Being Busy is the Killer of Productivity
This is something that has been on my mind recently as I am looking to take on more roles in my professional career as well being at a cross roads in my life. I will explain more on this later in another post. For the sake of this post I want to make a point that I am in a position where I am trying and testing a few new business ideas and opportunities to see what I focus on next now that my first venture is stable. This has resulted in working a lot over the past year, working 16 hour days, seven days a week, even when I'm not working I've been thinking about work.
The interesting part of this is when I speak to friends or family about how I'm doing with work. As soon as I say "everything’s going well, I'm really 'busy'". Every time it is met with a projection of praise and "oh that's good". After you've worked at the rate I have on multiple things, not taken a proper holiday in two years and your social life has dropped off a cliff it gets you thinking if "busy" is really worth it.
Busy, an overhyped word
Being busy and working all hours is often met with praise in the start-up and entrepreneur space. You Google around anywhere for the famous business success stories and most of them explain a certain individual who wore multiple hats in the business's early stage and worked countless hours to get it off the ground.
I fell into this category in a way. I am not saying I am some crazy unicorn start-up entrepreneur, I am saying I started a business I was incredibly passionate about a few years ago and I have done the same more recently in another venture. Both times I tell myself in order to be successful I must work all hours, I must do all the work myself and I must set crazy deadlines to get things accomplished. Whilst this works well to get things done, I am learning the end result is quite damaging.
Running out of Steam
When I compared my performance of around a month ago to what I was like 4 years ago when things were a bit simpler I can see a clear difference. A month ago I was starting to struggle with getting up in the morning, simple tasks required for work took longer, I was getting distracted easily and just not really giving anything my undivided attention.
Looking back at this situation, even though it wasn't that long ago it was clear I was out of momentum. I just hadn't realised it yet.
When I realised everything needed to calm down
It was a month ago I realised that working at a crazy rate wasn't getting me anywhere. I was on a business trip going to Lebanon of all places. The trip was to pitch to a new client that wanted marketing support. It was a hectic trip that involved creating the pitch deck on the plane, practising it that night and then presenting the day after. It was quite "busy" up until after the presentation. At that point I had a around a day to relax about everything and just enjoy the fact that I was in a 6 star hotel in Lebanon, next to the sea where the weather was incredible and the food was amazing.
It was only that day where I started to notice things. I had a lay in that day, got up and grabbed coffee, went to the restaurant and had breakfast outside and just chilled out. In the afternoon, as always, my thoughts about current business and new business started flooding back in but with one major difference. Certain road blocks that had been an issue for months was completely clear in my head in my head now. I was able to think more logically about it and put a step by step plan on what I needed to do. Not only that, certain problems that were causing a huge stress and headache for me suddenly didn’t feel that bad and I was able to solve them.
I started wondering what the hell was going on. How could I work all this out now? Was being in Lebanon the answer to all my issues?... Maybe not. The reality is that once I chilled out a bit and stopped working, I had the time and space to just sit back and look at it from a different perspective. It gave me the chance to remove my emotions from what I was working on and that changes everything. After returning back to the UK this changed my work mindset and really made me think about my time out and time off.
A quick pic of my day of realisation in Beirut, Lebanon
It's Important to make time off
Since that point, I am now cutting work off in the evenings (bar a few Steemit posts but I enjoy that anyway) and I am getting back my weekends to do life stuff (again ignoring the Steemit post I am writing on a Sunday morning!). In fact after finishing this post I am watching the F1 race whilst doing NOTHING else and then going to a friends BBQ. To top this off, whilst not booked yet, my partner and I are looking to book a late holiday for August/ September time which is something that hasn't happened for over two years.
The point I am making is despite how fashionable and good it is to be busy these days in either a job or business, don't do it. You will 100% be worse off making yourself busy and will not get as much done. Give yourself chance to recharge, mentally re-stabilise and attack your objectives with a fresh mindset. I guarantee you it will make a huge difference.
Summary
A few points to take on-board from this post
- Busy isn't good or cool.
- Take time off for space to think.
- Set working hours and stick to them.
- Have at least one full day off a week.
- As a new business owner, if you can delegate or outsource, do it.
Thanks to @furion who whilst he probably didn't even realise he touched on this point, actually spurred me to write this post. Reading his short post here made me realise others have realised this long before me.
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Have you read the 4-Hour Workweek? We often think that working 80+ hour weeks is the only way to make a business or our career become a success. I used to think that too when I ran a small business. However, greater productivity gains can often be had by taking some time off to recharge and connect with friends and family. Taking a step back from your business to think about your overall strategy and how you can be more efficient is also very useful. Sometimes less is more and working smarter not harder actually works!
I have indeed :) I try to follow a lot of those principles but I haven't quite managed the mini retirement but yet haha
we have totally undermined the value of peaceful solitude in our culture. meditation can be extremely productive and healthful, yet unfortunately this term is over-hyped as well, leading many to be intimidated or confused as to its meaning. the reality is that humans can only evolve so far without the true self analysis that calm reflection allows.
It is so important to turn off. I used to work all day, then go home and work some more. I would often stretch projects out, thinking, eh, I can do it at home later.
I caught myself thinking of work ALL. THE. TIME.
I also had a little moment, my husband and I had just went away for a weekend, and I had no access to the internet or my phone.
I decided then and there to stop this mode, and make sure I finished all my work with in the nine hours I spent at work during the day. I found myself becoming more organized, making more lists, and completing them on time, as I knew if I didn't, I would only be able to work on it the next day, in turn creating a busier, more stressful day for the next day.
I'm much happier now and also have more time for the important things in life.
We are, after all, working in order to have a great personal life, are we not?!
Exactly, it's all about work/life balance. Thanks for the comment.
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