Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning,
Speaker 1: This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
Speaker 1: tip is that when you realize you can't complete everything
Speaker 1: on your to do list, identify any tasks that would
Speaker 1: result in serious consequences if you left them undone. This
Speaker 1: provides a quick way to figure out what to do first.
Speaker 1: I was reminded of this tip to ask what is
Speaker 1: most consequential recently while reading through Dick Seller's book Successful
Speaker 1: Time Management for Dummies. As longtime listeners know, I advise
Speaker 1: considering your to do list a contract with yourself. When
Speaker 1: you put a task on the to do list for
Speaker 1: the day or week, you are promising yourself that it
Speaker 1: will get done. But occasionally our days go wildly off
Speaker 1: the rails. A very sick kid needs your careen presence.
Speaker 1: A dramatic plumbing emergency means there is water everywhere, or
Speaker 1: let's just hope it's water. An important work project lands
Speaker 1: on your desk with a very tight deadline. Suddenly the
Speaker 1: reasonable to do list that you are planning to complete
Speaker 1: becomes impossibly long, so you have to regroup. When you
Speaker 1: need to choose what to do from your to do list.
Speaker 1: Zeller advises asking what if not done today will lead
Speaker 1: to a significant consequence. I think this is a wise question.
Speaker 1: When you are feeling stressed, it is tempting to look
Speaker 1: at your to do list and choose the simplest or
Speaker 1: fastest tasks to complete. We all want to check things off,
Speaker 1: but if you aren't going to do everything, then this
Speaker 1: impulse is problematic because whether or not you fill out
Speaker 1: that form for HR today doesn't really matter if it
Speaker 1: is not due until next week, and it may not
Speaker 1: matter all that much at all. Doing it will take
Speaker 1: time away from doing more pressing things. It is much
Speaker 1: wiser to evaluate the items on the to do list
Speaker 1: to identify that any that will cause big problems if
Speaker 1: they aren't done today. Just run through your list and
Speaker 1: ask yourself, will terrible things happen if this doesn't get
Speaker 1: done today? So, for instance, will terrible things happen if
Speaker 1: I don't send back that big proposal that the client
Speaker 1: wants by the end of the day, Well we won't
Speaker 1: get the project in that case, and if we really
Speaker 1: want that project, that would be a bad thing. What
Speaker 1: will happen if I don't pick up that medication that
Speaker 1: I need and that I am completely out of well,
Speaker 1: that would also be bad. What will happen if I
Speaker 1: don't pick up my shirts at the cleaners? Well, if
Speaker 1: you have other shirts, not much, so that is probably
Speaker 1: okay to reschedule. You get the idea, consider what harm
Speaker 1: would actually come from not completing a task. As you
Speaker 1: do this, you may realize that some tasks don't ever
Speaker 1: need to be completed. That is good to know. Now,
Speaker 1: That's said, just because not completing a task today isn't
Speaker 1: harmful doesn't mean it won't eventually become consequential. Nothing bad
Speaker 1: will happen if you don't submit your taxes by April
Speaker 1: tenth here in the US, but something bad may happen
Speaker 1: if you don't submit them by April fifteenth. Likewise, Zeller
Speaker 1: gives the example of a presentation. The day before a presentation,
Speaker 1: you really do have to prepare for it, but that
Speaker 1: task may not have been urgent a week earlier. Of course,
Speaker 1: in general, we do want to do things before the
Speaker 1: last minute. But it is also true that if you
Speaker 1: can't get to everything and you need to triage, then
Speaker 1: it is better to do the things for which last
Speaker 1: minute is right now than the things for which last
Speaker 1: minute is sometime off in the future. In the meantime,
Speaker 1: this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's to making
Speaker 1: the most of our time. Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast.
Speaker 1: If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback, you can reach
Speaker 1: me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast
Speaker 1: is a production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts from iHeartMedia,
Speaker 1: please visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
Speaker 1: listen to your favorite shows.