PhotoCredit: PacMan
Where does all that extra time go? It’s the most interesting aspect of the quarantine to me. I have mostly avoided over-dosing on online yoga classes. Sure I sneak in the odd biscotti-making session when no one is watching. And there has been a slight over-consumption of re-watching the great British Baking Show. But I’m not traveling, I’m not commuting and I’m not going out to dinner in the evening. Where is the time going?
I sat down over the weekend to assess my schedule. I wrote out all the things I wanted to do in a week. How much time does each activity need? One hour of exercise a day. Thirty minutes of meditation. Try to reduce email to 90 minutes a day with a couple of catch-up sessions as needed. And. And. And. I added the total...to get 100 hours of productive time a week. I knew that wasn’t viable.
Back to the drawing board. I eventually managed a schedule that kept me occupied 5.5 days a week from 6am to 10pm. That seemed reasonable.
Not.
Of course I didn’t follow my overachieving insanity of a schedule. For starters, who over-schedules their Sunday? Second, I just plain didn’t want to follow it. I wasn't inspired. It didn't motivate me.
Then something weird happened.
I sat down at my desk and knocked out 80% of my scheduled items in a few hours. Interesting.
Then I went for a walk and caught up on a couple of podcasts. The second one couldn’t have been more perfect - “The Case For Being Unproductive.”
Let me start by saying this goes against everything I stand for. I love being productive. I’m not going to stop analyzing my productivity. Like ever. However I am rethinking how I do that. It feels like a great time for us to all rethink how we “do productivity.”
The podcast reminded me of my favorite productivity rule, that a job will expand to fit the available time. Parkinson’s Law. I had less available time today and I still cranked through my tasks. The interviewee, Celeste Headlee also reminded me that we are a lot happier and effective when we are task-oriented rather than time-oriented. A focus on tasks is considerably more motivating.
Many self-proclaimed productivity guru’s, I mean coaches, would suggest that a focus on your most important tasks is the better approach. Back to rocks, pebbles and sand (or nerds and cream eggs for those of you who have seen my SquigglyTube).
Except this hasn’t been working for me lately. I need more than a list. Weirdly, the schedule is helping. I find myself back on track for my day after a meeting was cancelled and other things were faster to achieve than I expected. Full circle that became rather satisfying. My under-acheivement led me to overachieving.
Like most great things in my life, the schedule created a game. In the video game industry we call this gamification - which essentially means you build in levels of achievement and rewards to a process. Can I “beat the clock” and get my tasks done while still leaving room to be unproductive? And by unproductive of course I mean cleaning, eating, baking and ordering stuff online - not at all in that order. I have 90 minutes allocated for XX task - can I get it done in half the time? It’s why I like the sprint process so much from the software development world - it turns a to-do list into a competition. Against yourself. My favorite kind...
When gamification and Parkinson’s Law come together there are endless opportunities for you to make your schedule work for you. Rather than you working for your schedule. So what game will you play this week?