Daniel Simons, author of the book ‘The Invisible Gorilla‘, wrote something interesting recently.

Simons looked at the evidence that demonstrates multitasking is not all it’s cracked up to be. He quotes that every productivity study in every industry published in the last 100 years has come to the same conclusion: after about 40 hours of work in a week, the quality of your work starts to go down. You start making mistakes.

That’s why working 60 hours may not save you time or money: you’ll spend too much of that time fixing the mistakes you shouldn’t have made in the first place. That may be the reason why software companies that limit work to 35 hours a week need to employ fewer QA engineers: there isn’t as much mess to clean up.

In today’s economy, where management thinking and creativity are seen as the main differentiators in business, brains are assets. They need to be looked after. Managers need to take the evidence seriously that too much work doesn’t make us all productive; it actually causes undue stress and downtime.

Problems are best dealt with when we spend some time away from them and let our brains simmer before solving them. Also, the only thing that happens when people are asked to work in ways that interfere with other parts of their lives is burnout.

As I mentioned in the blog on multi-tasking, it doesn’t make us more productive. Simons mentioned that checking emails while in a meeting does not enhance our efficiency. He was asked whether there was anything we could do to enlarge the capacity of our minds. The answer was simple; “no.” There are hard limits to what our brains will do. Practice, Simons says, will improve specific skills but not general abilities. Carrying out crossword puzzles will enable you to be better at crossword puzzles; it won’t improve your IQ.

Is there anything that managers can do that can help themselves? Yes, says Simons: exercise. His colleague Arthur Kramer showed that walking for a few hours a week led to large improvements on cognitive tasks. Stretching and toning exercises had no cognitive benefits, but aerobic exercise, which increases blood flow to the brain, did.

Older managers who walked for just 45 minutes a day for three days a week showed better preservation of their brains in MRI scans, says Kramer. Exercise, Simons concludes, improves cognition broadly by increasing the fitness of your brain.

That’s an interesting thought for this week. If you want to improve your emotional intelligence or feel better at doing your job, maybe take that 45 minute break at lunch time and actually do some walking or more strenuous exercise.

Build it up during the next few months and see what effect it has. And if you want to get the best out of your team, remember that overwork will not add much benefit to the company. In fact, it will just cause more problems. So avoid burnout at work; your team members are your greatest asset!

Thanks again

Sean

Sean McPheat
Managing Director
MTD Management Course

Click below for a:
FREE email course “Improve Your Management Skills”

Procrastination is a symptom. It’s your body and mind telling you there is some area of stress that you are focusing on. By relieving the feeling of pain associated with actually doing the task you are putting off, you are reducing your anxiety by focusing on something more pleasurable or less demanding.

Remember, procrastination is an end result, so you might want to diagnose what’s causing it first, before you dive into these tips and techniques:

Break any projects you’re working on down into more manageable chunks

Time management guru Alan Lakein suggests using the Swiss cheese method. By knocking holes into projects (doing small tasks associated with it) you don’t see it as a massive mountain, just small journeys to the next base camp.

Aim for a short period of interrupted, quality time that you can devote to the task. Even 20 minutes of focused effort can break the back of many big tasks. At the end of this time, make sure you give yourself a quick reward…a cup of coffee, a walk in the fresh air, a piece of fruit…anything that tells the brain it gets rewarded for completing that bit of the task. It then looks forward to the next 20 minute slot!

Remember your own needs…plan for and carry out some recreation time…but only when you have kept your promise of doing what you said you would with the task.

Use appropriate self-talk to keep momentum going. Words like ‘I choose to’ and ‘I want to’ are better than ‘I must’ or ‘I should’.

Don’t aim for perfection. Excellence is usually good enough for 99% of your stakeholders.

Reward those small wins and share successes with others.

Remember, procrastination is just a matter of thought processes. By concentrating on the benefits of finishing the task instead of the pain of doing it, you should soon see a change in your motivation to overcome procrastination.

Thanks again

Sean

Sean McPheat
Managing Director
MTD Management Course

Click below for a:
FREE email course “Improve Your Management Skills”

Do you waste time planning? Many managers do, because they spend too much time trying to organise things that are un-organisable! What I mean by this is, if you spend time trying to organise other people, you run the risk of that time being wasted because of your inability to control other people.

People don’t want to be managed. This is the oxymoron in the title ‘people manager’. A good definition of a manager is someone who plans, controls, directs and organises. How would you feel if everything you did during the day was planned for you, organised for you, directed for you and you were controlled every step of the way? I can imagine your answer!

So, when you do your daily planning, make sure you focus on things that you can control or, at least, influence. Here are some ideas:

Create a ‘to do’ list and, alongside it, a ‘will do’ list. These lists are your focal points of productivity. Take your ‘to do’ list and write down from it those items you categorically must, must, must get done today, no exception. This will be your ‘will do’ list, and shouldn’t cover more than half your day. That way, you will be able to top up from your ‘to do’ list without having to buy more time. The ‘will dos’ are those things that are crucial to get completed today. And from our experience, not everything on your ‘to do’ list falls into that category.

When you are about to start a task, ask yourself: “Is this the best use of my time right now? Is there a more efficient way of handling this task? Could it be delegated? Or am I the best person to carry this out?”

Work out the hourly rate you are paid by your company. Then ask yourself “Would I be willing to pay someone else that amount to do the hour’s work I’m about to do?” This often brings you to your senses as to the best use of your time.

Look at the next appointments you are about to handle over the next three days. Is it a valuable use of your time to meet with these people? Or would it be more suitable to phone them, conference call with them or email them? Sometimes a meeting is most suitable, but plan that out first to make sure.

Many people make mistakes when they prioritise their tasks. They start off with ‘Priority 1′ then move onto ‘2′, ‘3′, ‘4′ and so on. Let me ask you a question. How seriously and with how much passion do you tackle a ‘Priority 8′ task? Be honest!

Most people take something that’s 8 or below on their list and treat it like it’s not that important and often procrastinate with it. Here’s a simple technique…don’t view your lower-priority tasks with less enthusiasm simply because they are lower on the list. Having completed ‘Priority 1′, treat ‘Priority 2′ as the new ‘Priority 1′ !!!
That way you are taking all your tasks seriously and are less likely to procrastinate. Taking your ‘Priority 8′ seriously means you get a lot more done more effectively and efficiently.

So,don’t attempt to control others’ time…just work on what you can control and you’ll see your personal effectiveness improve dramatically.

Thanks again

Sean

Sean McPheat
Managing Director
MTD Management Course

Click below for a:
FREE email course “Improve Your Management Skills”

What day do you find it hardest to get up and out of bed in the morning? Most people would say it’s the first day of their working week, after the weekend.

In fact, according to Tokyo Women’s Medical University, most heart attacks happen on the first morning of the working week, between 4am and 10am. Why? Because many people see only the pain of restarting something they wish they didn’t have to do, and hence cause themselves a lot more stress than usual.

But it doesn’t have to be that way. How can you motivate yourself on a Monday morning every week? What can you do to plan effectively if you have trouble with this well-known phenomenon?

• Tidy up your work area at the end of the working week. If you arrive at work after the weekend to find last week’s work still there, it can cause more stress.

• Finish as many jobs as possible before you leave for the weekend. Then these tasks aren’t unconsciously hanging over you over the weekend.

• Set a new goal for the working week. This will help you start the new week running instead of moping.

• Try some exercise on Monday morning. It will get the blood and oxygen coursing and help you think more efficiently.

• See if you can get up 30-60 minutes earlier than normal, and spend those extra minutes boosting yourself before starting out for the week.

• Avoid massive tasks on Monday mornings. See if you can spread them out through the week

• Listen to upbeat music on your way in to work. It can do wonders for your mood.

• Listen to motivational CDs or MP3s. These will help brighten the commute as well.

• Vary your activities so they are spread over the week. Schedule something enjoyable for each day of the week, even if it’s only for a few minutes. This way, you look forward to some things throughout the whole week.

• Set the example for your team to follow on the first day of the week. If enthusiastic team members see you down, they may feel they have to follow your example

These may not chase away the blues every time, but at least they help you to be proactive and choose your mood when you get to work. But be warned: be prepared for others to ask what you were up to at the weekend!

Thanks again,
Sean

Sean McPheat
Managing Director
MTD Manager Training

Click below for a:
Free email course “Improve your Management Skills”

As much as you want to believe you’re a super-manager, the truth is that you probably aren’t. Now, don’t take that the wrong way. Most of us, believe it or not, are not stellar when it comes to multi-tasking. The real truth is that it is important to take a look at your performance and really understand whether or not you are part of the 2.5% of society (yea, that’s right – just 2.5%) that can multi-task, or if you are part of the 97.5% of society that really isnt’ very good at it. The latter seems a bit more likely, doesn’t it?

What does this mean to you?

It means most of us really aren’t as good at writing an email while talking on the phone as we think.

It means most of us should not be having conversations on the phone while driving – at all – even though we think we’re in control.

It simply means we shouldn’t attempt to do so many things at the same exact time.

Studies have shown that those who multi-task have lower performance levels when their work is evaluated. Meaning each project is considered average, and sometimes sub-par. People who turn in projects they’ve finished one at a time, or that they worked on in small chunks of time that were not dedicated to anything else, did very well with their work projects.

So what are you going to do with your schedule today? Are you going to sit at your desk and try to plan a meeting, read your emails, and double check a report at the same time? Or are you going to dedicate specific amounts of time to each and leave the others alone?

Remember, you don’t have to finish every project before you move on to the next – but you have to alot dedicated time to it without focusing on anything else. That’s when you’ll get true results.

Thanks again,
Sean

Sean McPheat
Managing Director
MTD Management Course

Click below for a:
Free email course “Improve your Management Skills”