What To Do When There's Too Much To Do (7 page)

• Don't make empty promises.

• Don't apologize or explain yourself.

• Negotiate as necessary.

• Meet the other person halfway.

• Be persistent and consistent.

• Be crystal clear.

• Don't worry about someone's feelings over your own needs.

Last, many meetings are unnecessary, so find ways to trim as many as you can out of your schedule, and let people know you're willing to do so. Finally, exercise clarity, discernment, and vision to make the correct choices “in the moment,” so you don't waste valuable time by allowing yourself to be derailed between tasks.

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When you're focused on completing a critical task within a specific amount of time, you want to access exactly what you need to support your work, exactly when you want it. You especially need to be able to retrieve all the information you require. But with multiple pieces of important data spread across twenty different documents and platforms covering the same general topic, how do you stay organized?

In this chapter, I'll show you. I'll begin by providing guidelines for reducing information, researching effectively, and reading efficiently. Then we'll discuss setting up a basic filing schema. I'll then explain how to refine your personal time management system for maximal efficiency. Once we cover the systems for organizing incoming information, I'll show you how to process each piece as it arrives with my original 6-D System for processing workflow inputs, whether by e-mail, paper, or voicemail. This methodology will help you make quick decisions and get information into the right place, so you can access it immediately.

Each day, you have to sift through a ton of available information to find the few things you really need. It's far too easy to overdose—when you take in so much information, you don't
have time to process it all. Unprocessed information doesn't accomplish anything, since any new information has to mesh with your understanding and methodology before it's applicable. Therefore, to make the best use of the information available, be selective about what you accept. Let's consider some ways you can do that.

First of all, do everything in your power to reduce the amount of information crossing your desk in the first place. In the modern office, receiving too much e-mail is a particular problem, and processing your inbox can be a nerve-racking experience. If you're fortunate enough to have an assistant, put that person in charge of screening your e-mail. An assistant's biggest responsibility is to save you time, and this is one of the best ways to do it.

If an assistant isn't in the picture, establish e-mail filters or rules to limit the amount of e-mail you receive. First, install a spam-blocker so you don't have to deal with unwanted commercial e-mail (or diligently train the one your company has installed for you). Look at each message you receive and weigh it for its value. Does e-mail from a particular source really help you get your job done? If the source sometimes sends you useful e-mails but sometimes doesn't, politely ask them to send only items they know or suspect are relevant to you. If their information is of limited or no utility, stop receiving it by unsubscribing, or by creating a Rule to move their messages directly to your Deleted Items (in Microsoft Outlook, right-click on an e-mail and go to Create Rule and check the appropriate boxes). Those rare nuggets of useful information just aren't worth the time you'll spend sorting through the mountain of garbage. You're better off doing your own search for the information when you need it.

If it takes you more than a minute to find a file, document, or e-mail, something's wrong. Develop a more efficient information processing/filing system.

Do you really need to receive the jokes and lists your coworkers circulate? Just reading them wastes your time, so politely ask your colleagues to stop sending them to you, or give them a personal e-mail address.

For all other unwanted mail, put the address of the sender on your Junk or “blacklist,” so you never have to see the e-mail (in Outlook, right-click on an e-mail, select Junk e-mail, and add them to your blocked senders list). That way, when you receive a new e-mail message from that person, it will go to your Junk mail folder, where you can review it before you delete it, to ensure something important didn't get filtered out, which can happen occasionally.

Some find it easier to set up a “whitelist.” Whereas a blacklist specifies the addresses you refuse to receive e-mails from, a whitelist contains only the addresses you're
willing
to receive e-mail from. You can easily arrange an autoresponder to deal with people outside your immediate circle who need to get in touch with you, simply by directing them to call you. Or you can use a Challenge Response E-mail service such as Spam Arrest. At the very least, delete the obvious junk without opening it. Just by looking at the return address and subject line, you can tell which e-mails are important and which ones aren't.

It pays to hone your research skills. For example: If you learn how to use online search engines more effectively, you won't spend so much time in fruitless searching. Be very specific about what you're looking for. Most search engines use a standardized set of “Boolean operators” (plus and minus signs;
quotation marks; and words like AND, OR, and NOT, etc.) to help you link keywords more effectively and thus weed out most useless search results. Thus, “Mexican-American War” +Texas -“Zachary Taylor” will return a somewhat different set of results than typing Mexican-American War without quotation marks.

Similarly, if you Google the words “save time,” you might get 241,000,000 responses. Among the top ten you might have images of clocks, a Wikipedia article on daylight savings time, an organization selling posters for the workplace on saving time, a PDF of Microsoft Office keyboard shortcuts, and several articles offering time-saving tips from authors like Yours Truly. They all have their place, but may not be what you're looking for at that moment. When you add a few words to your search, making it “how to save time,” you eliminate the clock images, the Wikipedia article, and the posters, trimming the list down to 148,000,000 responses—with the top ten all being articles about time-savings tricks and ideas. Or add the words ‘picture' or ‘video' or ‘lyrics' in front of your search. The Advanced Search feature in Google provides a self-explanatory way to narrow your search results.

As you can see, effective researching starts with knowing the right questions to ask, no matter what tools you select for the job. Do it
before
you go searching for the answers. Here's a more complex example. Let's say you have to make a recommendation to a university about buying PC or Mac computers for a particular lab. Before you start, decide what criteria would affect your recommendation. Among the many questions you might ask are:

• How much does each computer cost?

• Which platform do professionals in the relevant field use most?

• Which platform has better software availability?

• Which platform has fewer maintenance problems?

• How much training will be necessary if we switch or upgrade?

Those questions provide a starting point for your research. Without them, your research is undirected, and may produce equivocal results. Additionally, you'll waste a lot of time reviewing material that doesn't affect your recommendation.

You can also leverage library services to limit your research time. Libraries are largely digitized these days, but many still offer valuable resources beyond the online catalog to those willing to learn about and use them. Most librarians are happy to show you various tips, tricks, and shortcuts to minimize time spent searching for information, and there are special services available to help you hunt down and borrow obscure sources.

If you can't spare the time at all, consider delegating some of your research. Either hire specialized researchers to do the job, or, if it's within your power, assign the work to others in your organization. If you delegate research to more than one person, assign different, distinct topics to each person, to limit wasteful overlap.

Not everything has been digitized yet, so if your library lacks a particular resource you need, ask the librarian to arrange an interlibrary loan.

Because we're visual beings, reading remains one of the best ways to absorb copious amounts of information rapidly. Depending on your job, you may find it necessary to add reading periods to your schedule or spend the occasional weekend catching up. In addition, carry reading material with you at all times. That way, you can use unscheduled downtime to absorb new information.

If you'd rather not carry around a bundle of papers for downtime reading, consider carrying an e-reader or small tablet computer. You can easily scan and convert paper files to electronic formats, and most tablets have apps that let you mark them up, too.

As for the reading itself, I recommend the Rhythmic Perusal method, developed by the University of Minnesota's J. Michael Bennett. With this method, you first focus on the purpose and title (or subtitle) of what you're reading. Relax your face. Scan the upper surfaces of the words in a line, reading the entire line in a single smooth movement. Look for particularly meaningful phrases and terms, and read more for thoughts, feelings, and ideas than the words themselves.

Once you've internalized new information, put your subconscious mind to work. Most creative ideas come when you're not trying to think of a solution. Ideas often come to me in the middle of the night or on a stroll. It's as though my brain is “working on it” behind the scenes, and answers suddenly pop into my head. Many others tell me they get their best ideas when not deliberately thinking about an issue. Let any problems presented by new information percolate in the back of your mind for a while, or use a mind map or other brainstorming tool.