Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Good Morning. This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.
Speaker 1: Today's tip is to plan your early finished fun. Deciding
Speaker 1: what you'll do after you complete a task gives you
Speaker 1: something to look forward to and keeps you from dilly
Speaker 1: dallying on a project for longer than it requires. The
Speaker 1: more you study your time, the better you get at
Speaker 1: anticipating how long a given task will take. For instance,
Speaker 1: I know it takes me about forty five minutes to
Speaker 1: write a blog post. Writing drafts for a week's worth
Speaker 1: of Before Breakfast episodes can take ninety minutes to two
Speaker 1: and a half hours, depending on how long the episodes are.
Speaker 1: One upside of tracking my time for the last six
Speaker 1: years is that I've gotten better at estimating time. This
Speaker 1: is a really useful skill for making challenging but doable schedules.
Speaker 1: Some tasks, though, can expand to fill the available space.
Speaker 1: One way to avoid that is to allocate a reasonable
Speaker 1: quantity of time to the task, but then choose something
Speaker 1: you will do when you finish early. That way, you
Speaker 1: will look for ways to be efficient. You'll push through
Speaker 1: rather than getting distracted with other things. For instance, suppose
Speaker 1: your task for your lunch break is to write up
Speaker 1: your patient notes from the morning. You might decide that
Speaker 1: if you write up the notes efficiently and finish before
Speaker 1: your lunch break ends, you'll go outside and eat your
Speaker 1: lunch in the sun. If your task for the afternoon
Speaker 1: is to prep for a job interview, you could decide
Speaker 1: that if you finish preparing before it's time to pick
Speaker 1: up your daughter from school, you'll go to the boutique
Speaker 1: near her school and find a great accessory to add
Speaker 1: flair to your inter you outfit. If your task for
Speaker 1: the morning is to write up and circulate the minutes
Speaker 1: and next steps from a big meeting held the previous day,
Speaker 1: you could decide that, if you finish early, you'll listen
Speaker 1: to a recorded webinar a colleague recommended about running effective meetings.
Speaker 1: Deciding on the specific early finished fun activities will motivate
Speaker 1: you to work with purpose. You're not rushing through your
Speaker 1: important tasks. You're just approaching them with focus. You're refusing
Speaker 1: to let your mind wander, and after you're done, you're
Speaker 1: not going to continue fiddling with your work without adding
Speaker 1: more value. You're completing the task well and efficiently. And
Speaker 1: then you're having fun, specific fun, not the random and
Speaker 1: inefficient email checks that we often use to fill this
Speaker 1: time in your personal life. Early finished fund can really
Speaker 1: be well fun finished sending in your kids school registration
Speaker 1: forms and you can work on a puzzle for the
Speaker 1: next one minutes. But during the work day, it might
Speaker 1: make sense to think about early finished fund that will
Speaker 1: boost your overall productivity. A walk could do that, but
Speaker 1: so could a chat with your work best friend or
Speaker 1: the enthusiastic junior staff. Or you're mentoring in certain kinds
Speaker 1: of work. Seeing the beneficiaries of the fruits of your labor,
Speaker 1: customers and action kids in your programs can be very motivational.
Speaker 1: So go be energized by seeing the why behind your tasks,
Speaker 1: or choose early finished fund that's about learning. Watch a
Speaker 1: ted talk, read an article, read a book chapter that
Speaker 1: sort of thing, And there can be a place for
Speaker 1: frivolous early finished fund too. If you have put in
Speaker 1: the expected hours and fulfilled your responsibilities, then consider yourself
Speaker 1: free to go to the movies or bake a special
Speaker 1: career meet a friend for happy hour. So today, as
Speaker 1: you look at the tasks you need to complete, consider
Speaker 1: whether you could motivate yourself to work productively and efficiently
Speaker 1: by making a plan for early finish fun. If you do,
Speaker 1: you can let me know how it goes at Laura
Speaker 1: at Laura Vanderkamp dot com. In the meantime, this is Laura.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening, and here's to making the most of
Speaker 1: our time. Hey, everybody, I'd love to hear from you.
Speaker 1: You can send me your tips, your questions, or anything else.
Speaker 1: Just connect with me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at
Speaker 1: Before Breakfast Pod that's b E the number four, then
Speaker 1: Breakfast p o D. You can also shoot me an
Speaker 1: email at Before Breakfast Podcast at iHeart media dot com
Speaker 1: that Before Breakfast is spelled out with all the letters.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much, I look forward to staying in touch.
Speaker 1: Before break Fist is a production of I heart Radio.
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