A four-letter word you want…
Great fun! A night cheering on the UW Hockey Badgers in the Chancellor’s box at the Kohl Center with fellow certified PLCC coach classmates. Part of better balance for me…making time for friends that feed my spirit. It’s really amazing how we have all used our International Coaching Federation coaching tools to broaden our service in a wide variety of industries. Badgers lost ):
So…what’s this four-letter word you want more of?
I’ll bet you’re thinking “time.” Am I right?
Actually, that’s not it.
Do you feel your work is endless? That you are never finished? There is always one more email, or call, or contact screen to enter? There just aren’t enough hours in the day to keep up? Poor me. This is so hard.
When I start feeling like a victim and that life happens TO me, my first piece of head-chatter is something like, “If only I had a job that just ENDED each day and I could go home and be DONE.” Cleaning toilets looks real good in these moments – tangible and easily measurable results, clear tasks, and DONE when I leave. Sigh.
What you need is more DONE in your life. Here’s why and how.
- A sense of closure. Without this, the myriad of on-going tasks in your world are shouting at you endlessly in the chatter in your mind. There’s an anxiousness that comes with all the unfinished business. All the loose ends. From a knot in your stomach to a life filled with worry.
- A sense of accomplishment. Sure, you love it when your Ask brings a “Yes!” But that is just a small piece of the relationship-building work that fills your days. You love those spectacular vacations – but those too are just small parts of many “normal” family events. Do you recognize the small accomplishments that lead to the big ones?
- A sense of what’s next. “I have so much to do I don’t know where to start.” With no end, there is no beginning.
Here’s HOW to get more “DONE” in your life.
1. Establish Boundaries
- Use your calendar for specific work tasks and honor the date with yourself – Set up an hour block to make calls for appointments, do it and say, “DONE!” Block time for contact screens, do it and say, “DONE!” Move these time blocks around. Close your door (if you have one). Don’t waste one precious second of this time looking at the new email or going on Facebook. Do this for a month and you will create a habit of addressing your most important specific tasks. Your focus will allow you to do more, with higher quality, in less time. Worrying about something? Schedule it!
Use an Anchor – My Artful Asking Success Club guest this month, Kate Troelstra, VP of Advancement at Clayton University in Georgia, shared that as she is leaving for the day she says, “Today is done!” This is her anchor – her specific action that signals it’s time to stop working and embrace the evening with her husband, cats and outside-of-work interests. It is a boundary. And while she might peak at email or texts, she is careful to respond during business hours unless it is sincerely urgent.
I had a colleague who would take all the paper on his desk, make a pile, set it on his desk chair and shove the chair in. That was when his work day was DONE. An anchor is a physical or mental message that signals you to stop. CREATE YOURS!
2. Celebrate Each Small Accomplishment as a DONE!
- Celebrate steps towards the results. We have metrics to meet for sure. But within “20 Face-to-Face visits/month” is THIS visit. Hurrah! Think 20 mini celebrations leading to the grand finale of JOY in having 20 great visits with 20 great givers! Each is a DONE. Each phone call made – celebrate! DONE! Each contact screen entered – celebrate! DONE! A conversation with a program officer that added clarity to a funding priority – celebrate! DONE!
Create DONE Buddies. For every DONE – small and large – have folks You can call or send a note to who will celebrate with you. I had this noisemaker I’d run around the halls with when I set up an appointment. Wohoo!
- Crossing it off the list. Lists are SO important to me that I created my own “To Do” list. It’s limited to between 6 and 12 items so you actually have a chance of completing what you put down in one day. I titled it “GET To Do Today” because this shifts my thinking to tasks I GET to do. We have the opportunity to meet amazing people and do amazing work. Not everyone gets to do what we do. After each task, a “Ta Da” above the check box serves to remind me to shout TA DA and celebrate DONE! Bask in the GLOW of one thing DONE!
3. DONE clears the way to NEXT
- A timer takes you from “I will finish” to “I am DONE.”
Start with what would make you happy and proud to have DONE? (You expected me to use the old “priorities” line didn’t you?) Ponder this and you have the key to working smarter. Creating this ezine for you makes me happy and proud – especially when I get it out on schedule. Walking every day makes me happy and proud. Give yourself 30-90 minutes – set the timer! Don’t dare get out of your chair or think of another thing until you are finished. DONE!
Next task. Repeat. Oh yes, next task. This still allows you to break down a monster project into pieces. But commit to finish each piece. Then you can take the next step.
We know what makes the most difference but we allow self-doubt about tasks we perceive as hard to push us to the comfortable busy work. Asking “Will this move a prospective major giver closer to investing in us?” zeros in on what produces results, not activity.
- An all-inclusive task list let’s you be DONE with ‘forgetting’ and ‘concerning’.
Each month I create a massive GET To Do list of everything I can think of within categories that include my speaking, VIP clients, writing, family, band, health and personal tasks. It is 8 typed pages and has short and long-term projects so I know I will remember everything I want to do. I review the list and drop anything I’m “concerned” about but don’t control. For example, I’m concerned that too many development staff manager/ED’s/VP’s don’t understand artful major gift relationship building. My concern has no influence whatsoever. Instead, if I add, “Think about a program/webinar/course I can create to reach MGO managers” I can control and plan steps to create something to address this. With no control, ‘concern’ is a useless emotional expenditure that leads to worry – another energy-zapper.
- Refer to yourself as someone who gets things DONE!
And so it shall be.
DONE! Get more of this four-letter word in YOUR life!
Hit reply and share how you apply this and get more DONE! Oh look, DONE writing this! WoHOO! Thanks for letting me help you compose a good world!
Invest in Joy!
