“Work smarter not harder”
Let’s face it we’ve all probably had someone say this to us at some point in our life, but it's often easier said than done...
I searched for some tips on workload management and came across an article from Entrepreneur Magazine 6 Steps to Managing Your Overwhelming Workload. I found this article to be very valuable in managing my personal workload and I wanted to share my findings with you.
Step 1: Get Your Priorities Straight
There is always going to be more work than you can get done and the sooner you accept that the better off you will be. You need to make sure urgent and important tasks are tackled first. Don’t let pressing work take priority over important tasks.
Step 2: Limit Your Time on Tasks
Make sure the time spent is representative of the importance. Spending an hour on something may be a good investment, but spending five hours on the same task may be wasted time. It is the law of diminishing returns. The authors mention a colleague that allots only one hour per day to social media to promote the business because he knows if he doesn’t it will suck him in.
Step 3: Avoid Perfectionism
This has a direct correlation to step 2, the last thing you want to do is continue working on something long after you’ve stopped adding value. All this does is prevent you from checking other tasks off your “to do” list.
Step 4: Exercise Discipline
Make sure you stay focused on business activities and completing mission critical tasks.
Step 5: Outsource
Tasks that are outside of your skill set should be outsourced. That could mean giving the task to someone else in your organization that is a better fit and can accomplish the task in a fraction or the time or literally outsourcing to a company or individual that can help you complete more efficiently.
Step 6: Sprint
You can only sprint for a short period of time. You need to find a pace that is sustainable over the long haul. Think about when you started your current job. You probably had to put in more hours at the beginning to learn the business as well as to gain the respect of your employees and/or peers. As you become more comfortable you become more efficient and learn to delegate.
I hope you’ve found these tips to be helpful. To learn more about Extract Systems and how our automated indexing software FlexIndex or automated redaction software ID Shield can help you manage your workload please contact sales@extractsystems.com. Watch for Part 2 of this series – Prioritizing Projects.
