Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Good Morning.
Speaker 1: This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
Speaker 1: tip is to be done by Thursday. If you work
Speaker 1: from Monday to Friday work week, aiming to be done
Speaker 1: with most of your work duties by the end of
Speaker 1: Thursday will buy you breathing room for things to go
Speaker 1: wrong or to go very right. Longtime listeners know that,
Speaker 1: at least for information type jobs, I advocate keeping Friday
Speaker 1: as open as possible. This isn't so you can take
Speaker 1: a long weekend, though of course that's nice from time
Speaker 1: to time too. The idea is that most of us
Speaker 1: benefit from having open space in our schedules. We don't
Speaker 1: know on Monday all the things we will need to
Speaker 1: do by the end of the week. If every minute
Speaker 1: is already spoken for, then there is no place to
Speaker 1: put anything new that comes up. That means not scheduling
Speaker 1: meetings for Friday until you get to Friday and find
Speaker 1: you really need to have them, But it also means
Speaker 1: not having a full plate of things to get caught
Speaker 1: up on. Some work duties are time specific. If you
Speaker 1: have to file something daily, then obviously you can't do
Speaker 1: it on Thursday for Friday, but some things are not
Speaker 1: time specific. Ideally, you should construct your work schedule so
Speaker 1: that everything that is not time specific is done by
Speaker 1: the end of Thursday. So if you have to write
Speaker 1: a report every week, get it done by the end
Speaker 1: of Thursday. If you need to check in with your
Speaker 1: clients once a week, do that by the end of Thursday.
Speaker 1: Anything that you have to do regularly should be finished
Speaker 1: by the time you end work Thursday afternoon or evening.
Speaker 1: That way, Friday is actually really open. This habit does
Speaker 1: a few things. First, you have a buffer if any
Speaker 1: of your regular work duties take longer than usual, when
Speaker 1: enough time is built in to do it by the
Speaker 1: end of Thursday. Then if it takes longer, you still
Speaker 1: have Friday to deal with it. If something big comes
Speaker 1: up during the week, you also have time to deal
Speaker 1: with it and your regular work duties. The big thing
Speaker 1: might have displaced something from earlier in the week, but
Speaker 1: there is space to get caught up on Friday. You
Speaker 1: weren't counting on having that Friday for anything else. That
Speaker 1: big thing could be a problem, an emergency you have
Speaker 1: to deal with, but it could also be something really cool.
Speaker 1: Maybe you get an inquiry about a really exciting new project,
Speaker 1: or a client announces she'll be in town and.
Speaker 2: Wants to meet. You can say yes, knowing that any
Speaker 2: regular work duties that are displayed can be dealt with
Speaker 2: on Friday without borrowing time from the next week, which
Speaker 2: will no doubt have crises of its own. Getting it
Speaker 2: done by Thursday also means that you have more mental
Speaker 2: space on Friday. Many of us claim we'd like to
Speaker 2: have more time to think. Friday can be that time
Speaker 2: you can come up with ideas or think about how
Speaker 2: you'd like to do things better. You can reach out
Speaker 2: to people or maybe read that email a little closer
Speaker 2: and see that the person is suggesting something that might
Speaker 2: actually be really cool. You follow up and it leads
Speaker 2: to an opportunity. In a world where people feel starved
Speaker 2: for time, having some open space can make time feel luxurious.
Speaker 2: We feel time rich. But all it really takes to
Speaker 2: get to that state is making sure that whatever has
Speaker 2: to happen has a time to happen earlier in the week.
Speaker 2: Get it done by Thursday, and you'll find your work
Speaker 2: life in general feeling more productive and less stressful. In
Speaker 2: the meantime. This is Laura Thanks for listening, and here's
Speaker 2: to making the most of our time.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas,
Speaker 1: or feedback, you can reach me at Laura at Laura
Speaker 1: vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast is a production of iHeartMedia.
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