by step, Knowledge is freedom.
2008-08-27
Spam thoughts
The problem: There is not only spam information - there are also spam thoughts.
Spam is reducing our productivity and happiness. But there is not only spam mail and spam information - there are also spam thoughts.
The reason: We want to note everything down because our brain tends to forget.
We want to improve and learn from our experiences. Going to work in the morning offers a lot of impressions that triggers thoughts as every impression (as well as information) contains potential issues to learn. GTD tells us to write down everything - although there are also some critics on this.
The solution: Trust your brain and let go.
While on the go or while working on something else there are thoughts coming only loosely related to the topic of your focus. If it is important it will return, come back in the same or similar way on other opportunities. If the same thought returns more often then it is worth more being noted down and reviewed. Don't act immediately on a single thought or let a single thought be the reason for (big) decisions.
Related posts: Information overflow, Who cares?, All Done status, Crying for attention, Analysis and therapy.
Spam is reducing our productivity and happiness. But there is not only spam mail and spam information - there are also spam thoughts.
The reason: We want to note everything down because our brain tends to forget.
We want to improve and learn from our experiences. Going to work in the morning offers a lot of impressions that triggers thoughts as every impression (as well as information) contains potential issues to learn. GTD tells us to write down everything - although there are also some critics on this.
The solution: Trust your brain and let go.
While on the go or while working on something else there are thoughts coming only loosely related to the topic of your focus. If it is important it will return, come back in the same or similar way on other opportunities. If the same thought returns more often then it is worth more being noted down and reviewed. Don't act immediately on a single thought or let a single thought be the reason for (big) decisions.
Related posts: Information overflow, Who cares?, All Done status, Crying for attention, Analysis and therapy.
2008-07-08
Safety distance
There is a lot you can learn by trial and error. But there are some actions and either whole jobs where errors can have fatal impacts:
In such cases it is important to have a "safety distance" from the dangerous and critical point. I mean here with safety distance every behavior and security tool that helps reducing the probability of fatal incidents. Imagine you are standing on a high rock and look down. You will probably not step to the very front line. So I think of staying away from the most dangerous situations.
When working on large projects it can also be important to avoid situations and solutions that can go easily wrong as for instance think of worst case scenarios and try to avoid them already in advance by choosing different solutions or at least identify early indicators. And for programming it means to do more error checking in your code, use checksums on data transfers and so on.
You are not immediately a perfectionist if you simply keep the "safety distance" to reduce the probability of fatal impacts. Perfectionism starts when keeping the safety distance to non-critical situations.
- Changing a baby (you have to pay attention that it does not fall from the changing table)
- Driving a car
- Doctor at operation
- ... and many, many more
In such cases it is important to have a "safety distance" from the dangerous and critical point. I mean here with safety distance every behavior and security tool that helps reducing the probability of fatal incidents. Imagine you are standing on a high rock and look down. You will probably not step to the very front line. So I think of staying away from the most dangerous situations.
When working on large projects it can also be important to avoid situations and solutions that can go easily wrong as for instance think of worst case scenarios and try to avoid them already in advance by choosing different solutions or at least identify early indicators. And for programming it means to do more error checking in your code, use checksums on data transfers and so on.
You are not immediately a perfectionist if you simply keep the "safety distance" to reduce the probability of fatal impacts. Perfectionism starts when keeping the safety distance to non-critical situations.
2008-06-11
Why not multitasking how to
The problem: You know it is better to avoid multi-tasking for better productivity but your environment seems to make it impossible.
Many life hackers strongly recommend not to multi-task, but in most cases it seems simply impossible as reality does not really allow single-tasking in a lot of cases, e.g.:
The reason: There is not a single reason and hence no single answer to this problem. You have to distinguish different cases. - Different problem requires different handling.
There are several different types of interrupts - basically I see 5 classes of events that causes need for multi-tasking (starting with the easiest to avoid):
The solution: Reduce interruptions from different sources by using different strategies, accept multi-tasking where it cannot be avoided and see the positive side of multi-tasking. What you can also reduce is the effect it has on you.
Where is the positive side of multitasking? - As I mentioned in the previous post "Decision planning", before taking a decision you should have some days doing a pause not thinking of the issue. Multi-tasking is an opportunity to pause one task (where you maybe have a problem not finding a good solution now) waiting for a good idea or coming back freshly powered.
According to the 5 classes of interrupts I mentioned above here are the different solution proposals:
Depending on your actual job there is some percentage of time lost dealing with unavoidable interrupts. Depending on that percentage you should leave appropriate gaps in your calendar. So an interrupt is still annoying but it does not bring you in trouble finishing your work in time.
When you reduced the number of interrupts and their effect you can focus on those tasks that really need to be done. Many tasks are too big to solve them in one piece and so they have to be split. Analyze them, cut them into smaller pieces and schedule appropriate time frames in your calender - for instance - every Friday is day to work on the new company's website.
When you get interrupted see the benefit of getting in distance to the current problem you are struggling with having the opportunity to get back to the overview again probably finding a better solution to your detail problem as mentioned at the beginning of this post.
Related posts: Decision planning, GTD - E-Mail-Folders and Tags, LTO - Letting things open, When to strictly avoid multitasking, Razor sharp focus, Cost of substitution.
Many life hackers strongly recommend not to multi-task, but in most cases it seems simply impossible as reality does not really allow single-tasking in a lot of cases, e.g.:
- If I do not take the phone I have to call back later. Maybe then I do not find the other person available and until I get in touch a lot more time passes and the cost of the phone call either goes on my company. So it is simply better to accept the phone interruption.
- In a lot of offices there are more people sitting in one room - in my case the room neither has a door so anybody else easily can come in. Hence disturbing events cannot be avoided. And I either cannot place a traffic light on my desk. Naturally my boss expects me to be available for him - since he is paying me :-). I either cannot leave office as I am expected to be available - we are not so many people that for everybody there is a substitution.
- Even if I manage to stay on one project for a day, project priorities often change very fasten. I am told to learn APIs from product A and then suddenly gets obsolete and I should focus on product or project B. And every day a customer may call with some very urgent issue.
The reason: There is not a single reason and hence no single answer to this problem. You have to distinguish different cases. - Different problem requires different handling.
There are several different types of interrupts - basically I see 5 classes of events that causes need for multi-tasking (starting with the easiest to avoid):
- Self triggered/created distractions.
Actions like reading new mail instantly as they arrive, reading news and RSS feeds and so on. Usually you can find out that you switch to such tasks more easy if you should work on some difficult other thing that you really hate to do. You accept - no - you welcome this kind of interrupts usually because
a) you are (or should be) working on a difficult or nasty task producing inner resistance and opposition or
b) you have priorities and interests that do not match with your current job (duties) and/or the priorities set by your boss. - Interrupts created by your family and friends.
Ever experienced your wife or mom calling you continuously in the office asking you when exactly you will come home or what else to buy on the way home? - Interrupts created by colleagues.
Some co-workers do often interrupt by asking questions, asking for help or wanting to tell you some nice story. - Interrupts created by customers.
All kind of customer or suppliers, partners and other kind of people. Customers usually have to be treated very well so they are some kind of boss for you. - Interrupts created by the boss.
When the boss comes in and asks you things to do now then they usually cause immediately a change of priorities and you have to change task immediately. Your boss is paying you doing your duty - and part of this duty is being available for the boss any time (at least during the working hours ;-) ).
The solution: Reduce interruptions from different sources by using different strategies, accept multi-tasking where it cannot be avoided and see the positive side of multi-tasking. What you can also reduce is the effect it has on you.
Where is the positive side of multitasking? - As I mentioned in the previous post "Decision planning", before taking a decision you should have some days doing a pause not thinking of the issue. Multi-tasking is an opportunity to pause one task (where you maybe have a problem not finding a good solution now) waiting for a good idea or coming back freshly powered.
According to the 5 classes of interrupts I mentioned above here are the different solution proposals:
- Self triggered/created distractions:
- Re-sync your priorities and interests with the ones of your boss and/or the company (have a talk with your boss about the company goals) or
- Change your job. Changing your job does not necessarily mean you have to change company. Nowadays in larger companies there are also possibilities to change the field of work also by staying within the company and just change department or products to deal with.
- When both seems impossible, try to learn something from your daily duty that improves the skills that you want to improve (according to your personal priorities).
- Interrupts created by your family and friends:
- Your family and friends can be briefed not to call you in the office or not to chat you.
- Regarding chat one possibility can be that you simply set yourself into do-not-disturb-mode.
- Inform your family and friends that if you need to pay additional attention to your family and friends while in the office then you will come home later then.
- Interrupts created by colleagues:
Regarding co-workers it depends if you are in a team working effectively together or not.- If it is a colleague you are working with in a team then you can schedule time frames in your calendar where your full attention is dedicated to the open issues - which is a benefit for both of you: The co-worker gets your full attention and you do not get interrupted again with one question after the other. Ask your co-worker to prepare all questions and issues to discuss - which will be an opportunity for the co-worker to deal with the topic and maybe one or the other question either disappears suddenly.
- But apart from co-workers there can be people just nagging you without working (officially) together on a project and maybe you don't see any benefit from cooperating with them. In these cases there is possibility to nag them back and after a while they will give up nagging you. you can tell them
- that you don't know an answer for their question,
- tell them to come later when you have time (tell them a time then),
- tell them to search the internet,
- tell them to write you an e-mail (or a forum post or some specification) - that is additional work for them and for you it offers easy dropping to your GTD-Folders.
- Interrupts created by customers:
- If there is anything that a customer should prepare before calling (especially for support calls) then the customer should be "trained" to prepare those things (for example send some screen shots) or fill out some forms. Sometimes people want a solution and neither are aware yet of the problem nor have collected a minimum of data or started a minimum of analysis.
- On phone calls try to immediately check the "real urgency" (some state always that it is urgent even if it isn't) and for non urgent things estimate the needed time and schedule it on your calendar. State that you are going to solve the customers problem - tell the customer either when exactly you are going to work on his thing. If you need the customers cooperation then it is good to have a time frame where you and the customer both have a reserved piece of time for the issue. This reduces stress on both sides.
- Never ever forget about customer requests or put them away to think about "when is time"! The customer will learn and call you every week to remind you on the issue which is more and more interruptions - or will give up and choose another supplier. If the customer can rely on you and knows that you will serve him then there is no reason for him to call you repeatedly.
- Have a forum or at least a support email address and teach customers to drop there problem by mail or forum post. One advantage is that issues discussed in written form can be easier used later as a knowledge base. For customers calling unnecessarily often you can give them some extra wait or tell them you need to look up something and then call back. Call back at lunch times or shortly before the customer wants to go home in the evening. This may help bringing support to forum or e-mail which is better for you because you can decide when to look into the mails.
- Interrupts created by the boss:
These are definitely the hardest. Who pays, commands. Interrups here often causes changes in the priorities - immediately. But there are things you can do (apart from changing your job ;-) ):- Ask the boss for weekly meetings to exchange news and current company goals.
- Ask for a weekly "Priority-Newsletter". Then you get the priorities by mail and can deal with them when you have time.
- If your boss changes the priorities too often (more than once a week for instance) it might not be a problem to simply skip some - to leave an issue open may not cause any affect tomorrow because then there will be already completely different priorities and older ones are forgotten.
- Create little "penalties" for an interrupt - for instance:
- on the interruption tell the boss what you were working on and deliver it with a short delay.
- Take a little longer to respond so the boss can clearly see that you are currently still thinking of the work you were supposed to do before. Let the boss "participate" on the "time loss because of process swapping".
- State "good that you interrupt, for an hour I need to go to the toilet in reality. Just a minute - then I have more time for you". - This might be exaggerated but it shows two things: A penalty and the important fact that you let the boss know that his is interrupting you. So he gets reminded that he is permanently interrupting you.
- Use strategies that were mentioned above to be used for customers.
Depending on your actual job there is some percentage of time lost dealing with unavoidable interrupts. Depending on that percentage you should leave appropriate gaps in your calendar. So an interrupt is still annoying but it does not bring you in trouble finishing your work in time.
When you reduced the number of interrupts and their effect you can focus on those tasks that really need to be done. Many tasks are too big to solve them in one piece and so they have to be split. Analyze them, cut them into smaller pieces and schedule appropriate time frames in your calender - for instance - every Friday is day to work on the new company's website.
When you get interrupted see the benefit of getting in distance to the current problem you are struggling with having the opportunity to get back to the overview again probably finding a better solution to your detail problem as mentioned at the beginning of this post.
Related posts: Decision planning, GTD - E-Mail-Folders and Tags, LTO - Letting things open, When to strictly avoid multitasking, Razor sharp focus, Cost of substitution.
2007-10-30
When to give up
The problem: You try to achieve a goal with all your power but the result is not showing up, you have problems and you get frustrated.
This problem can show up for short term working goals or even while working towards long term goals. I think it is a well known situation for everyone having those walls in front - barriers, hurdles, hences wherever you look. You put so much effort into a thing that you do not want to believe that it was for nothing. - Even worse is the feeling if you think to be already very close to your final goal. You release your last energy reserves and nothing, nothing helps. You get tired and more frustrated because with every attempt more and more time is wasted.
The reason: Insufficient evaluation, missing knowledge, missing experience and bad luck.
Whenever you set a goal before starting you usually check the possible solutions or ways to reach your goal and choose one that seems to bring an optimum somewhere between quality and required effort and/or resources. This is an evaluation process that is based on a lot of insecurities. While working towards your goal some things may happen that you did not expect and this might affect the required effort or the final output negatively.
Then you maybe already put a lot of effort into your project and to ensure that your work was not for nothing you automatically put more effort into your project. If you face a "real" problem that cannot be solved in an economic way you create a vicious circle.
The solution: Do a pit stop for new evaluation.
When you face a situation that turns out to put your main goal in danger working with the expected amount of effort then take yourself time to
"Giving up" is negatively tagged in our language and "giving up" is seen as a general capitulation. But giving up on something is not a general capitulation.
Giving up is an economical decision driven by experience!
And further:
Giving up NOW does not mean necessarily giving up FOREVER!
Giving up is not necessarily completely STOPPING - it is heading over to new goals.
It might turn out later after the accumulation of additional knowledge and waiting some time that then - later - your goal can be achieved a lot easier.
But after a new evaluation of your current situation it also may turn out to be better to continue because the new situation might add additional value to your project.
Continuing on a difficult thing might empower your personality and your know-how - it might turn you to a leader in your field of work!
Before you decide whether to continue or not make sure that you have well evaluated the situation. When you decide not to continue then think of the experience you got and the opportunity to learn from it - from the situation, from your false estimation but also from all the steps you achieved so far working towards your goal. This reduces the negative feeling of "lost time".
This problem can show up for short term working goals or even while working towards long term goals. I think it is a well known situation for everyone having those walls in front - barriers, hurdles, hences wherever you look. You put so much effort into a thing that you do not want to believe that it was for nothing. - Even worse is the feeling if you think to be already very close to your final goal. You release your last energy reserves and nothing, nothing helps. You get tired and more frustrated because with every attempt more and more time is wasted.
The reason: Insufficient evaluation, missing knowledge, missing experience and bad luck.
Whenever you set a goal before starting you usually check the possible solutions or ways to reach your goal and choose one that seems to bring an optimum somewhere between quality and required effort and/or resources. This is an evaluation process that is based on a lot of insecurities. While working towards your goal some things may happen that you did not expect and this might affect the required effort or the final output negatively.
Then you maybe already put a lot of effort into your project and to ensure that your work was not for nothing you automatically put more effort into your project. If you face a "real" problem that cannot be solved in an economic way you create a vicious circle.
The solution: Do a pit stop for new evaluation.
When you face a situation that turns out to put your main goal in danger working with the expected amount of effort then take yourself time to
- think of a workaround for your current problem but still should lead you to your goal,
- think of asking for help,
- think if there is additional knowledge that could help you and where you could get it,
- review the estimation of required work to achieve your goal,
- review the goal itself (maybe arriving half the way is enough or another goal is more adequate - at least for now - think of the 80/20 rule here also known as the Pareto principle)
"Giving up" is negatively tagged in our language and "giving up" is seen as a general capitulation. But giving up on something is not a general capitulation.
Giving up is an economical decision driven by experience!
And further:
Giving up NOW does not mean necessarily giving up FOREVER!
Giving up is not necessarily completely STOPPING - it is heading over to new goals.
It might turn out later after the accumulation of additional knowledge and waiting some time that then - later - your goal can be achieved a lot easier.
But after a new evaluation of your current situation it also may turn out to be better to continue because the new situation might add additional value to your project.
Continuing on a difficult thing might empower your personality and your know-how - it might turn you to a leader in your field of work!
Before you decide whether to continue or not make sure that you have well evaluated the situation. When you decide not to continue then think of the experience you got and the opportunity to learn from it - from the situation, from your false estimation but also from all the steps you achieved so far working towards your goal. This reduces the negative feeling of "lost time".
2007-10-27
Blessing of criticism
Today I read the 16 Tips to Survive Brutal Criticism (and Ask for More) at lifehack:
The reason: We see ourselves too much in competition with others and getting critics gives us a feeling of decreased value of ourself.
The solution: Criticism is the best what can happen to you.
It is a very good thing to get feedback. If it is constructive then it helps to improve you / your work / your view ... - if it is not constructive it improves your strength finding good arguments for your opinion and your solutions or it is an exercise how not to feed a troll. And last but not least it shows you that it is sometimes a good thing to hear what others think and sometimes it is time wasted. Most people simply change their habits and do not contribute to improve the situation. So criticism is a blessing because someone took the time to give feedback. Evaluate the value for you.
Honesty is a Good Thing, Here’s How to Survive ItThe problem: Our ego gets hurt when we get critics.
Here are some tips for surviving the floods of good intentions that might crash upon your ego:
[...]
The reason: We see ourselves too much in competition with others and getting critics gives us a feeling of decreased value of ourself.
The solution: Criticism is the best what can happen to you.
It is a very good thing to get feedback. If it is constructive then it helps to improve you / your work / your view ... - if it is not constructive it improves your strength finding good arguments for your opinion and your solutions or it is an exercise how not to feed a troll. And last but not least it shows you that it is sometimes a good thing to hear what others think and sometimes it is time wasted. Most people simply change their habits and do not contribute to improve the situation. So criticism is a blessing because someone took the time to give feedback. Evaluate the value for you.
2007-09-16
Quality of solution
I used to be very critical and I am quickly in uncovering sub-optimal solutions. While this is an engine that gives you the opportunity of doing something good for the world by improving the situation it might create a negative aura around you.
The problem: You see a lot of problems to be solved and you want to help by pointing out but nobody wants to listen.
There is so much to improve in this world - too much. You see plenty of bad things done and a bunch of potential dangers in the way things are managed currently. You want to improve but you have so few time. You want to help and so you think notifying somebody about the dangers and traps is the minimum you can do. As you have so few time you hurry to the next problem...
The reason: People already have enough problems themselves and if you don't bring solutions you don't help them.
If you can't present a better solution then pointing to a bad situation can cause negative effects for you, because
Doing nothing or to wait (until you better studied the situation and environment) can be the better choice rather than making it worse. Accept that there are open issues and focus on those issues that seem most important to you and match with your fields of interest. Then search for solutions to particular problems in your area of expertise. Keep in mind that solutions might include several drawbacks but it is better to have a bad solution than having none. Accept to live with patches and workarounds - it's better than nothing. And guess: Maybe the solution you think best turns out to be even worse...
The problem: You see a lot of problems to be solved and you want to help by pointing out but nobody wants to listen.
There is so much to improve in this world - too much. You see plenty of bad things done and a bunch of potential dangers in the way things are managed currently. You want to improve but you have so few time. You want to help and so you think notifying somebody about the dangers and traps is the minimum you can do. As you have so few time you hurry to the next problem...
The reason: People already have enough problems themselves and if you don't bring solutions you don't help them.
If you can't present a better solution then pointing to a bad situation can cause negative effects for you, because
- you get considered egocentric or bigheaded/cocky
- you are negative
- the group you are talking to contains the architect of the current solution
Doing nothing or to wait (until you better studied the situation and environment) can be the better choice rather than making it worse. Accept that there are open issues and focus on those issues that seem most important to you and match with your fields of interest. Then search for solutions to particular problems in your area of expertise. Keep in mind that solutions might include several drawbacks but it is better to have a bad solution than having none. Accept to live with patches and workarounds - it's better than nothing. And guess: Maybe the solution you think best turns out to be even worse...
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