Maximizing Your Potential!

I know, I got what you’re saying.

It’s one thing to apply this to your self and have a totally beautiful desk that is now polished to a high sheen thanks to Pledge. How the heck do I get those around me to help me keep my desk uncluttered???

First off, let them admire that beautiful, uncluttered desk. Maybe you can even share the posts that helped you do it, if you are feeling particularly generous. But, seriously, what do you do?!?

It’s really quite simple. Get them to put things in writing. Sounds simple, right? Have a little basket mounted right outside your door with 2 slots. Have a sign posted that says, “Got a question or problem??? Put it in writing. Take a minute to fill out one of these forms and put it in the top basket. I will review all requests at 11:45 AM and 4:30 PM and get back to you the same day in most cases.”

Just think about it. The toughest thing for any person to handle is the interruption. You lose you train of thought with the task you are dealing with. As a result, you probably go down the emotional tone scale into antagonism or anger and you are not at 100% in terms of brain power for solving the persons problem when you get it.

I guarantee that this simple little tool will save you oodles of upset and lost production.

If you are the manager in your office or wind up being a problem solver for those around you you can have another section on that same form which says, “State the Problem.” Then a section below that, “Possible solution.” And then one more section for you which says, “Comment.” This is where you can say, “Great solution, go for it.” or “I don’t think that will work. I recommend you do ‘X’.”

The bottom line is that you have now established a protocol for how to deal with interruptions and problems and it will make you and those around you much more effective.

Next time we will cover how to handle your pending basket!

Technorati Tags: Anger, Antagonism, Beautiful, Bottom Line, Brain Power, Desk, Emotional Tone, Great Solution, Heck, Interruption, Interruptions, Little Basket, Pledge, Possible Solution, Problem Solver, Protocol, Sheen, Slots, Tone Scale, Tool, Toughest Thing

Last time, we reviewed a little bit about what time management is. I think we all agree that good time management is a very valuable thing.

The question becomes – where to start? That is relatively simple to answer. We MUST start with a CLEAN slate. That clean slate is our work area.

I recommend that you set aside a block of time when you won’t be disturbed. Turn off the cell phone, the pager, the home phone if you are there. Shut off  your email alerter, Twitter, or any other potential interruption as all of these are a distraction from this very important task.

Ideally you have a partner there to help you sort out which one of the 4 “D’s” to apply. Get three baskets and set them on a corner of your desk.

Mark the first or top one ‘IN‘. This basket is ONLY to contain those items or dispatches you have just received. The middle basket is labeled ‘PENDING‘ and will contain those items which have been reviewed but do NOT have an immediate solution. And the lowest basket is labeled ‘OUT‘ and contains all the items which have been completed and are now ready to be filed, mailed or otherwise moved to another person’s work area.

Once you have labeled your baskets you should gather everything that is sitting on your desk and put it in your ‘IN’ basket. Or if there is too much stuff, place it in the center of your desk. One time when I did this with a gentleman, we had to get a 55 gallon trash can and place everything in there and pull things out one at a time until they were ALL sorted out. It took 2 days but it was worth it!

OK. Now you are ready. You pick up the first item in the pile. Read it fully and then decide which of the 4 actions you need to take to complete this task:

1. DO it - complete all the actions necessary to the completion of this task.

2. DELEGATE it – realize that it does not pertain to your work and pass it on to the correct person. *Note:  You must pass it on with enough information so that the person you have passed it on to can actually complete the actions necessary to fully deal with it.

3. DELAY it – Place the item in your pending basket to complete later. *Note: You must make a note on the item specifying the exact steps needed to bring the task to completion later on AND you must also estimate how long that action will take and block the time in your schedule to actually complete the task.

4. DUMP it - Throw it away. This is one of the HARDEST things for most people to do. They feel that if they don’t keep the information they will be caught flat footed someday without this ‘vital’ data. I recently had someone who needed the info on lottery rules in California and was able to find the information, thanks to Google in about 5 minutes. Piece of cake. There is NOTHING which can not be found on the internet in a very short period of time.

So, away you go. You just start getting things done. A very simple rule of thumb on keepsakes or news articles, etc. if it is not going to help you make money or bring you pleasure, let it go.

I guarantee that if you do this and do it fully, you will allow new pure clean energy to move into your life. A cluttered area actually sticks your work and energy flows. It’s a fact of life which has been demonstrated hundreds, if not thousands, of times throughout the last 15 years. (can you believe I have been doing this for 15 years?!?)

Anyway, Stick with it! Don’t give up. Pick up one item at a time, sort out what is needed then apply the appropriate D to the situation.

You’ll be glad you did!

Technorati Tags: Baskets, Cell Phone, Clean Slate, Corner Desk, Correct Person, Delegate, Desk Top, Dispatches, Distraction, Disturbed, Email, Gentleman, Good Time Management, Interruption, Last Time, Little Bit, Pager, Paperwork Management, Trash, Twitter