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Aug 24
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893: How to Help Your Team Beat Distraction and Unleash Their Productivity with Maura Thomas

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Maura Thomas shows you how to create a distraction-free work environment to make time for the tasks that matter most.

You’ll Learn:

  1. The underlying cause of derailed productivity
  2. How multitasking hurts your productivity and attention
  3. The two questions that will help you eliminate distractions

About Maura

Maura Nevel Thomas is an award-winning international speaker and trainer on individual and corporate productivity and work-life balance, and the most widely-cited authority on attention management. Her proprietary Empowered Productivity™ System has been embraced by the likes of NASA, Dyson, and Google. She is a TEDx Speaker, founder of Regain Your Time, author of six bestselling books, and was named a Top Leadership Speaker in Inc. Magazine. 

Maura is frequently featured in major business outlets including Business Insider, Fast Company, and Washington Post, and she’s also a regular contributor to both Forbes and the Harvard Business Review, with articles there viewed over a million times.

Resources Mentioned

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Maura Thomas Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Maura, welcome back to How to be Awesome at Your Job.

Maura Thomas
Pete, I’m so excited to be here. Thanks for having me.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m excited to get into the wisdom of your latest book, Everyone Wants to Work Here: Attract the Best Talent, Energize Your Team, and Be the Leader in Your Market.That sounds like cool stuff, we all want that. But first, I need to understand, between the last time we spoke and now, you’ve adopted a pickleball habit. Is this accurate?

Maura Thomas
It is accurate. I’m so addicted. I play every chance I get. It’s so fun and I’m getting to the point where I’m just north of horrible, so it’s a little more fun. It’s not embarrassing anymore. It’s only slightly uncomfortable.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. That’s good. One of the very first speakers I remember was named Fran Kick. Shoutout to Fran Kick. We’ll link to him. I think he’s still kickin’. He made a lot of kick jokes, and he talked about this concept of when you get good at something, it becomes more fun, and then you want to work at it some more. And then you become better at that thing, and so it’s a nice little virtuous cycle between work, fun, good. And I was like, “Fran, this makes a whole lot of sense.” I remembered it from high school. So, a powerful message.

Maura Thomas
It is. And one of the most important things I learned, I trained in martial arts years ago, and I keep finding this theme happening in my life. My sensei told me that once you hit black belt level, that’s when your training begins. And what I’m learning about, any time I try to tackle something new, it’s like once you have…like you can’t be a good writer until you know the alphabet.

And you think that knowing the alphabet is your goal but that’s not your goal. The goal is really to write and to write well. But you can’t write well until you know the alphabet. It’s like you can’t do a thing until you are at least competent at the thing.

Pete Mockaitis
Absolutely. Absolutely. And that could be really a period of entry. I’ve never really gotten into golf because I had so many painful embarrassing moments when starting. Maybe in the future I’ll go to it. But pickleball, it’s trendy right now, right? Like, I remember playing pickleball in high school PE class over the summer, and I never heard of it before then, and very rarely after it. But then the last couple of years, I guess there’s pickleball courts sprouting up everywhere.

Maura Thomas
They are sprouting up everywhere. They are, because I think it’s more accessible. It’s a little less impact than tennis. It’s a little easier. Yeah, it’s very accessible. You see people, I mean, today, I was in a game with, like, a 12-year-old and a guy. It was easier, easily early ‘70s. And we all had a game and it was great. It was super fun.

Pete Mockaitis
Beautiful. Well, now let’s hear a little about some other team insights from your book Everyone Wants to Work Here. Any particularly surprising, fascinating, counterintuitive discoveries when putting together this work here?

Maura Thomas
A lot. A lot. So, in the book, I talk a lot about unconscious calculations. And I call unconscious calculations things that we behave in a way that suggests that we believe a thing but we’ve never actually examined that thing to know if that’s really true or if we even really believe that that is true. So, one of those unconscious calculations is that, “I am not being good at my job,” or, “I’m not providing good service to my customers,” or, “I’m not being a good team player unless I’m responding to all communication immediately.”

And people behave as if that is true but I think we all kind of know that isn’t really true. You can service your clients really, really well even if you don’t respond to them every minute. And you can help your team members even if you take time for yourself. We put this weight on, “Being available to other people is part of my job, so I have to do that.”

But what we forget is that your colleagues depend on you to get all the millions of things that are on your to-do list done, and you can’t do both. You can’t be constantly responding to incoming communication and also be making progress on your to-do list at the same time. We try but that’s not super effective. So, one of many, many sort of counterintuitive things.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, Maura, this is, I think, we can talk for hours about this alone. Unconscious calculations. I love the way you’ve articulated that, and this reminds me of some other concepts. We’ve heard maybe Ramit Sethi talk about invisible scripts a lot or Vishen Lakhiani talks about “brules,” which stands for bull crap rules.

Maura Thomas
Ooh, I love that.

Pete Mockaitis
We keep a clean rating here. But, yes, this unconscious calculation, I like the vibe because it does connotate analytical numerical judgment evaluation side of the brain, which I think is a very real nuanced part of that. I know I’ve experienced it, and it can be sometimes damaging to mental health, like, “I’m not a good parent unless I…” A, B, C, D, E, F, G. And those things, they are unconscious, and until you bring those to the surface, which practices like self-reflection, and therapy, etc., can help do, it can really drain folks’ energy and capabilities.

Maura Thomas
Yeah, it really can. As those other people have articulated as well, we really need to look at what we believe. And a lot of times, I see my job as just shining a light on how people are operating so that they can just ask. Sometimes somebody says something to you, and you’re like, “Ahh.” They say, “Why are you doing that?” and you’re like, “You’re right. That’s totally stupid. What? What was I thinking?”

The story that comes to mind, for me, is when I redid my kitchen, and my aunt came over, and she’s in the new kitchen, she’s standing at the stove, and she opens the drawer beside the stove. And in the drawer beside the stove, there’s silverware. And she looks at me, and she said, “Where are your potholders?”

And I point across the kitchen, and I’m like, “My potholders are over there.” And she looked at me, waiting for me to catch up, like, “Potholders should be beside the stove, right?” I was like, “Oh, you’re totally right. You’re totally right. I never thought about that before.” “Move the potholders so that they are near the stove.”

But once she said that to me, I was like, “Oh, and the spices should be near the olive oil. And, oh, the spatula should be near the frying pans.” And I had a whole new outlook on everything as soon as she just sort of shone that light on, “Does this make sense the way you’re doing this?” But I never even thought of it until she said that.

And I think a lot of the things that I sort of do with my clients is really just shining a light, “Does this make sense the way you’re doing this? And wouldn’t you like to do it a little easier?”

Pete Mockaitis
Well, that’s already a fantastic tidbit. Can we maybe zoom out a little bit and hear what’s sort of the big idea or main theme of the book here?

Maura Thomas
I outline a lot of problems that are happening inside companies that are making people go home at the end of the day, and say, “Oh, my gosh, I was busy all day, and somehow I got nothing done.” Instead of going home at the end of the day, and saying, “Oh, my gosh, that was such a good day. I got so much done.”

There are many, many sorts of culture, corporate culture, and leadership behavior problems that are contributing to this, but underlying all of them is distraction. Distraction is what prevents us from going home at the end of the day, and saying, “Oh, my gosh, that was such a good day. I got so much done.” Distraction in the way that we communicate, distraction in all of those unconscious calculations.

Another unconscious calculation that people make is, “Well, people are interrupting me all day but I have to do that. I have to deal with that. That’s part of my job. So, the only way I can get stuff done is when people aren’t bothering me.” Well, the only time people aren’t bothering you is when you’re not supposed to be working – nights, weekends, early mornings.

So, we behave as if we have just accepted that we will work all day at work, and then we will go home and do our most important work, “I’ll just deal with everybody bothering me all day long, but then I’ll do the really important stuff tonight, or Saturday, or Christmas eve, or whenever people aren’t bothering me.” And that’s just, I don’t think anybody wakes up on Monday mornings, and says, “Ooh, I can’t wait to work 60 hours this week.”

Pete Mockaitis
Right, yeah. And then I heard recently, it said almost universally CEOs and executives do work before they get to work just almost out of necessity, it’s like, “I’m going to do half an hour, or one hour, or two hours of super important stuff early in the morning before I am even on the premises and can be accessed.”

Maura Thomas
“Yeah, because that’s the only way that I can get it done.” And I believe that leaders and people, anybody, whether you’re a leader or an individual contributor, you need to own the fact that you need to get your important work done at work, and you do need to be available to other people but you can’t do that to the exclusion of getting the important work done. So, you have to carve out the opportunity in your work day to both be available to people but also be unavailable so that you can get important work done.

And I talk a lot about that in Attention Management, which is the book that I was on with you before about, and in Everyone Wants to Work Here, I talk about how leaders can really make it easier for the team to do that because people think that they can’t do that because their boss is going to get mad at them if they do.

And another unconscious calculation, usually, because usually it’s not true, I can’t imagine a rational boss saying to someone, “No you can’t have any time while you’re undistracted. I need you to be distracted all day.”

Pete Mockaitis
Absolutely. And I have led workshops where lightbulb moments go on, and this is a wildly held unconscious calculation that they need to respond right away, and it is wild. I might have a team of a dozen folks, and we discuss some norms associated with email response times, and maybe half of them are like, “Oh, wow, really? It’d be okay if I didn’t reply for 24 hours, and if you needed it faster, you’d drop by or call me or text me or something? Oh, wow.” And so, it’s just beautiful. I feel like, “Oh, my work here is done. That’s all we had to do was have this one conversation and we got a great ROI on this training here.”

Maura Thomas
Well, yeah, and it does start people thinking but then when I talk about, and I’m sure you do as well, you need a bat signal. Like, “I have a million things to tell you all day, and I’m going to shoot you some emails, but if I really need something,” bat signal. What’s your bat signal at your company? Because if every email might be an emergency, then you have to treat every email as if it is an emergency until you know that it isn’t. So, you can’t use the same communication device for emergencies that you use also for non-emergencies, so there needs to be a bat signal.

Pete Mockaitis
Absolutely. Well, I’m enjoying we’re already getting on some of the tactical goodness, which I love. But first, I want to maybe address what’s the prevalence of this distraction? Or, do you have some stats on the widespread-ness, the cost in terms of dollars or hours per week? Like, I have a sense it’s a big one, a big problem. Can you make it a little bit more precise just how big we’re talking here?

Maura Thomas
Yeah, there’s a ton of research. So, Gloria Mark at UC Irvine, I read a lot about her research. And her research, her older research said that we switch what we’re doing at work, on average, about every three minutes. And her latest research shows that that three minutes have gone down to about 47 seconds.

Pete Mockaitis
Right.

Maura Thomas
I think a lot of the people listening here are people who use a computer to do their work, primarily folks who need to solve problems, and communicate, and generate ideas, and write things. Some people call them knowledge workers. If you work primarily at computer for your job, then, really, your job is to think, and you can’t think clearly, you can’t make any good decisions, you can’t have your best ideas in 47-second increments. And yet that’s pretty much all we give ourselves throughout the day.

And so, how are we supposed to be good at our jobs? Because if you’ve ever been in a meeting, and at the end of the meeting, you’re like, “Hmm, I shouldn’t have said that,” or if you’ve ever said, “Oh, my gosh, I should’ve said that,” after you’ve had a chance to think about it, you have a much better answer than you did that you just blurted out when somebody asked you a question.

And so, we’re not our best selves in these tiny little increments. I talk about brain power momentum. We need time to really muster the full range of not only our talents, and our wisdom, and our skills, and our abilities, but also our diplomacy, and our tact, and our kindness, and our humor, and our empathy so that we can be the best version of ourselves, and we’re not the best version of ourselves in 47-second increments.

Pete Mockaitis
You know, that absolutely rings true. And so, is it your sense that the majority of knowledge workers have the majority of their work day gobbled up by distractable environment time? Or, just how big are we talking here?

Maura Thomas
I do think that. There is some research, it really depends on what’s the average salary and how many people are in the organization.But for an organization that has about 50 employees, making about $50 an hour on average, the average distraction, and this is with the old research, that the distraction is costing somewhere around $1.2 million a year for that organization. So, again, the numbers depend on a whole bunch of different things, but it’s a lot. We all know it’s a lot.

Pete Mockaitis
Yes, understood. That is a meaningful fraction of everybody’s week. So, then tell us, what are the primary culprits of this distraction environment?

Maura Thomas
Yeah, so part of the problem is that we are habituated to distraction. Most people who use technology today have a habit of distraction, and that is on purpose. Our technology has created in us a habit of distraction. So, we’ve gotten to the point where, most people are at the point where doing only one thing at time is really hard and really boring.

And I even find it in myself when I’m watching a TV show or something, or when I’m cooking dinner. Watching TV, I have the itch to scroll my phone, and when I’m cooking dinner, I have an itch to listen to a podcast, or put a book on. I try, and my husband and I have come to this place where we have a commitment we fail a lot, but we have a commitment to being a single-tasking household because the more distracted you are, the more distracted you will be, the more you do multiple things at a time, the harder it will be for you to do only one thing at a time.

But the reverse is also true. So, the more you practice doing one thing at a time, the better you get at doing one thing at a time, and the less itchy you feel about, “Oh, I need to do something else.” And when we’re doing one thing at a time, that’s when we can put our best out into the world.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s intriguing. So, this makes me think of analogs of any sorts of training. Like, you do a thing, you get better at a thing, the muscle gets stronger, the legs get faster, the heart and lungs are able to process more oxygen, and endure longer. It’s sort of like a training effect or adaptation is unfolding. So, I’m curious, do you have a suggested protocol or routine or workout that we might engage in, in order to strengthen that capability of doing one thing at a time and being less itchy?

Maura Thomas
Well, because for most of us it’s a habit, we have a habit of distraction, and so the first step in changing any habit is really the awareness. So, recognizing when you get that itch to do something else, then sort of making the conscious calculation. Probably doing both isn’t a good thing, “So, do I want to just do this thing? Or, do I want to just do that thing?”

And bringing more awareness of when we have the urge to be distracted is the first step in changing any habits. But I would say the practice is start out doing only one thing. If you’re going to watch TV, put your phone in a different room. Try to make it easy for yourself to do only one thing.

Pete Mockaitis
And then, likewise, I’m thinking I guess there’s all sorts of layers or levels or variations of this. Like, with your eating, don’t be eating and watching TV or listening to a podcast.

Maura Thomas
Yeah, there are different ways to multitask, and some are better than others. So, one physical thing and one cognitive thing is better than two cognitive things. So, scrolling your phone while watching TV is probably worse for your multitasking than heating up something in the microwave while you listen to a podcast, because one physical thing and one cognitive thing.

Now, if you are a chef, then you might not want to listen to a podcast while you are creating your meal because that is kind of an artform to you. But if you are not a chef, like me, and you’re just making something that doesn’t require a lot of thought, practicing single-tasking is good but there are also some kinds of multitasking that are worse than other kinds of multitasking.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, that’s good for our download numbers. Thank you, Maura. Understood, there is a distinction there. Okay. So, that’s first, like within us, individually, that’s something we can all do, and that really does sound swell in terms of the impact that can make and the muscle you build.

One of my favorites, I actually have a sheet right here, one my favorite approaches is I make a list of what I did do and what I wanted to do during a phase of work, because I’ll have all these ideas, like, “I want to check the news. I want to check social media. I’m curious about this thing, hmm. I wonder if you can buy a thing that does that. Let’s put it on Amazon.”

And so, all these things pop up, and so I just write them down. And it feels fun because then, after the work session, I get to behold it, and say, “Ooh, look at all these victories I racked up. Each of these was a distraction I did not engage in,” and so I feel a sense of accomplishment there. And when it’s time to indulge these distractions, “Ooh, I’ve got a bunch of things I was curious about and want to play with already cued up for me to go binge and tour.”

Maura Thomas
I love that idea. I love that. I think that’s a great idea. The thing that I try to keep in mind, so there’s a quote I’m told. I went looking for it and I couldn’t find it. Somebody, one of my keynotes told me that it comes from the movie “Hitch.” But the line is “It’s not the moments in your life that matter. It’s the life in your moments that matter.”

And my belief about that is that if you are not present when you’re doing a thing, then you miss both the moments in your life and the life in your moments. And we only get a finite number of moments in our life, and I really would like to be present for every single one of them, cognitively present, not just physical present.

And so, to me, we all need to find the motivation that works because somebody tells you something is good for you, that might not be sufficient motivation, “Yeah, a lot of things are good for me that I don’t do.” But I think each individual has to find the thing that is this the sufficient motivation for them. So, you like your victories, and I like thinking about…I like yours though, I might try that too. But I like thinking about, “How many moments today was I really present for? How much of my life was I just not cognitively there for?” And when the answer is too many, it makes my heart hurt, so.

Pete Mockaitis
No, that’s powerful. And I love the way you’ve described that in terms of these are different flavors of motivation or why that resonate differently. And a heart hurting versus a victory has very different vibes to them, and there could very well be many others that are custom and unique, and for each individual that are really powerfully resonant.

Maura Thomas
And a different day could mean a different thing. On one day, looking at your list might feel amazing, and another day it might be more about the moments. It really depends on the day, too, right? So, we can employ all of them. All of them.

Pete Mockaitis
Yes. Okay. Well, so we talked about some approaches that the individual can use. Tell us, if we are in a position of management or leadership and have some influence with the team and the culture, what are some best and worst practices that we should be considering?

Maura Thomas
Yes. There’s a whole chapter in the book about how much leaders underestimate the influence they have. So, I think it’s really important if you do have people who are on your team for whom you are the leader, at least at work, or really anywhere else, if you are the leader, then you need to realize that you have a lot of influence.

I think that it’s clear that a leader has influence during the work day on somebody who works for them. But I think what they forget, for example, is that how that person feels about their work day, they’re going to carry that home with them and interact with their family in a way that reflects how they felt about their work day.

So, if they had a work day where they said, “Oh, my gosh, that was a great day. I got so much done,” they’re going to go home and be with their family, and they’re going to show up very differently than if they go home, and they’re like, “Oh, my gosh, another day where I’m exhausted, I was busy all day, and still I got nothing done,” they’re going to interact with their family in a very different way.

Also, if you are, for example, sending emails to your team after hours, that’s going to impact the family because I think we’ve all been in a situation, either as the grownup in this situation, or maybe as the child in this situation, where it was like, “Yeah, we’re all going to sit down to dinner, oh, but mom just got the phone call or the email from work, and now mom says, ‘Start dinner without me. I’ll catch up as soon as I can,’” or, “Go to the park. I’ll be there later. Go ahead, do that without me,” or they show up, they’re at the park but they’re really just sitting on the bench on the phone, and not really present in the park.

So, leaders just underestimate so much how much influence they have not only on their team members but on their families. And if you influence families, then you influence communities. And if you influence communities, you influence the whole world. And so, modeling behaviors is really, really important in thinking about people as whole people who have lives outside of work. And when you send that email at night, it doesn’t matter if you say, “Oh, this isn’t important. Don’t worry about it,” your team is going to check it. They’re going to check it, and there’s all kinds of research about that, too.

Pete Mockaitis
Super. So, yeah, just wait, put in drafts, we can schedule it, software will do that for you. Certainly, you’re setting the model.

Maura Thomas
All of that, yes, but also act in a way that is good for your team. Downtime is as important for leaders as it is for everybody who works on their team. And I know a lot of leaders who think it’s such a good example by being the first one in, the last one to leave. I think that’s such a horrible example. It just makes your team want to work more and more and more and more and more.

So, take time off, don’t check in, be away, go on vacation and be on vacation. There are so many different ways that you can model healthy ways to engage at work. And when people, leaders and individual contributors, when people take better care of themselves and they disconnect from work, then they’re actually better at work the next day.

Pete Mockaitis
Absolutely. Can you share with us some other behaviors you recommend modeling and some new thinking? I really love your example there associated with, “Oh, I got to set an example by being there early and staying late.” And I guess, maybe, if your problem is you have a bunch of loafers who are slacking, that might be the example that you need to set for them.

But it seems like, often, these days, we have the opposite problem in terms of working nonstop and being distracted and not getting awesome things accomplished with the time that we do spend. So, having some more leisure does the trick, so model that instead. Any other reframes or paradigm shifts you want to put forward here?

Maura Thomas
Yes. What you just said reminded me, having a team of loafers, I’m sure that there are lazy people but I work with thousands of people in a year, not tens of thousands, not to mention everybody I know and people in my professional network at, I don’t really know a lot of slackers. So, I just want to put out there this idea that, I really want to put this idea of quiet quitting to bed. It was never a thing. It was never a thing.

Some guy on TikTok thought he would get some attention by saying, “I’m going to do the bare minimum at work and see what I can get away with,” and then that turned into this business propaganda that would have leaders, trying to scare leaders into thinking that they have a team full of lazy people, and they need to be careful about their employees are slacking off all the time, and that’s why hybrid and remote work doesn’t work because if you can’t see them, they won’t be working. It’s not a thing.

Everybody wants to show up at work and do the best job that they can. Everybody wants to feel productive and satisfied and accomplished at the end of the day. It’s not a thing. I wrote an article for Forbes called “Why you should want your employees to quiet-quit?” I covered it in the book as well. quiet quitting is just about, “There’s more to life than work.” Maybe.

And maybe I’ll have some better boundaries now than I did before. And maybe I won’t always be checking my email on the weekends. And maybe when I go away on vacation, I’ll actually be on vacation and be present with my family so that I can show up better at the end of my vacation. That’s all that is, it’s boundaries. It’s not lazy people trying to get away with stuff.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Thank you. Well said.

Maura Thomas
Sorry, I feel a little passionate about that.

Pete Mockaitis
No, I think it’s good. And in my experience about the folks I know, when they engage in something that resembles quiet quitting, it’s usually because they keep asking for good meaningful work to be done, and they keep not getting it, and they’re like, “All right, fine. If I’m just going to get minimum amount of stuff that doesn’t actually matter, then I’m going to enjoy myself.” And so, it’s not a matter of, like, “I’m sticking it to you. I’m going lazy mode,” but rather it’s like, “I guess it’s sort of like a consolation price. If I can’t do meaningful work, I guess I’ll just chill a little bit.”

Maura Thomas
Yeah. Well, then address the culture. Address the culture and help people do the meaningful work so that they can enjoy those days. Here’s another sort of contrarian thing or another unconscious calculation. People talk a lot about open-door policy, “We have an open-door policy here.” Well, that word maybe doesn’t mean what you think it means. What do you mean when you say open-door policy?

What I think most people think when they hear open-door policy, they think anyone can drop in on anyone else for any reason at any time. And I don’t think that’s really what we ever intended open-door policy to mean. And some people even think it means, “We are not allowed to close doors here.” And if you’re going to use the phrase open-door policy, you really need to explicitly define it for your team. Otherwise, you’re setting up the company to have a culture of distraction where everybody does drop in on everyone at any moment at any time for any reason, and that’s not a place that is conducive to high-quality knowledge work.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s well said. I always thought, because I do, I love my quiet time, and to be able to just go deep work, focus mode, and make things happen. And so, I always thought that that was an odd phrasing, “My door is always open,” and I thought, “Always? Really?” “My door is always open between 4:00 p.m. and 5:00 p.m. and when you schedule an appointment,” is sort of like how I think that sentence ought to be finished because that’s sort of silly.

Maura Thomas
My metaphorical door, meaning, “I will be here to help you if you need some help,” but open-door policy is not a good way to say that. “My door is always open” is not a good way to say that.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, this is fun, Maura. How about you just keep giving us hot takes? What else do you got for us?

Maura Thomas
Yeah, I think, again, it comes back to distraction is the problem. And if you start looking for distraction in the way that you operate, and in the way that your company operates, all of these, it’s the shining light, and you just start to see, “Oh, my gosh, if I just…that is so distracting. And the way we do this is so distracting, and it’s taking away from our ability to really do meaningful work.”

Now, not to say that collaboration isn’t important. It absolutely is but it needs to be intentional, and it needs to have a purpose, not just, “Hey, I just thought of a random thing, so I’m going to drop this half-formed thought on your lap just because it just popped into my head.” That’s not the best way.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, I’d love it if you could maybe wrap us up by sharing a cool story of an organization, a team, an environment, a culture, where distraction was just causing all sorts of consternation, and then a couple key things folks did, some changes made, and the nifty results that came out on the other side?

Maura Thomas
Yeah. So, what my clients tell me a lot is that they get the unconscious calculations really were interfering so much more than they thought. They really thought that their required 60 hours. And when they managed their distractions, and when they had a conversation with their boss about, “I’m going to be offline occasionally not for hours at a time, but maybe 60 minutes, 90 minutes, maybe even just 20 minutes throughout the day,” it turns out I can get a lot more done in less time, and the quality of my work is higher.

And so, I could name client names, but that’s like the common refrain that I hear. Unconscious calculation, job requires 60 hours. When you really shine a light, when you realize all of the areas of distraction, when you really look at how your work is getting done during the day, you realize you could do so much more.

And if you can get your work done in fewer hours, then how much room does that open up for you to do other things, to learn about other things, to think about other parts of your life, to take up a new hobby, to spend more time with the people that you care about? It just opens the door because people feel like they have space, and they have breathing room, and they can think about other things. And it’s game-changing.

Pete Mockaitis
That is beautiful. And so, the action step there, it sounds like the big one is simply to have that conversation. And maybe it sounds something, like, “Hey, boss,” “Hey, colleague,” “Hey, teammates, I’ve noticed that my whole day is inundated with distraction, and I think I could do much better work more effectively and efficiently if I want to give you a heads up that there’ll be zones of the day, maybe 20 minutes, maybe 90 minutes at a time, in which I am entering a tunnel of focus, deep work mode, whatever you want to call it, and you won’t be hearing from me because I’m doing important stuff, but I’ll reach back out to you soon.”

I’m trying to use my best words. Do you have any suggested verbiage?

Maura Thomas
Yeah. So, here are two specific examples that the words come out of, “In order for this to work, we need to look at two important things. One, how does work flow through our department and get done.” Most people, I find, show up at work and do whatever happens to them. There are just communication coming in, it could be from colleagues, it could be from vendors, it could be from customers, and I’m just dealing with all of that.

And so, work isn’t flowing through me, through the department, through the company, in a systematic logical way. This happens first, and then this happens, and then we do this, and then we do this. And in between that, yeah, we communicate with each other. But you focus on the way the work moves through the organization. That’s the first thing.

Shining a light on that, if you’re not a leader, then just look at the way work comes to you, and look at the things that you are truly getting evaluated on, and really what’s in your…ultimately, in your job description, the thing that you are hired for, and how much of your day do you actually get to spend doing that. So, that piece is the really important thing.

And the second thing to think about is, “How do we communicate as a team?” We have lots of ways to communicate, and, usually, as a team, we don’t create any guidelines. I have a whole chapter in the book about communication guidelines. So, we have 17 different ways to communicate but we use this one in this situation, in general. There are exceptions, right? But this one in this situation, and this one in this situation, and this one in this situation.

Because without that, it really just defaults to personal preference, “Well, you seem to like chat, and Joe seems to like email, and Lisa likes to have meetings, and Marty always likes to call me. And I don’t know, I can’t remember how you all like to do this. So, I’m just going to send everything I need to send in all the ways. I’m going to leave you a voicemail, I’m going to put it on the chat, I’m going to send you an email, and we’ll talk about it in the meeting just for good measure.”

And so, the volume of communication in organizations is way too high, and the efficiency of communication is way too low.

Pete Mockaitis
Very good. Well, Maura, tell me, anything else you want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear about some of your favorite things?

Maura Thomas
Yes, just the last thought I will leave you with is I teach people two primary things. Number one, how to manage their attention, and, number two, how to manage their work, bigger picture. Nobody can do that except you. Nobody can manage your attention except you. No one can manage how your work gets done except you. You get to decide, so it is entirely up to you.

Now, if you’re a leader, yes, you have to help. But bottom line is no one is going to do this for you. If you would like to have days that feel more accomplished, more productive, more satisfying, if you would like to feel less frazzled and flustered, if you would like to have more space in your life to do other things, that is 100% up to you. And I know that many people feel like it isn’t but I’m here to tell you, it is.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that’s powerful. I guess even in, like, the worst-case scenario, it’s like, ain’t nobody in your whole organization budging whatsoever when you raise these things to them. You still have the agency and the ability to make a change, like, “Hey, this is not the organization for me at this time of my life. All right.”

Maura Thomas
Either that or maybe it’s just like, “You know what, I’m going to work differently, and I’m going to see how everybody else around me reacts to that.”

Pete Mockaitis
That’s true.

Maura Thomas
“But I’m going to work in the way that makes the biggest difference for me, that helps me get the most done, that I can put the best of myself out into the organization and into the world, and let’s just see what happens with that because, I bet, the results are going to be better than you think.”

Pete Mockaitis
That really does ring true. I remember I was at a wedding, and I was chatting with a friend, Kelsey, catching up, and she was working in a consulting firm, which could be notorious in terms of demanding clients, and managers and partners, and all that stuff. And I said, “Oh, man, so you just must be working really…” and she said, “Oh, it’s not too bad.”

And it blew my mind. She basically just established boundaries for herself, and I was like almost…my mouth was agape, I was like, “I don’t think I even knew you could do that in that environment.” She said, “Well, I just told them that, ‘Hey, it’s really important to me that I train for this Ironman, I’m bonding with my brother doing that thing, and so I’m probably not going to be working during these times but I’ll give you my best focus and attention during these times, and dah, dah, dah, dah, dah.’”

And I said, “And they went for that?” And she’s like, “Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, and I got promoted.” It is what you say is true. It may feel impossible or scary, and yet if you give it a shot, it just might work out way better than you think.

Maura Thomas
Yes. Yes. And I’m a control freak so that means a lot to me.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, now could you share with us a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Maura Thomas
Yeah, so a couple. One I already gave you, “It’s not the moments in your life that matter. It’s the life in your moments.” Another one that has always kind of resonated with me is kind of two ways to say the same thing, I guess, “Don’t wait for your ship to come in. Swim out to it.” Another way to say that, I have it hanging on my…a little quote I cut it out of a magazine. It’s hanging right on my desk, it says, “Ask for what you want 100% of the time.”

Pete Mockaitis
Okay.

Maura Thomas
It can’t hurt to ask. You might not get what you want but it can’t hurt to ask. It never hurts to ask.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And can you share a favorite study or experiment or bit of research?

Maura Thomas
Yes, I think that I’m really fascinated by Gloria Mark’s research, and how technology is affecting us, and how much it’s costing us not just financially but in all parts of our life because, I think, again, when we’re not present in our moments, then we rob some of the richness from our lives. And when I read Dr. Mark’s research, it just feels…I don’t know why, I should call her Dr. Mark, but I feel like I know her because I am so steeped in her work. But it just smacks me in the face, and just it’s such a good reminder for me about what it’s costing us.

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite book?

Maura Thomas
I have two. One, I think, Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich because that’s where I learned the idea of mastermind groups, and mastermind groups have changed my life. And then, personally, it’s by Gavin de Becker, it’s called The Gift of Fear. And it’s about listening to that. It’s about really how to keep yourself safe. But the reason that the book is so great is because it reads like a thriller, it reads like a mystery thriller, but it’s really about practical life advice. And I’ve given it as a gift to a million people.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And a favorite tool, something you use to be awesome at your job?

Maura Thomas
I don’t know how I would get my life done without Todoist, task manager. I’m a big fan of the folks over at Todoist. We also use their other tool called Twist, which is an alternative to chat tools, it’s a different kind of chat tool, but it is based on asynchronous communication, and I’m a big fan of the folks over at Doist.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And a favorite habit?

Maura Thomas
So, we talked earlier about finding that motivation, and I guess this goes along with the book idea. But I read a book that I guess has been out for a long time, but I just stumbled upon it, and it’s called Younger Next Year. And that book really gave me…everybody knows you’re supposed to exercise and how to take care of yourself, and it’s like, “Yeah, yeah, I’m supposed to exercise. I know.” It wasn’t enough to get me to exercise. The information in this book made me go, “Oh, oh, oh, now I get it. Now, I understand why I really…why it matters every single day,” and it really has had an impact. So, favorite habit is exercise.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And is there a particular nugget you share that really seems to connect and resonate with folks; they quote it back to you often?

Maura Thomas
Yes. The thing I hear that resonates most is the way that I reframe. I don’t think I said it specifically this way today but how you manage your time really doesn’t matter unless you also manage your attention. So, what matters more than time management is attention management.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Maura Thomas
MauraThomas.com is the best place to learn all the things.

Pete Mockaitis
And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Maura Thomas
Yes, try to be more present more often. Manage your attention and make the most of your moments.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Maura, this has been a treat. I wish you much luck and fun and well-managed attention.

Maura Thomas
Thanks for having me, Pete. It’s been a pleasure.

Apr 06
0

854: Mastering Your Surprise Career Super Power: Notetaking with Anh Dao Pham

By | Podcasts | 3 Comments

 

Anh Dao Pham shares pro tips on developing the most underrated skill that makes a world of difference: note-taking.

You’ll Learn:

  1. Why note-taking is a powerful differentiator
  2. The four-hour investment that ends up saving hundreds of hours
  3. How to synthesize your notes for maximum impact

About Anh

Anh Dao Pham, VP of Product & Program Management at Edmunds.com, has successfully led technical projects for two decades at start-ups and major corporations. In her book Glue: How Project Leaders Create Cohesive, Engaged, High-Performing Teams, Anh vividly brings compassionate, positive, nimble leadership to life, demonstrating with actionable guidance, the power of caring and connection to inspire outstanding results.

Anh lives with her husband and two children in Los Angeles, California.

Resources Mentioned

Anh Dao Pham Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Anh, welcome back to How to be Awesome at Your Job.

Anh Dao Pham
Thank you so much for having me back, Pete.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m excited to chat, and I think this may be the shortest follow-up interview we’ve ever had with a guest because you teased note-taking. I asked, listeners said, “Yes, yes, yes” numerous times, so we’re back, we’re talking note-taking, and I’m excited.

Anh Dao Pham
I’m excited, too. I’m always thrilled when people tell me they’re excited about note-taking because I always feel like I’m such a geek when I talk about it, but it is such an important skill so I’m so delighted that some of your listeners were interested in this topic, and I’m hoping that we give them what they want.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, me, too. And I thought we might start with, I know you use jingles to celebrate and commemorate things, any recent jingles that have tickled you and/or your teammates?

Anh Dao Pham
I haven’t written a jingle recently but I did write a very short “Roses are red, violets are blue” for you here.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, boy.

Anh Dao Pham
Just two, just so that…a couple here. First,

“Roses are red, violets are blue
Hello there, Pete,
I’m happy to see you.”

I thought it was nice for us to be together again, so thank you for that. And then the second for your note-taking crew,

“Roses are red, violets are blue
note-taking is awesome
And so are you.”

So, hopefully, everybody gets excited at this point about note-taking.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s right. And heartwarming. All right. Okay, Anh, you mentioned in the last conversation that note-taking is your superpower. Can you tell us what’s super about it and why should professionals spend time working on this skill?

Anh Dao Pham
Well, note-taking has a ton of advantages. I feel like it’s one of the most underrated skills that we just don’t ever think about investing in. And, for me, it’s been so important to my career that I’d call it the cornerstone of my career. It’s like that one skill that, whenever I talk to people, I say, “You really have to think about note-taking,” and they’re always like, “Yeah, yeah, Anh, that sounds great but I may be not that interested.” But, to me, there’s really a few different benefits.

The first is people’s perception of you, and this is something that I don’t think people think about, but if you’ve, in particular, been in any sort of leadership position where you’re facilitating a meeting or having a discussion with people, and they see you taking notes and you’re typing, and you type slowly, their perception of you is not that you’re necessarily the smartest person.

And this is something that I feel like goes unspoken, but if you watch somebody typing, and they’re like pecking at the keyboard, you might perceive that they’re not as intelligent as they actually are. And that’s, I don’t think, an accurate representation in any way but it does affect people’s perception, in particular, if you’re facilitating a meeting and you’re taking notes slowly, and you’re slowing down the entire meeting.

Their perception of you is not that great. And so, I think mastering good note-taking is important just to make sure that people have a certain amount of respect for you when you’re doing your job if you’re taking notes.

The second is, at least for me, note-taking has been something that’s really made my learning process efficient. So, one of the things that I do, I do religiously in all of my meetings, is take notes. Whether or not I’m going to publish them or not, I take notes. And, for me, it just crystallizes my learning on things so it’s a part of my learning process.

And I started taking notes when I was in college. I was a math major and I was pretty lazy in summary cards. You don’t think of mathematicians as lazy but we kind of are. We’re looking for the most efficient way to do things, or maybe we’re advocates of efficiency is a better way to put it. But I was also a very slow reader. I just couldn’t go through textbooks. And anytime I was studying for a course and you had to read multiple chapters in the textbook, I just couldn’t get through that material.

And I had stumbled upon an article about note-taking, and they said, basically, if you take notes in some sort of structured format, then it improves your recall ability dramatically. And so, what I did was I just started taking notes in outline format, which is like a really traditional way to do it, in all of my lectures, and it was so effective when I was in college that I actually stopped buying the textbooks, like I didn’t read them.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, there you go.

Anh Dao Pham
Yeah, I went to lectures, I took good notes, and then I reviewed the notes, and most of the time, the professors would cover the material that was needed from the textbook in their lectures. And so, if I took good notes, I didn’t actually need to purchase the textbook anymore. So, after a couple of quarters, I just stopped altogether, so it saved me a ton of money, and I did well in those courses. I did pretty well.

I was at UCLA, and I got a pretty decent GPA coming out of college. So, it was really, really effective for me and has, to this day, been one of the reasons why people often compliment me on my memory. They’re always like, “You have such a great memory.” It’s like, “No, actually, I just spend a lot of time processing the information through note-taking, and that crystallizes my learning in a way that I feel like other people who were not participating as much, will have that as an advantage.”

Pete Mockaitis
That’s cool. And in your book Glue, on the chapter about note-taking, you mentioned that when you are consistently taking notes and sending them out, you’re really effectively cementing the impression of being a subject matter expert to those that you’re sending the notes to. Can you tell us about that?

Anh Dao Pham
That’s right. Absolutely. I see note-taking as a way to actually get informal power, and so I tell people that information is power. And when you capture information and you send it out and distribute it, you start to become seen as a subject matter expert on the information that you’re putting out there. There’s a misconception that you capture information and some people will capture information and hoard it as a source of power, but to me it’s actually the opposite.

If you think about, let’s say, reputable newspapers or content sites, the reason that people see them as an expert is because they put their content out there. And then when people think of a topic or a question, they know where to go for that information, and note-taking happens in the same way. So, if you’re the person who consistently is taking notes and then sending them out, and they’re good notes, then the people will start to see you as that person who knew this information, publishes information, and a place that they can go to get the information.

And that shifts the dynamic from somebody who’s just sort of a bystander in a meeting to somebody who actually holds information and is somebody who has a certain amount of power and influence in the situation.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, now my brain is going to Bob Cialdini who endorsed your book. Kudos.

Anh Dao Pham
He’s amazing.

Pete Mockaitis
He’s one of my favorites. We were delighted to have him on the show when we finally got him. So, anyways, I’m thinking about the tools or principles of influence – reciprocity. I’m just thinking about how many times folks have been able to miss meetings either because they just want to save some time, or they really had some other obligations going on, and they were able to look to your notes to really save the day.

And so, I’m thinking, over your career, you’ve done that for many people many times, and I would hope that that gives you a little bit of sway when it’s time for you to ask for some help or some favors or some assistance.

Anh Dao Pham
Yeah, I would agree with that a hundred percent. The principle of reciprocity, I cannot even say that word, reciprocity is another thing that I talk about in the book, and also think a lot about in my career. And the interesting thing about that principle is that it’s not about giving something to get in that specific moment. It’s about establishing a pattern of giving and giving that benefit to other people so that at the time that you go to them at a later date, they actually are able to reciprocate and to provide something back to you because they’ve had that good feeling from you if you’re giving them something.

And I get this all the time, “Oh, I miss the meeting. Thank you so much for the recap. I was able to catch up.” In fact, oftentimes, the notes are way more efficient than being in the meeting. In particular, if you don’t need to be an active participant in the meeting to have the discussion but you need to understand what the outcome is, the notes are tremendously helpful.

I’ve had times before where, as an example most recently, one of our legal team members was asked a question, and he was searching through all of his documentation for anything about a particular discussion, and he said, “The most helpful information I found was actually from this recap that Anh took.” And I went back and looked at the notes, I was like, “I don’t remember this discussion at all. I’m so glad that we wrote it all down.”

And office settings often, in particular when you’re moving very fast, there isn’t a lot of things, there aren’t a lot of people who actually document things. And so, when you start doing that, it becomes often the system of record for whatever the discussion was that happened, and it helps all the people thereafter, either in the moment because they missed it, in some sort of a reminder capacity, like, “I can’t remember exactly what we talked about. I remember we covered this at some point.” Or, even very much later, like through this legal inquiry, some indicator of what was actually discussed and why we did it.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s beautiful. Well, shifting gears now into the how, you mentioned that in some ways, just your sheer typing speed is foundational. Can you speak to that?

Anh Dao Pham
Yes, typing speed is extremely important. Actually, out there, there are studies that talk about note-taking and how taking notes with a pen and pencil is actually more effective in terms of your ability to remember things. I actually believe that that’s kind of bunk but there are studies about that. I think the active, actually, taking information and then participating in it, that actually crystallizes things.

If you’re in an office setting, I would argue that typing is the equivalent of doing that pen and paper activity as long as you’re actually participating. But in order to be able to participate, you can’t be slowed down by your own skill to capture the information, so typing speed is extremely important. And I always tell people, if I notice them not typing as fast as I think that they can, to spend some time investing in themselves in that typing speed.

We always have people complain about how they don’t have enough time in their day, and if you spend a lot of time actually responding to emails or reading things or writing memos, this is a place where you can actually improve your efficiency significantly, and it doesn’t actually take that much investment. When I actually started typing, I was in high school, actually my transition from high school to college, and I attempted to go and get a job at a temp agency.

And at the time, I think I was around 18 or so. I got tested for my typing speed, and I came in at something like 40 words per minute. I’d never actually put in a concerted effort to improve my typing speed. And the people who were helping with the hiring said frankly to me, “Hey, this is just not going to cut it. Nobody is going to hire you for a temp position if you don’t get this typing speed up.”

And at the time I went home, and I happen to find a really old spiral-bound typing speed book that my mom had used when she was younger. And I picked it up, and I did a handful of drills, and I think I spent maybe three or four hours or so just doing a handful of drills. And then a couple days later, I went back and took the test again, and my typing speed was up to 60 words per minute.

So, it wasn’t actually that big of an investment. And if you think, if you currently type 45 words per minute and you can increase your typing speed to 60 words per minute, that’s like a pretty significant improvement in your efficiency, and it doesn’t take that much to invest in yourself to get that typing speed up. So, I feel like everybody should take a moment to do that if they haven’t already.

It’s funny, because when I say this or when people read the book, they’re like, “I went and tested myself, like right after I read that chapter.” And they’re always reporting their typing speed to me, I was like, “Great. Great. Do that.”

Pete Mockaitis
“Thank you.” You’ve seen a lot of these unsolicited reports. Well, you’re bringing some fond memories back. I remember I found a transcriptionist and he was so gung-ho. I think it was in one of those contractor platforms, like Fiverr or Upwork or something, and he said, “I’ve already started on it, and you can see.” And then he showed the Google Document which he was transcribing quickly, I was like, “Okay, there you go. That’s impressive.”

As well as he had a video in his portfolio, he was like, “Look at me on TypeRacer.com,” which is a website I’ve been to, to see, “Sure enough, you can type very fast.” And that’s impressive, and not just when you’re hiring a transcriptionist but for any number of roles. And I think there was an episode of “The Apprentice” back in the day.

I think maybe Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, why I remember this, maybe because it left an impression. He was typing so slowly, I was shocked.

Anh Dao Pham
And didn’t it affect your perception of him?

Pete Mockaitis
Well, it did, and I already knew, like he’s a fraudster criminal, and it made it worse, and he can’t type fast. So, it makes an impression. I just want to mention, so right now, AI is so hot right now, and the ability for automated transcription to occur. What are your thoughts on that? Does that make it less important to be able to type quickly?

Anh Dao Pham
No, I think that, at the end of the day, typing is a way of processing information, so it depends on what you’re trying to use it for. Like, as an example, if you’re going to transcribe a podcast and you’re putting it out there because you want the content out there, then I think there’s absolutely no harm in doing some sort of automated transcription. You’re not actually trying to learn the material or do something with it. You’re just trying to make it available.

But, for me, the main reason I like to do note-taking or that I practice it religiously is because it does help me learn. And so, if you’re taking advantage of a tool to do that work for you, you actually lose out on the benefit of processing the information. When I think about typing and taking notes, the reason that it helps improve your memory is that you’re processing information multiple ways.

So, let’s say you’re in a meeting and you’re taking good notes, you’re listening to the information that’s coming in, and then you’re participating in the meeting, so, obviously, you’re likely there because you have some role to play. So, you’re participating in having some discussion, that’s like two ways, “I’m listening. I’m talking.” That’s another way to process the information.

And then if I actually write it down, I’m processing it a third way. So, all in the span of a one-hour meeting, I’ve now triple-processed the information. And it’s not just about writing the information down, but if you actually take the time to reorganize the information or write it in your own words, then you’re processing it another time. So, you’re like taking in the information and then outputting it in a way that is in your own words so that you can confirm that understanding.

So, all in that span of time, if you’re using your fast note-taking abilities and processing all this information, that information is going to get crystallized in your brain in a way that other people who are just listening or just speaking and not taking in all those different activities at the same time are not going to have to their advantage. So, that’s why you’ll come out of the meeting and learn this information so much more quickly.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. So, let’s say we have invested just a few hours in our typing speed, and it’s gone way up. Cool. Tremendous return on investment there. So, then let’s zoom in. We’re in an actual meeting, we’ve got our laptop, and our fast typing skills. I’m wondering if folks, right from the get-go, are thinking, “Is this even appropriate for me to whip out the laptop and be clanking away? Is this something that’s going to be distracting, annoying? Is this just more for junior people?” Can you talk to us about any resistance folks might have in the moment?

Anh Dao Pham
It’s really funny because I used to work in a startup called Opower, and at the time, I was the first person there who was a program manager. I was director of program management, and I was in charge of hiring other people for my team. And when I put out the job description, we put out an exercise. And in the exercise, it was just a handful of questions that the job applicants had to answer in advance. And one of the questions I’d put on there was, “How fast do you type?”

And the funniest thing about that question was it was the most controversial and telling question on the pre-application. Some people would write back, and the answers were so funny.

Pete Mockaitis
“It shouldn’t matter how fast I type.”

Anh Dao Pham
Exactly. Like, we did. We actually got responses like that, like, “This is not an admin job” was one of the responses, or, “I’m a hunt and pecker,” which was so funny to respond that way, but people were actually offended about this question, that they felt like it was beneath them. And, to me, that’s really telling when it’s like you should have the humility to do this work if it needs to be done on your project. So, if you’re thinking you’re above that, in any job, in anything that makes you better at your job, you should be willing and want to do.

And so, I feel like if there’s an ego there about it, you’re just shooting yourself on the foot by not taking advantage of this particular skill or this opportunity to do that. But I do see resistance because there is a certain amount of ego with it. Now, I would say, though, that most of the time the ego is coupled with a lack of skill. So, it’s like, “Why would you push back on it if you could do it?” It just seems like an odd combination. So, we do see some of that resistance.

Now, in the scope of actual meetings, and I come from a project management background but now I also do product management work, and I’m on the executive team, and I still go into meetings and take notes. And you would think, like, “Hey, as Anh moves up in her career, she’s going to do this less.” It’s like, no, actually, I’m not because, again, I think it becomes a very valuable resource, it’s important for my learning process, and people really appreciate it. So, why wouldn’t I continue to do that?

And people have come to know that I do this. They will rely on this skill, sometimes maybe too much, but they’ll rely on this skill, and this is something they can count on with me if they’re not able to attend a meeting, it’s like, “Hey, are you attending? Could you share your notes with me?” That’s like a huge benefit for them and it’s something that I think I’m always going to do.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. That’s good. And no one has ever said, “Hey, cut it out,” or looked annoyed, like, “Ugh, your keyboard noise is such a distraction and annoying us, Anh.”

Anh Dao Pham
No, actually. And I do have long nails so I do clank a little bit on the keyboard. Now, if I’m in a meeting or on a Zoom or something, and you can hear the clanking, then I’ll mute myself so that it doesn’t happen. The only thing I would say is if you’re maybe on a one-on-one situation, and you’re sitting there, staring at your computer while you’re taking notes, or you’re concentrating so much on that, that’s not a great situation.

Some of those smaller form meetings, you might want to pay more attention to the conversation, or you might at least give a prerequisite or preamble before you actually start taking notes, like, “Hey, I’m going to be taking notes, but the reason I’m taking notes is because I’m listening to you so intently, and I want to make sure that I’m capturing this information.”

So, you can give that up front so that people know that that’s important to you for the purposes of this meeting. I’ve actually participated in interviews with companies before where the interviewer, it was just me and him, and he said, “Hey, this is a part of my process, so just know when I’m staring intently into the camera, I’m taking notes and it’s not you. It’s because I’m really trying to listen and make sure that I captured everything.”

So, I think you can phrase it in such a way, with whoever you’re meeting with, to let them know that this is an important part of the process, and that’s why you’re doing it, and that should cut out any hesitation for you taking on that task.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. So, we got the typing speed up, hesitations are behind us, we’re in the moment, what do we actually do?

Anh Dao Pham
So, there’s a couple phases in the book I break this down on note-taking. In the very beginning of a project, oftentimes, you’ll start a project and not actually know what’s going on. And so, if you’re in a meeting and you’re trying to facilitate and you’re trying to take notes, sometimes that’s very difficult. And so, I call this phase the fake-it-till-you-make-it phase.

And the idea here is you’re listening intently, you’re asking questions when you don’t understand things, but you’re trying not to slow down the discussion or the meeting. And so, one thing you can do is if there are things that you really need clarification on, you can sort of jot them down. Sometimes I’ll create my own private note section, like, “Note to myself: Ask about this later because I don’t want to slow this down.”

But in the span of the meeting, what you want to do is try to capture the most salient points, the most important things, and there’s really only a couple of categories. One is, “What are the key decisions that are being made?” And then, two is, “Are there any sort of follow-up items or action items? And who’s going to be responsible for those?”

And in a meeting where you don’t exactly know what’s going on, and sometimes maybe they’re even using jargon that you don’t fully understand, the most important thing is to write down accurately what is being stated. And if you’re unsure, you can always prompt somebody, like, “Hey, I heard this word. It sounds like a decision was made. Is that true? If so, can somebody just restate the decision for clarity?”

And when you do that, it actually helps the meeting because, oftentimes, people will say, “Okay, great.” They’ll have a discussion and they’ll seem to have come to some sort of consensus, and then they’ll move on, but nobody actually stated the decision at the very end. And sometimes when you do that, and prompt, like, “Hey, I heard a decision or I think we made a decision. Can somebody state that?” It will actually clarify that maybe something was missed or maybe somebody had a slightly different understanding of the decision, so you’re actually helping the process by asking that question.

And then once it gets stated in a clear enough way, you can say, “Okay, so I heard this is the decision,” state the decision, and then write it down. So, you’re sort of capturing the most important things. And that, to me, is sort of the fake-it-till-you-make-it stage. And if there is jargon that is being used in that state where you don’t fully understand what they’re saying, you just make sure to repeat back, “This is what I heard you say. Is that right?” And then write that down in the way that they said it.

It’s not as important in this phase that you understand the notes as it is that the people who are in the meeting understand the notes and what’s next. And so, there you just want to capture exactly what they said, and a note to yourself to learn and understand it later. And then you can follow up with the person, ask those questions to make sure that you fully understand what you’re sending out. Don’t send out things that you don’t understand. Capture them and then make sure you understand them before you send it out because that’s how you’re going to get the benefit, ultimately.

So, that, to me, is like really the first phase. And then, over time, what you want to do is sort of graduate to a more, I’d say, mature note-taking phase where you’re then sort of going through the process, participating in the meeting, and then taking notes but organizing the information as you’re going along. And when we talk about note-taking, people ask me all the time, like, “Well, what’s the secret?” I was like, “Well, I don’t just take notes. I’m actually participating and then I’m summarizing the information in my own words.” And there’s a lot of benefits to that.

The first is really that when people speak, it doesn’t always make for good notes. If you capture everything verbatim, there’s uhms and ahhs, there’s pauses, there’s twists and turns, they might repeat themselves five times. It doesn’t make sense for you to write everything that everybody is saying. What you want to do is capture what the point of that discussion was. So, take a moment to sort of rephrase it for yourself in the most concise way, and then type that down.

And then, as you’re going through the meeting, you’re participating. And if you have read my book Glue, there’s actually two chapters next to each other. It’s the note-taking chapter, and then the next chapter is about synthesis. And I think, when you’re doing really successful note-taking or good note-taking, you’re actually practicing both skills at the same time. And so, note-taking is sort of the act of writing down the information and organizing it, but how do you actually organize the information? And there’s a few different ways to do it, through different techniques of synthesis.

And the simplest way of synthesis is to actually just try to sequence things. So, if somebody’s describing a process or a plan to do something, you’re kind of like sitting there and trying to write these things down in order. So, as people are talking through it, it’s like, “Okay, we needed to do step one.” “Okay, great. I captured that.” Then, suddenly, they’re talking about step two, and then it’s like, “Oh, well, actually, there’s something that needs to happen before that.” So, then you sort of reorganize that information and sequence it in a way.

Think of it as like I talk to my mom about recipes that she cooks for Vietnamese food, and sometimes she gives those steps in all different orders. Like, she doesn’t have anything written down because a lot of Asian cooks don’t. They don’t have recipes. They just kind of feel their way through. And when she conveys the information to me for how to cook something, I step back and go, “Okay, I heard you said this, this, and this,” and I’m like writing those down as if they were instructions that I could follow later. And that is a way to sort of synthesize the information.

So, when you’re taking good notes, you’re doing that. You’re not sort of just capturing anything as it comes along because then your steps may not be all out of order. You’re actually synthesizing them into something that’s useful and structured. And that, to me, is sometimes hard to do, but if you practice it over time, you get really good at it.

And when you’re doing it as well, it also helps you identify if there are gaps. So, in the book, I give an example about cooking chicken pho. It’s a recipe, and my mom’s giving me these instructions, and she says, like, “Hey, you’ve got these vegetables, you need to chop them up. And then you need to do X, Y, and Z.” And at the end, after I write it all down, I realize, “I didn’t do anything with these vegetables that I chopped up. What do I do with them?”

But if I didn’t sequence the information out, I wouldn’t necessarily realize that the vegetables didn’t go anywhere. And so then, it’s like, “Hey, mom, I missed the vegetables. Where do they go?” It’s like, “Okay, well, you add them at this point in time.” It’s like, “Okay, let me slot that in where it needs to happen.” And so, that active synthesis really helps you make sure that you fully understand the information.

So, when you’re capturing the information and then, ultimately, sending out, that it’s like 100% accurate, and you’ve helped identify potentially gaps in the information that you’ve plugged in as a part of that discussion.

Pete Mockaitis
So, sequence is fantastic in terms of, “How do I do this thing?” and in the course of a meeting, we say, “Oh, we should do this.” “Oh, but first I guess we got to do that.” “Oh, but that’s really going be contingent on this.” And so then, that really is super value added in terms of we had a jumble of discussion, and then what’s coming out the other side is, “Oh, here are the six steps. One, two, three, four, five, six. You made it look easy, Anh. Cool.”

So, that’s one style or approach of synthesis is sequence, chronology. Are there any other key frameworks or schemas that are handy when it comes to synthesizing?

Anh Dao Pham
Yeah, another active synthesis that I describe in the book is I call it inference. And so, this is like a really simple technique where you try to collect multiple pieces of information, and then you try to extrapolate another piece of information out of that. So, one of the mistakes that you’ll make maybe early on when you’re even participating in meetings, regardless of whether or not you’re taking notes, is you just take statements at face value.

So, it’s like, “Anh’s going to go on vacation this week. Pete has Anh scheduled for a podcast this week.” Those are two pieces of information. Now, if you’re not thinking about them, you just write those two pieces of information down, but if you’re thinking about them, you realize, “Anh’s on vacation this week, and Pete’s got a podcast. Well, Anh’s not going to make that podcast and we need to reschedule it.” There’s an extrapolation that happens.

And sometime those seems super obvious but, when you’re in a meeting, and when you’re in a lot of meetings throughout the day, oftentimes people are only participating and thinking about their one piece of it. So, I might only think about my thing, you might only think about your thing, and nobody’s connecting the two dots together.

And so, the act of inferences take those pieces of information, and then if you dare extrapolate and make another statement, a conclusion based off of that, just to make sure that you understand what the result is. So, maybe in this specific example, we say, “Oh, Anh is not going to be there for the podcast so we’ve got to reschedule it.” And I might say, “Oh, no, no, no, Pete is so special that I’m going to come out of my vacation and I’m going to take this call with him so that I can be on this podcast.” And you’re like, “Okay,” and all worked out.

So, the extrapolation was incorrect in that statement, but we clarified something that was really important that everybody missed and nobody said it out loud.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s fun.

Anh Dao Pham
And so, to me, that’s a great skill and it’s really simple. The one thing on that skill that you have to be okay with is getting things wrong. And I think in note-taking, in general, or any sort of synthesis, you have to be okay with getting things wrong and having people correct you, and it’s not until people have corrected you enough and you got it right in the way that you’ve written it down, that you know that you understand the material, so you have to get pass that, but I think the benefits are huge.

Pete Mockaitis
Certainly. And I think that can, over time, expose some themes and patterns in terms of, “Oh, okay, this person will make vacation exceptions for super important things,” or, “Does not ever want to be interrupted on their vacation.” And so, that’s a very narrow extrapolation or theme or pattern recognition.

And then, in a way, it’s even helpful for the individuals in terms of, “Oh, here’s how I’m communicating, and here’s what’s often missed. Okay.” And you mentioned that when you are taking your notes, what you want to record, the most critical things such as the decisions made and the action items, who will do what by when. To what extent do we want to share the key considerations of those decisions?

Because sometimes those conversations are quite meandering, and then they landed on a decision. And sometimes they’re quite clear, “Oh, this critically hinges upon four key inputs.” So, how do you think about note-taking in these environments?

Anh Dao Pham
Yeah, I’d say it’s kind of an elevation of note-taking. So, if you’re in the beginning, and you’re still just trying to keep up with the Joneses in your note-taking, then it’s fine to capture just the most salient points, meaning the key decisions and the action items. I think that’s like the minimum that you really want to capture in order for your notes to be useful to others.

But once you progress to being able to extrapolate and organize information in your note-taking, and, ideally, doing that in real time because you’re participating, then you do want to be capturing the why. And I think that is one of the biggest things that helps you actually remember the material, is understanding the why.

It’s very difficult to just understand or remember words verbatim unless they’re maybe in a song, or the alphabet, or you have some sort of moniker for them. But when you actually understand the underlying reason, you don’t actually have to necessarily understand or remember the outcome. You can kind of reason your way there, if that makes sense.

A similar example from memory was when I was in high school, I took the Calc BC test to see if I could get credit for my Calculus course. And our teacher had covered this concept called the trapezoid rule, which is a way to calculate the area of a particular shape through an integration, or through an integral, and he explained how it was actually put together.

So, when you actually do the trapezoid rule, basically what you do is you take a line of the curve, and then you split it into trapezoids, and then you add all the trapezoids together, and that’s how you actually come up with the total are below the curve. This is like me super geeking out on the math side of things. But when I got to the AP test for this calculus exam, the first thing on the test was this trapezoid rule, and I remembered coming out of it, and everybody was, like, “Oh, my gosh, does anybody here remember the trapezoid rule? Like, how could you possibly remember that?”

And it’s like, “Well, I remembered how he explained it to me. I remember that you had to actually create trapezoids, and I know how to calculate the area of a trapezoid so I just kind of was able to derive the formula as I was going through.” And I know that was such a geek example but it stuck with me so much because I remember, like, “Well, because he explained the why, and I understood how it worked, I didn’t actually have to remember the formula at the very end.”

And so, to your point, if you’re going through and you’re having these conversations, if you can capture the why, participate in the why, then you may not even need to remember the outcome because if somebody is asking, you can say, “Oh, well, I remember we talked about this and that, and this was good. And so, the conclusion must’ve been this.” And I think that that’s very powerful as well to have that information so that you can reason through those things.

Pete Mockaitis
That is really good. And I find that when I don’t have an understanding of a why, or the why is just nonsense to me, I have a hard time remembering anything associated with the conversation or anything there. So, that’s really insightful.

Anh Dao Pham
It’s like your brain almost discards the information. It’s like a superfluous piece of information, you’re like, “That didn’t make sense. It didn’t fit into the puzzle pieces of my brain, so I’m just going to kind toss it out.” And then once you truly understand that, whether or not you agree with it is a different question, but if you at least understand the reason that got you there, then, typically, you’re going to remember the answer.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And then any tips when it comes to shorthand, organization, or sending them out, or platforms?

Anh Dao Pham
I mostly advise people to use the tools that are most easy for them to use. You want to use what’s most comfortable for you. So, this is like a really simple example but at my office, we used to have computers in the room, in the conference rooms, for our meetings, and then you could also bring your laptop and plug it in.

And one of the things that I would do pretty regularly is I would bring up the conference room with a computer, and then put my notes documents up on the screen so that people could see it, but then I would actually take notes from my laptop. So, it was just projecting the information through one mechanism and taking notes from my laptop.

One time a person asked me, “Why do you do that?” I was like, “Well, I type much faster on my laptop because the keyboard is the keyboard that I practice on. The keys are a certain height. I’m just more comfortable there.” And it’s such a small tip but if you are much faster on your laptop, then go ahead and use that as advice.

And, similarly, if you’re very familiar with a particular word processing program, if you much prefer Word or Google Docs or something like that, use the mechanism that you think is going to be the fastest and easiest for you to use. Then if you send them out, you might want to translate them or post them somewhere in a shared document, depending on what your company uses, but I’d say when you’re at least capturing the information, use the device and tools that are most comfortable for you.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And when you mentioned your book, when you send them out, you want to do so as promptly as possible.

Anh Dao Pham
Yes, you do because, honestly, things move so fast that the information may be invalid or have changed over time. So, if I sit too long sometimes on a recap, sometimes people have completed the action items and they’ve already come to slightly different conclusions. So, you want the information to go out as timely as possible, and you want it to be timely and accurate and concise if possible, and to get them to the broadest population that you can that’s relevant to them.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, Anh, tell me, anything else you want to make sure to mention before we hear about more of your favorite things?

Anh Dao Pham
I’d say the only thing that I wanted to reiterate is I think that, again, note-taking is a very learnable skill, and it’s one of the things that people don’t pay attention to, they don’t think about investing in, and I think that there are so many different benefits if you just invest a little bit more in yourself, that you’ll have. This is in your arsenal for the rest of your career, and reap those benefits.

And I feel like the only thing you need to get over is, if you don’t type very fast, and don’t practice this skill often, just to let your ego get out of the way, and spend a little bit of time, and know that it’s going to benefit you over the course of your career.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, Anh, we spoke pretty recently but you mentioned that you did prepare some additional favorite things. So, lay it on us, how about another favorite quote?

Anh Dao Pham
So, recently, I was reading a book called Be Water, My Friend by Shannon Lee. It’s a book about the philosophies of Bruce Lee. And my favorite quote from the book is “The usefulness of a cup is in its emptiness.” And maybe this goes along with that sort of theme of getting out of your own way. One of the things that they talk about in the book is there’s a proverb about a person who is meeting a Zen master, and he’s talking about something, and his Zen master is trying to give him feedback but he’s not listening to anything.

And so, the Zen master takes tea and starts pouring it into a cup, and then the cup starts overflowing, and the person says, “The cup is overflowing. It can’t hold any more tea.” He’s like, “Well, how can you learn anything if your mind is already full.” And I love that quote because it reminds me, if I’m sort of struggling with something, maybe it’s because I have a preconceived notion or something, my mind is too full that it can’t receive the information to understand the truth.

And I feel like when I get stuck, I’ll often think about that, like, “Is there a way that I, again, could be looking at this differently or sort of letting go of some particular assumption or reservation that I have in order to get out of my own way?”

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite study or experiment or bit of research?

Anh Dao Pham
Have you seen the TED Talk by Derek Sivers: How to start a movement?

Pete Mockaitis
You know, I think I have long ago.

Anh Dao Pham
It’s one of my favorites. I think it’s a two-minute TED Talk, really, really short. And what I love about it is it’s entertaining as well as it packs a punch of a message. And, basically, he shows a video of a person who’s sort of like dancing like a crazy person on a hill. It’s a hill with a bunch of people who were sort of sitting, maybe it’s like a picnic or a show or something.

And there’s one person who gets up, and he starts dancing. And then after he’s dancing for a period of time, then one second person gets up and starts dancing. And then just a few minutes later, all of a sudden, people swarm together and start dancing together. And he says, “Hey, we’ve started a movement.”

And the interesting thing about this is he says people think about leadership as the first person who actually started the movement, but, actually, it was the first follower who was the most impactful because the first follower joins that leader, and the quote is, “Without the first follower, the leader is just a lone nut.”

And I love that because it stresses the importance of being not necessarily the person who’s typically designated as leader, but a leader in a different capacity. And, in a way, I think note-taking is kind of similar to that. Sometimes you’re offering support in your role, and when you offer support, it offers a different kind of leadership. And the first follower is actually the person who helps create the movement. Without the second person, there never would’ve been a swarm of other people.

So, if you haven’t seen the TED Talk, I highly recommend it. It’s not exactly a study but the message packs a powerful punch.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And a favorite book?

Anh Dao Pham
I was thinking about different books. I read books in all different genres. And kind of in the note-taking theme, I actually have two favorite books on the topics of writing, and these were books that I read when I was writing Glue. The first is On Writing Well by William Zinsser, and it’s a book about writing nonfiction. He actually talks, too, about if you’re writing in business but you’re not a person who’s aspiring to be an author, how important it is to be able to express your words concisely. And I found that it was just such an impactful book, not long at all, but just packed a great message.

The second book on writing is Stephen King, an author that I’m sure everybody is familiar with, called On Writing. It’s more about writing fiction, but I think both of them just teach you that there are so much more to learn in the craft of writing. And while note-taking isn’t the same as writing a book, I think it just reminds you that there are ways that you can always improve on what you’re doing, and something that you’re doing every day on a daily basis in your jobs.

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite tool?

Anh Dao Pham
It’s funny because I’ve been saying, “I really like typing so I like to do everything electronically,” but my favorite tool is actually Post-Its, Post-it notes. I love Post-it notes. When I have lots of tasks that I needed to do, I’ve got lots of Post-it notes all over my desk. In fact, you can see when I’m really busy because I’ll  have lots of Post-it notes everywhere.

But I use them for facilitating meetings. If you’re doing sort of any in-person discussion, or any sort of brainstorming, or clustering exercises. I love all of that. If you’re doing timelines, it’s easy to plot things out in a timeline. Or, in a case where you maybe don’t want to take notes or you have the luxury of having people in person, and you want to sequence information. This is great. You can write a Post-it, you can move them around. It’s wonderful. I love them so much that people will joke sometimes that I must’ve invested in 3M.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And a favorite habit?

Anh Dao Pham
I read a lot. And I feel like people forget that they can read to get information. Probably not your listeners. I think maybe they do like to read, and you have a lot of guests who are authors, but one of the things I find so beautiful about today is that you can learn about almost anything you want to learn about because there are so many resources out there through videos, through blogs, etc. But I love reading books. I feel people gravitate now to online content for a lot of things, or short-term content, but I feel there’s nothing better than a really well-put together book.

Pete Mockaitis
And is there a key nugget you’re known for?

Anh Dao Pham
Outside of being a lover of note-taking and a lover of Post-its, in the book and the other things that we had talked about in the last podcast I did, people do talk to me a lot about this idea of not having to have a project plan when you’re a project manager. The other thing that I often get asked about is this methodology I introduced in the book about project management called CALM. And it means closely aligned, loosely managed.

And it’s a way of managing projects without managing them as hands-on, as typical project managers might. Through alignment and setting clear goals, and then giving people ownership over their respective tasks rather than trying to dictate and control everything. So, I get asked about that a lot.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Anh Dao Pham
I’d love it if folks could contact me through my website. It’s www.GlueLeaders.com. In there, you can find, again, all the links to any information about my book, this podcast when it’s available, as well as the last podcast that you had me on, Pete. So, thank you so much for the opportunity. And, yeah, if you’d like to reach out or have any other questions about note-taking or anything else in the book, I’d love to hear from you.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Anh Dao Pham
I’d say, at least with respect to note-taking, just try it. Just try it and, again, practice. It takes a lot of practice, and practice doesn’t actually make perfect. I feel like, as a person in my career, I’m almost looking for a way to progress, and I never have finished progressing. And so, I’d say practice and continue to strive to make yourself better because I think everybody has the capacity to do more and better as long as they put their minds to it.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Anh, this has been a treat. I wish you much luck and many good notes.

Anh Dao Pham
Thank you. I hope your listeners really enjoy this note-taking, and I’d love to hear from them. Thank you again for the opportunity, Pete.

Jan 16
0

831: How to Manage Multiple Projects without the Overwhelm with Elizabeth Harrin

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Elizabeth Harrin lays out the five critical steps to making the management of multiple projects more manageable.

You’ll Learn:

  1. The easiest way to make managing multiple projects manageable
  2. How to ensure follow through when you’re not the manager
  3. How to strike the right balance between time, cost, and quality

About Elizabeth

Elizabeth Harrin teaches people how to juggle multiple projects so they can meet stakeholders’ expectations without working extra hours. She is a project management practitioner, trainer, mentor and founder of RebelsGuideToPM.com. 

An author of seven project management books, Elizabeth prides herself on her straight-talking, real-world advice for project managers. She uses her twenty years’ experience doing the job to help people deliver better quality results whilst ditching the burnout through her community membership programme, Project Management Rebels.

Resources Mentioned

Elizabeth Harrin Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Elizabeth, welcome to How to be Awesome at Your Job.

Elizabeth Harrin
Hello. Thank you for having me on the show.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m so excited to dig into your wisdom but, first, I think we need to hear a little bit about your ritual involving the song “Firework.” What’s the story here? 

Elizabeth Harrin
Well, when I go live on a video or something like that, I feel like I need to get into the zone. And having that break between just doing my emails or whatever I was doing before, and focusing on showing up and being present in the moment, I do that with music. So, I play a song and I just got stuck on Katy Perry’s, so I play that to get into the right frame of mind before going live and talking to people.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, “Firework” is actually a really fun tune, and I love the metaphor at the beginning, like, “Do you ever feel like a plastic bag?”

Elizabeth Harrin
Absolutely. Drifting around, isn’t that what every project manager feels like at the beginning of a new piece of work, and you have got no idea what you’re supposed to be doing?

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, Elizabeth, you’re a master of the segue and tying it together. All right. Well, I want to hear a little bit about Managing Multiple Projects. You’ve written the book on it. Could you kick us off with a particularly surprising or counterintuitive or extra-fascinating discovery you’ve made when it comes to managing multiple projects?

Elizabeth Harrin
I think one of the things that surprised me was I did a survey to get some numbers, a bit of research for the book, and most people are managing between two and five projects, and that doesn’t sound like very many, but having to constantly switch between work does create that overhead, and workload is the biggest cause of burnout. So, if you can’t manage that workload effectively and switch between all things you’re juggling, it can be really quite difficult.

And the most surprising thing for me about that survey, and the results I got back when I was interviewing people for the book, was how sad it is that people are feeling so unhappy about the work that they do. And the verbatim comments were, just shocked me that people show up to work, they want to do the best that they can, and they’re not in environments where they can do that.

And I felt that that was something that we need to change in the world because we all need to be happy at work. We spend so much time there, it’s not worth doing things that we don’t enjoy.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, Elizabeth, that is powerful, and thank you for sharing that. That really does connect emotionally in terms of overwhelm, burnout, sadness. When you say verbatim comments, are there a couple that have lodged into your brain and haunt you, that you could share to tee up just what we might be able to escape here?

Elizabeth Harrin
There was a comment from a woman called Kimberly, and she wrote, “I work in a fast-food project management environment that expects a sit-down service.” And I thought, “Don’t we all?” So many people must feel that they’re in environments where you want to do the best quality work you can, and actually it’s got to be a quick turnaround. There has to be speed and shortcuts, and we have to apply all these hacks just to get through the day because we don’t have the time to focus on the people that matter and the work that matters.

And so, that analogy about feeling like you’re in a fast-food environment but all your customers and the work that you want to be able to deliver, you won’t be able to provide this five-star dining service. Does that make sense?

Pete Mockaitis
Absolutely. And it’s really funny, and I have felt both of those work desires. Sometimes it is a blast to just shred through a lot of stuff at medium quality and high speed, and just enjoy the thrill ride, like, “Woohoo! Look at all these things checked off and out the door. That’s really cool.” And other times, you really do want to be, I don’t know, sort of like an artisanal, craftsmanship, bespoke, excellence, maximum beauty, maximum quality, and what’s challenging is often you don’t get to choose.

Elizabeth Harrin
Exactly.

Pete Mockaitis
“That might be your mood but what’s required is this.” And if they require both speed and excellence at the same time, yeah, that’s a tricky one.

Elizabeth Harrin
It’s a tricky one, and people end up working longer hours. That was certainly my experience when I went back to work after maternity leave and was in this situation where I was managing multiple projects myself. My choices were do things less good, to a less quality standard, or work longer hours. And neither of them really appealed to me in terms of wanting to be the best professional that I could be and do good things in my career. So, I had to start rethinking what work meant and how I could work more productively because the tools I had only gave me those two choices, and that wasn’t good enough.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, that’s powerful and it sounds like some of your thoughts made it into your book, Managing Multiple Projects: How Project Managers Can Balance Priorities, Manage Expectations and Increase Productivity. If you could give us the key thesis or big idea behind the book, what is it?

Elizabeth Harrin
I’ve put together a five-part model that helps people break down their work, structure it differently, and then keep all their balls in the air. Although, the thing I would say is that no book will ever tell you there’s a one-size solution that will fit every need, so it’s written very much from a perspective of, “Here’s a ton of different tools and techniques that you could try. Test them out in your work environment. Find what fits your working style,” because everyone is different, aren’t they? And everyone’s work environment is different. But, broadly, with a few tweaks, hopefully, you can make the work a little bit more manageable.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, that sounds exciting. Could you share with us a case study or a particularly inspiring story example of someone who was able to upgrade their managing multiple projects game to see great results?

Elizabeth Harrin
Yes, I can. I do a lot of mentoring as well, so a lot of the people I talk to will pick and choose a couple of different things to apply. I can give you my own example and then I can share some examples from other people. The thing that made the biggest difference for me is the first of those five steps, which is working out what’s in your personal portfolio. So, what was the totality of my workload? Because I had three or four projects that I was managing, but also, I was mentoring my colleagues, I was organizing events at work, I was having to turn up and deputize for my manager at different meetings.

And all the other things, they never really make it into your mental to-do list because they’re the stuff you jot down on a Post It note and you never find the time, really, to put those on a project schedule or anything. They’re just expectations. So, when I had a complete picture of all the things I was responsible for, I then got a big shock about how many hours that actually equated to within a week, and being able to then have an intelligent conversation with my manager, and also to plan my own time, it became a lot easier because I had full visibility.

And I think that’s something that I know from teaching about managing multiple projects, that other people have take away as well, just that realization of all the extra things that we’re expected to do, whether it’s time sheets, or finance reporting, or organizing a party for the end of the year celebrations, whatever it is, all of those things take time away from us being able to deliver the main part of our job, the projects that we’re working on.

Pete Mockaitis
Absolutely. And I’m thinking about mandatory trainings, I’m thinking about the sort of meetings, I’m thinking about email. Email is tricky because, on the one hand, are these emails about your projects. Well, then I guess, in a way, that time might get counted. Or, are the emails about everything else from the CFO and the CEO and this and that cross-functional group here and there.

Elizabeth Harrin
Yes, team meetings, briefing your colleagues, all that kind of stuff. So, that personal portfolio step was really helpful for me. And one of the other things that I talk about in the book is dependency management. So, how do you work out how your work interacts with other people’s work, and how each of your projects interact with each other?

And I can tell you about Robert, who told me that once he’d planned out those different dependencies between his workload, he felt that he already knew that in his head. But having plotted it out and writing it down in a matrix, he could then use that as a communication tool to help other people in the department understand how their work impacted other people.

And that was valuable then because he could use that to help people talk about, “When does their work need to be done? What’s going to happen if it’s late? This is the implications for these people or this team or that project.” And they could talk about how they could help each other, make sure all of those expectations were met.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, lovely. That is handy. And so, just like a snazzy chart graph, flowchart, bit of graphical loveliness?

Elizabeth Harrin
You could do it that way. I just wrote it in a spreadsheet. I’m very good at simple things. So, the spreadsheet is a list of all my projects, a list of all my other responsibilities, a list of the way that my work interacts with other people’s work. The way that we did the dependency matrix was we had a list of projects down the side, and then a list of the same projects across the top.

And where they met, we could say, “Well, does this project have anything to do with that? Does this piece of work have anything to do with that team?” And you could sort of write in the box, “Yes, we need to be aware of this,” or, “Yes, we have to do that before this one.”

Pete Mockaitis
Beautiful. Okay. Well, those are handy right off the bat. And could you share, when it comes to managing multiple projects, there are many books and works and tools and trainings on project management, and your corner of the project management universe, managing multiple projects, is distinctive. Can you share with us, what are some of the key differences, distinctions about the game when you’re managing multiple projects versus one super project?

Elizabeth Harrin
I think the biggest challenge for me is having different stakeholders, more stakeholders. If you’re managing a big gigantic project and it’s taking up all of your workload, then you’ve probably got quite good relationships with the people that you work with because you’re with them every day, working with them every day. The team might be large, and I’m not saying there’s not a lot of people and relationships to manage, but there’s one common goal that you’re all working towards, which is delivering the project, and you’ve probably got experience of working with them on a regular basis.

Now, let’s say you’re managing four projects. That’s four potentially quite separate, different teams, each of who want a piece of you at some point in the week, and you’ve got to switch between managing their expectations about how important their work is because not all projects are the same level of importance. Someone has to work on the stuff that’s low importance. And it might be that someone wants more of your time than you can actually give because you’ve got other things to do in your week as well.

So, I think those relationships are probably the hardest thing and the most different thing about managing multiple strands of work rather than just managing one. And that could be managing four different clients. If you’re in a client-facing role, maybe you’ve got four different clients, maybe you’ve got four different internal projects but, ultimately, the more people you have to work with, the harder, I think, the job becomes.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, then, now could you share with us, you mentioned at the very beginning that burnout, sadness, overwhelm stuff, do you have any strategies, specifically, that are targeted toward the internal game, our emotional landscape?

Elizabeth Harrin
I would say having boundaries is probably the most important thing because often, when people give us work to do, there is the expectation that we have the time to do it. And because we are good employees, and we don’t want to rock the boat, we say, “Yes, of course, I can take on that extra piece of work. When would you like it done by?”

And I think having mental boundaries around, “How do you accept new pieces of work when it’s within your gift to be able to do that?” Are you going to make the point about saying, “Well, I can do this but it will mean I’ll have to stop doing something else. I can do this but not by tomorrow because I’m working on something else. I can get it to you by Friday. Is that okay?”

And having that kind of sense of protecting your own time and your own mental health so that you’re not saying, “Yes, I can do everything, of course. Just lay it on me, and I’m just going to stay up till midnight and be at my keyboard all night.” By being aware of what your own limitations are and how many hours you’ve got available, what else you’ve got going on, planning out the next couple of weeks, you can start to think about, “If I say yes to this, and I have to because my boss is asking,” let’s be honest, you haven’t really got a lot of choice, “How can I make this fit? Whatever help do I need? How can I have that conversation?” And I tend to default to the, “I can do this, and this is when I can get it to you.”

There’s another tool that I can share, if you like.

Pete Mockaitis
Yes, please do.

Elizabeth Harrin
One of the things that has helped me has been the two-week look ahead. So, I will take a point in the week where I’ll look at what’s coming up in the next fortnight with the team, to say, “Okay, what do we know about the next two weeks? Who’s got holiday? When have we got big meetings that we need to prepare for? What deadlines do we have?” and then nothing really surprises you, or you’ve built in a little bit of time to be aware of the things that are coming up, so if you do get a surprise, it doesn’t throw your whole schedule off because you’ve already built in some resilience for what you know is coming up.

That’s been really helpful for me because it also means that I can look ahead in terms of just how busy I’m going to be. So, you talked about protecting yourself and being mentally ready to be busy and juggle all these things. If I know I’ve got another week coming up in the future and it’s very busy, lots of big meetings, high stress, I can prepare for that because I can make sure that I’ve got things for the children’s lunchboxes in the freezer, I can make sure I’ve got childcare organized, I can make sure I’m not booking any late-night social events for me that week.

Or, if I am, I’m planning the next morning so that that’s easy. And so, I’m trying to holistically look at work is coming up and what that affects me, how that affects me personally so that I can be more prepared to show up ready to work.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s lovely. Okay. Well, let’s dig into your five key concepts. They each start with P, which is handy to remember: portfolio, plan, people, productivity, positioning. We’ve already gotten a couple tidbits for each. Could you perhaps give us a quick definition or articulation of the concepts, and then perhaps a top do and don’t within each of the five?

Elizabeth Harrin
Okay. With portfolio, I talk about having full visibility of the work that you’ve got on the go at the moment and the things that you’re responsible for. So, my top tip for that is just to take an hour, perhaps even less, and just look through whatever notetaking tool you use or your notebook or the notes you’ve got on your phone, and try and write down everything that you are currently working on, looking at how much time does that need to take per week.

And I know working out hours is very difficult, so what you might want to do is just think, “It’s a big thing, a medium thing, a small thing. That’s good enough for this exercise.” And then that’s the portfolio piece done. It gives you a good sense of what’s going on. The thing not to do is to keep that information to yourself. Use that as a talking point tool with your manager and with your team to say, “Look at all these things I’ve got on the go. Can you help me prioritize so that I’m focusing more of my time on the things that really matter to the organization?”

The plan step is about scheduling, working out when you’re available to do things, and the tip I have for that is to look at all the different projects you’re working on, and then look at where they’ve got their big milestones, when are they going live, or when do you have a big meeting about them, and then plot those on – again, I did it on a spreadsheet – because then you can start to see, “Oh, project number one and project number four have very similar schedules.”

“Maybe we could work on them together and maybe there are some benefits in looking at how we can streamline and combine the work, if it makes sense to do so, so that we’re not doing everything twice.” With that you’re going to need help from other people. So, again, the tip not to do is to try and do that alone. Other people will have a different insight about what’s important and what’s coming up on a project schedule, so it’s worth involving the rest of the team in your planning.

The people element of the model is all around working with others, as you guess from the name, and that is to do with thinking through how you use other people’s time. So, my suggestion there, if I have to give you one thing, would be to look at where you can combine meetings. And I can tell you about a time I did not do this.

I went along to a meeting with my project sponsor, my main manager I was working with on that piece of work, and I was all ready to talk about one project, but he was also involved in another project, and he asked me questions about that one and I wasn’t ready to talk about that, I didn’t have any of my notes, so I baffled, made episode, went along, and got through it. But it made me think, actually, other people are working on multiple things, too.

And to them, they might have multiple things they want to ask you about, so let’s try and combine the communication so that we’re only contacting people once rather than contacting them multiple time about each different thing that you’re involved with because you then help them manage their time as well.

With productivity, which is the fourth P, it’s really around managing your own time, thinking through what works for you, what productivity tools and techniques you want to use, and how you can help other people in your team be productive as well. The thing not to do with that is to get sucked into the latest shiny tool or what’s working for your colleagues because, in my experience, everybody has quite different ways of working to the best of their ability.

For me, I’m very much a pen-and-paper person. I do use electronic tools for project scheduling and task management and all that, but I always have pen and paper as well. Whereas, I know people who would never write anything down. So, you need to find out what works best for you and then use that in the way that you work.

Positioning is the last P. It’s also the one that’s the most convoluted because I kind of have to find the P that fit it, but it’s more around, “How do you set yourself up for success? So, what does the environment look like?” So, this is all around checklists and templates and processes, and what can you change in your environment to make life easier for future you.

So, one very simple thing to do would be to think through, “What do I do on a regular basis? How much time do I spend thinking about that? Would it be easier if I just had a checklist or a work construction or something like that? Then, if I’m not here, someone else can do it, but, equally, when I need to do it, I can make sure I just wheeze through it. I don’t have to worry about any of those steps.”

And I wonder if this is part of me getting older, but I used to be able to hold a list of things in my head. Now, I struggle more to think about the different steps involved in every process and making sure that nothing gets forgotten. So, anything that can be written down and templated just saves you time in the future.

Pete Mockaitis
And when it comes to the holding in the head, I’ve really noticed that. It’s a little bit of a stressor in terms of, I guess, maybe the psychologists would call it our working memory capacity. That might not be right construct but something like that in terms of there are so many things we can put there, and then when we try to push it for more, I actually feel sort of stress signals popping up.

And so, what I find interesting is if there is a task that is already somewhat stressful, or I’d be prone to procrastinate on because I’m worried I might screw something up or overlook something, make a mistake, or it’s just unpleasant for any number of reasons, having that checklist in place is very satisfying because it’s like I can free up all the potential stress associated with thinking and remembering the steps because they’re just there, and I can feel a little bit of fun momentum associated with, “Okay, I checked this piece of a checklist. It only took 30 seconds but I did it, and it’s checked. And now momentum is there visibly on the page before my eyes.”

Elizabeth Harrin
Exactly. Who doesn’t love ticking a box on a spreadsheet, right, to say it’s done, cross off that task on your to-do list? Project managers love that kind of stuff. And it’s exactly true, and it gives you a better-quality result because you’re not going to forget things. You’re going to go through a set of steps. And, honestly, the first time I did it, my checklist was a bit rubbish, and as I went through the actual task, I went, “All right, I have to do that as well. Oh, I’ve forgotten to involve that person.” So, you just add it on and it becomes checklist version 2.0, and you keep improving and iterating as you go. But the next time you have to do that, you don’t have to think so hard.

Pete Mockaitis
Beautiful. Okay. Well, now just a couple follow-up questions across some of these five Ps. I’ve had the experience, and apparently there are some psychological truths or principles that suggest that we humans have a real hard time, in fact, estimating how long something is going to take. Is that your experience? And what can be done about this challenge?

Elizabeth Harrin
Yes, that’s very much my experience. It’s really hard to estimate. And a lot of what we do is knowledge work where we’re thinking of things or changing something, and we probably haven’t done that before, so you don’t even have past projects where you can go back and say, “When we did it the last time, it took us this long, so, therefore, we can just use those estimates.”

Sometimes that’s because organizations don’t really capture the data in a format we can go back and use again but, also, it’s because people suffer from optimism bias. And when we think, “Oh, yeah, we can do that in four hours,” meanwhile forgetting about the fact that we all need toilet breaks in the day, and to take calls, and to check our emails, and to turn up and do other things.

So, my suggestion for people who are struggling with estimating is to think about how many hours you’ve got in the day, and then to schedule yourself and other people in your team, or have conversations with other people about what’s realistic for them to do, but only think of yourself as available 80% of your time because that then gives you time for those team meetings, the mandatory training we talked about earlier, and taking phone calls on things that are completely unrelated but still relevant to your job, and then you’ve got a bit of a buffer in your day.

The other big challenge with estimating is that people often approach estimating, thinking that they’re only doing this one thing, whereas, in real life, we’re probably juggling multiple different strands of activity or many projects, and switching between projects also cause us some time. So, time blocking has helped me.

Blocking out some time, a few hours to work on a particular thing, or an afternoon to do a particular type of task, and talking to our colleagues about best ways to get things done, what productivity techniques work for them, how do they organize their time, when have they got holidays coming up that they might need to do more things beforehand to hand over, and that might make them less available for your project because they’re supporting something else is just a lot about talking.

And I think contingency as well. Do you think that would be useful?

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah.

Elizabeth Harrin
Yeah, contingency is a buffer time. People often ask me, “But how much contingency should I add to this estimate?” or, “I think this task is going to take five days, but what’s reasonable contingency?” And I tend to, “Contingency should be something that’s based on uncertainty.” So, if you’re not really sure and you’re just guessing, you want to slack on a bit of extra time. Quite a lot probably if you just don’t have the information to make an accurate guess at the moment. But if you’ve done the work before, or you’re quite confident in how long things are going to take, you could probably get away without adding a lot less extra time.

Pete Mockaitis
I hear you. That makes sense in terms of the variable driving whether you want to add more or less contingency is uncertainty because we just don’t know, so let’s play it safe by having some more in a high-uncertainty zone. So, let’s say that the uncertainty is small, you’ve done it before, but it’s a little different. Do you have a go-to percentage that you utilize?

Elizabeth Harrin
I like 10%, I would add 10% extra on. There are lots of estimating models, so if your organization is quite mature in the way that they approach time tracking and estimating, then there’s a lot better ways to do it than just to add on 10%. But if you are just working on something yourself without an awful lot of other guidance from a project management office or anything like that, then give yourself a bit of a buffer, and 10% seems to cover most scenarios.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And when it comes to the people side of things, when you’re in the tricky position of having to lead without the authority, like you own the project but you don’t own the employees, you have to do the stuff to make that proceed, it could be a tricky spot to be in. Do you have any top tips beyond being considerate in leveraging their time, of being extra influential, persuasive, to have people to say yes, and, in fact, follow through with their stuff?

Elizabeth Harrin
In my experience, I think it helps to tell people…well, to not tell people, to invite people to participate and explain the reasons behind why their participation is valuable. People like to do things because there’s a reason behind, not just because they’d been asked. So, the great thing about projects is that often there’s a change or a benefit that’s coming at the end of the work. Projects sometimes have bad outcomes, like, “We’re closing down an office, so we’re making your department redundant,” or something like that.

But, often, we’re trying to do something that will be beneficial for the organization and bring about something that’s good. So, if you can tie their contribution into the vision, or the bigger picture of why we’re doing the work in the first place, they can draw those lines and make the connection between how their contribution matters. That can be quite a powerful way of helping people to feel motivated about doing the work in the first place.

The other thing that works is allowing them to set their own deadlines. So, if you go to somebody, and say, “I need this by Tuesday,” their instant reaction might be, “Oh, I can’t do that. You can’t tell me what to do.” Whereas, if you can say, “We need this piece of work done, and your boss has suggested that you’re the right person to do it. How do you think…how much time do you think this might take?”

Obviously, this is not a conversation you’d have in three sentences, but you’d sit with them and explain what the requirements are and help them see the bigger picture of the project as well. And people can then say, “Well, if I need to involve this person and do this and work with that, then I think I could probably get that done by a week on Tuesday.” And that’s the date that goes in your project plan.

One of the biggest mistakes that people make when they’re trying to do projects is they make up all the deadlines themselves. In fact, I’ve sat in a room with senior managers, and they’ve drawn out a project plan on a whiteboard, and said, “Right, that’s what we’re going to do.” And I thought, “But none of the people who are actually doing the thing are in the room.”

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, “You don’t know what it takes.”

Elizabeth Harrin
“You just don’t know. Why are you making this stuff up?” And then, of course, you just caused delays later because you’ve set expectations that are unmanageable. So, using other people’s expertise, and tapping into what they know, and trusting them to suggest the right timeframes can help. And I feel I’ve gone off the question now. Did I answer the question?

Pete Mockaitis
Well, no, it’s all juicy stuff in terms of you cast the vision for, “Okay, this is how things can be better when the project is done and how you’re contributing to that.” But the deadline-setting stuff, I think, is handy in terms of thinking like there might be a date by which it’s extra valuable to have this done, like, before the tradeshow, or the big meeting, or the big conference. So, that’s, I guess, would be nice to have it done, and executives can determine that.

However, I’m thinking about this is maybe the first project management lesson I learned I thought that was really useful – was it the triangle? You can probably describe it better, Elizabeth, than I can. What’s the time management or the project management triangle?

Elizabeth Harrin
We talk about the iron triangle, the triangle of constraints, of balancing time, cost, and quality. Although, the thought process behind that has moved on a bit now, and we don’t just use time, cost, and quality as a measure of success. But in terms of talking to your stakeholders, your colleagues, and your project sponsor, and your boss, it is really helpful because you can say, “Well, I can deliver to this level of quality, and it will cost this much and take this long.”

And then they could say, “But I want it faster. I can’t spend that much money. I want it cheaper.” And then you can adjust the corners of the triangle, and say, “Well, if we want it cheaper, it will have to be less quality, or maybe it will take longer because we’ll use cheaper resources to do it. Or, if you want it to take less time, it’ll probably cost more because we’ll throw more resources at it. We might be able to maintain quality but we might have to take a few things out of the project scope and maybe add those in as a phase two later, but then we’ll hit the deadline.”

So, it’s about balancing all these different success criteria. And that’s a really helpful point that you’ve put out there because you need to know what people feel is important, and maybe it’s the deadline, maybe it’s, “Do what you need to do but get it done by the tradeshow.” I worked in healthcare, and I was on a project once, and people didn’t really care about when it got done. Well, that’s not true. They did care when it got done, but what was most important was that when it was delivered, it was good quality.

Elizabeth Harrin
And if that took a couple of extra weeks, then a couple of extra weeks didn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things. They just needed it to be good. So, some people will say the date is important. Some people will say, “You’ve got a ceiling on this much money that you can spend,” or, “This quality criteria has to be met,” or it might be something like sustainability, customer satisfaction, or some other kind of measure that they think is important. And if you know that, then you can make all of your decisions based around, “How do we get to that?”

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that is powerful to see what is the priority there. And when you say quality, I think my own synonym for quality is how much good stuff, in terms of we can have more…it’s almost two dimensions, like a scope thing in terms of how excellent is the thing and how many of the things are there. Like, if we’re doing a bunch of home renovations, it’s like, “Okay, you want 30 updates across the kitchen and the bathrooms and whatever. And so, we can sort of do fewer of those updates, or those updates could be chintzier, or we’re going to have to have more people working on it, contractors, etc. which will come with the paying for it, or we just take more time to do it.”

So, I think that has been handy for me as I think through stuff, and I get stressed out, like, “Uh-oh, how on earth….?” This feels bad to say but I guess it’s real and something has to give somewhere or else we will be those sad, burnt out, overwhelmed people, is that usually what I sacrifice is quality. It’s like, “All right, well, it’s going to be worse.” But because my quality expectations are usually so insane, we sent you a microphone, so I’m told that no one else does that, and I thought, “Oh, really? They probably should,” but whatever.

So, I’m able to back it up, it’s like, “Okay. Well, we’re just going to allow that, and it’s good enough for 98% of the people who are encountering this thing that I’m making, and I’m just going to have to take a breath and live with it, and that’s fine.”

Elizabeth Harrin
And that’s very much the case at work, isn’t it? There are some things that you absolutely have to get perfect. And if you’re a lawyer writing a contract, you can’t just go, “Oh, well, it’s 80% good enough.” Your client is not going to live with that. But if you’re drafting an internal document just for review to brief your colleagues on something, you know, I prefer not to send out things with typos, but if something did slip through, no one is going to die. It will be fine.

And if it means that you get it out the door at 5:00 o’clock, and you go home on time, and you have a life instead of sitting there stressing about every full stop, and staying at your keyboard till 7:00, because I guarantee that half the people who read that document won’t even notice whether a full stop is there or not. 

Pete Mockaitis
I really like what you said there about no one is going to die, and that is a perspective I’ve come to again and again, because it’s true. There are some things in healthcare, in transportation, in military, police, and other fields where it truly is life and death. The quality of your work will make that impact. And many other times in the land of spreadsheets and memos, it’s usually not.

And so, I find that quite comforting if I’m getting a little bit too worked up about something, is to recall that no one will die no matter how horrible an episode we produce, Elizabeth, although you’re doing great. So, that’s cool. Well, now tell me, Elizabeth, anything else you really want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear about some of your favorite things?

Elizabeth Harrin
Something that you can do to start managing your multiple projects more effectively is to think about how you can group them into different buckets. So, if you do a couple of things for one client, or you’re leading on a couple of initiatives for one particular department, how can you bring those things together to streamline the communication, try and have meetings where you cover multiple things in one go instead of scheduling lots of meetings about the same thing?

So, looking for connections between the work you do can make it feel a lot less overwhelming. If you’ve got 15 things on the go, for example, that’s 15 things you have to think about. But if you can put them into buckets, and you’ve got five things in each bucket, then you’ve only got three things to think about, and it could be around the solution that you’re building, the person you’re doing it for, the type of technology that’s in use, the date it’s got to be finished by. It could be anything. But if you can group the work, I found in people I worked with have found that it relieves some of the overload because it gives you a way to think about things at the next level up.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Thank you. Well, now, could you share a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Elizabeth Harrin
The quote that I have on my wall is from Francine Jay, and it says, “My goal is no longer to get more done, but rather to have less to do.”

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite study or experiment or bit of research?

Elizabeth Harrin
I like the copy machine study by Ellen Langer, which is about providing a reason for why we want people to take action. When people know there’s a reason, they’re more likely to do the action that we want. 

Pete Mockaitis
And how about a favorite book?

Elizabeth Harrin
If I was on an island, I’d be taking Les Miserables. I really love that book by Victor Hugo. If I was choosing a business book, I’d choose Emotional Intelligence for Project Managers by Anthony Mersino, which really changed the way that I look at our profession.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite tool, something you use to be awesome at your job?

Elizabeth Harrin
I use a tool called Infinity for task management, and a Maltron keyboard to help me type more easily.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. All right. That’s cool. And a favorite habit, something you do to be awesome at your job?

Elizabeth Harrin
I do Pilates once a week. I think I need to have that time just to be focused on me.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And is there a key nugget you share that really seems to connect and resonate with readers and listeners, and they say, “Yes, Elizabeth, you’re so right when you said this”?

Elizabeth Harrin
Maybe communicate more than you think you have to.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Elizabeth Harrin
You can find me on LinkedIn and on all the normal social media channels. And you can find out more about project management at my blog, RebelsGuidetoPM.com.

Pete Mockaitis
And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Elizabeth Harrin
I would say to remember that it’s easier to ask for forgiveness than permission. So, if you want to just organize your work in a different way, just do it. Most managers want action and results, and they don’t really mind how you get there, as long as you get there.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Elizabeth, thank you. This has been a treat. I wish you much luck with all your projects.

Elizabeth Harrin
Thank you for having me on the show.

Oct 20
0

810: How to Get Stuff Done inside Bureaucracies with Marina Nitze

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Marina Nitze reveals what makes bureaucracies tick and how you can work your way through them.

You’ll Learn:

  1. Why bureaucracies can actually be great
  2. Six favorite bureaucracy hacks
  3. What not to do when trying to challenge a bureaucracy

About Marina

Marina Nitze, co-author of the new book Hack Your Bureaucracy, is a partner at Layer Aleph, a crisis response firm specializing in restoring complex software systems to service. Marina is also a fellow at New America’s New Practice Lab, where she improves America’s foster care system through the Resource Family Working Group and Child Welfare Playbook. Marina was the CTO of the VA after serving as a Senior Advisor on technology in the Obama White House. She lives in Seattle.

Resources Mentioned

Marina Nitze Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Marina, welcome to How to be Awesome at Your Job.

Marina Nitze
Thanks for having me. Great to be here.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m so excited to hear about your wisdom but, first, I think we need to hear a little bit about your job as a 12-year-old making fan sites for General Hospital.

Marina Nitze
Well, it was the best way to learn HTML back then. It was the days of AOL keywords, and I loved my General Hospital soap opera couples, and it was a great way to learn technology, and that was absolutely the start of my tech career.

Pete Mockaitis
So, at 12 years old, you’re loving General Hospital?

Marina Nitze
Yes, it was our neighbor’s grandma watched it, and I got to sit and watched it with her. And then you get hooked, right? Friday cliffhanger, you got to see what happened Monday, and then you’re running home from the school bus every night.

Pete Mockaitis
That is fun. That’s fun. I have a feeling that in your childhood you probably had a lot of fun conversations with “grownups.” Is that fair to say?

Marina Nitze
I was really bad at being with kids, so, yeah, I mostly just talk to grownups and tried to have my own businesses. Yeah, being an adult is more fun.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, I’m intrigued to hear you’ve got a cool specialty. We’re talking about your book Hack Your Bureaucracy. You’ve worked in some in your career in your days. Could you share with us, any particularly surprising or counterintuitive discovery you’ve made about bureaucracies in general? Is there something most of us have wrong about bureaucracies?

Marina Nitze
I think so. I think bureaucracy is often a four-letter word. We think of them as things that you need to blow up, you need to move around, you need to get rid of. And, for me, the most surprising thing as a Libertarian joining the Federal Government, believing that the whole thing should be blown up, and it totally did not work, was that bureaucracies actually work quite effectively and you can do a lot of effective things to get them to change for the better. And so, learning those techniques was really the impetus behind writing the new book and sharing those with others.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, so tell us more about that. Bureaucracies, in fact, do work effectively. Can you give us some data or evidence or examples there?

Marina Nitze
Well, we kept seeing, when I was in the Federal Government, we had a program called the US Digital Service, which recruited top-tier technologists to come into government for tours of duty. And, repeatedly, kind of the pattern was always the same. They wanted to come in and the first thing they thought was the path to success was getting a waiver or an exception to the rules, or going around the rules, and that worked zero percent of the time.

But what did really work was learning what the rules were, and then not only using them to your advantage, but sometimes changing the rules of the game themselves so that the next thing the bureaucracy was doing was the right thing and the thing that you wanted them to be doing consistently even after you left.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. So, they were able to accomplish what they were hoping to accomplish by doing things the way that they say are to be done, and that was fine.

Marina Nitze
Yeah. I had a great story there around trying the normal way first, which was one of our bureaucracy hacks. When we wanted to use cloud computing because, at the time, all the websites for veterans were literally operating on computers that were like under people’s desks or, in one case, in a mop closet. And even if you don’t know a lot about technology, computers and mop closets and water should never the twain shall meet.

But one of the big objections that we got to doing this was from the inspector general, who said, “Well, wait a minute. You can’t use cloud computing because you can’t put the cloud in an evidence bag.” And so, by actually going through this process and working with them and understanding how they conducted their investigations, which was they would walk into your office, they would pick up the computer, and they would put it in an evidence bag. They didn’t know how they could do that in a world where cloud computing, and you can’t actually touch the computers anymore.

So, we had to work with them to help them see how they could actually conduct their investigations more effectively.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, yeah, you don’t have to truck it over to the mop closet.

Marina Nitze
Exactly. You don’t have to lift anything, you don’t have to put it into bags, your back won’t be strained anymore. And then, in the course of following up with that, we ended up hitting the IT approval paperwork had questions, like, “Marina, do you pinky-swear that you jiggled the doorknob to make sure that it was locked on the cloud?”

And you can’t jiggle the doorknob of the cloud either, so you had to actually change the paperwork itself. But in the course of changing the paperwork, now you can say, like, “Hey, is this server in a mop closet?” And if it is, then it doesn’t get approved, “Does this server have backups?” And if it doesn’t, then it doesn’t get approved. “Does this website have business hours?” And if it does, then it doesn’t get approved. And that’s how you can make a really systemic change in a bureaucracy.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I just need to follow up. So, there was actually an official form somewhere that had the phraseology pinky-swear and jiggle the handle on it? Is that accurate?

Marina Nitze
The pinky-swear is my color, admittedly, but the jiggling the handle was actually literally a security control. We had to promise. I had to swear and sign on a piece of paper that I had jiggled the doorknob to make sure it was locked.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, this is fun. This is the way I love it, it’s the detailed insight scoop. All right. So, maybe let’s zoom out a bit. What’s the big idea behind the book Hack Your Bureaucracy?

Marina Nitze
Yeah, it’s really the Frank Sinatra test. So, in Frank Sinatra’s song “My Way,” he says, “Hey, if I made it here in New York, I can make it anywhere.” And so, the bureaucracy hacking tactics we learned in the White House, when I was at the VA as the chief technology officer in Department of Defense, when they worked there, we then found, my co-author Nick and I, that when we left, now he’s in venture capital and at Harvard University, I now do IT crises consulting for Fortune 500 companies and I work in state and local governments on foster care, and the bureaucracy hacking tactics still keep working.

And then we tried them in PTAs and Homeowners Associations, and they still keep working. So, the idea is, “Here are some hacks that work in some of the toughest bureaucracies, and they’ll also work in your everyday bureaucracies.”

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, could you share with us an inspiring story of someone who, indeed, successfully hacked their bureaucracy and got something cool done which others may have said is impossible?

Marina Nitze
Absolutely. So, at the VA in 2013, there was a horrible backlog of healthcare applications from veterans that were trying to access VA healthcare, 800,000 of them waiting, pieces of paper waiting in a warehouse. And it was in the news that the inspector general had determined that 100,000 of those veterans had died waiting for the VA to process that paperwork.

And so, the VA was going to do what the VA always did, which was, “We’re going to do more mandatory overtime and more data entry.” But my team believed that there was a different way to go about that, “What if we could bypass the paper and get digital instant enrolment for veterans?” And what unlocked that was actually sitting down with a real veteran whose name was Dominic and, with his permission, we recorded him trying and failing to apply for VA healthcare 12 times.

He called; we hung up on him. He tried to open the website; it wouldn’t load. He tried to open another website; it wouldn’t open. And up until that point, the VA’s belief had been that veterans don’t use the internet because the numbers of veterans that apply online were so small. When, in fact, it was that the websites didn’t work.

And so, when we had this video of Dominic trying and failing so many times, and then it turned out he was actually absolutely eligible, and we were able to enroll him the next morning. We gave him our new mobile form, which is not rocket science, it’s not machine learning. It’s literally a form that was under on your mobile phone. He was able to enroll instantly, and we’ve since enrolled 2 million veterans instantly in VA healthcare through that mobile form.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s beautiful. Okay. So, taking a step back and parsing some insights from that story, it seems that the leadership has a mistaken view of what things are really like on the ground, it seems to be my takeaway there.

Marina Nitze
Yeah, and so our tactic here is you got to talk to real people. No matter where you are, if you’re a brand-new hire, if you’ve been in your role for 30 years, if you’re the leader or if you’re like an entry-level employee, going out and talking to the real people that are really experiencing your service, whatever your company may offer, is the way that you’re going to find those disconnects that you’re not going to find if you never leave the office.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, that is a grand story. Well, so you’ve got 56 such approaches for hacking. I don’t imagine we’d cover all 56 in the time we have here today. But could you maybe give us some of your greatest hits in terms of, and here’s my criteria, how I define greatest hits, that’s widely applicable in terms of it covers many kinds of bureaucracies; it is widely effective in terms of, “By golly, there’s a high percentage of the time this thing gets it done; and it has a good return on effort, if you will, like a little bit of time here can give big returns?” So, I’m putting you on the spot, Marina, if you could give us a few of your favorite bureaucracy hacks that meet these three criteria, what leaps to mind?

Marina Nitze
Absolutely. It would definitely be the space between the silos. So, the bigger your bureaucracy is, the more specialized it gets, the more that there’s different departments, it may even be that your company interacts with other companies through the course of a process. And while there’s tons of defensive antibodies that don’t want to change inside a silo, there’s often absolutely nobody paying attention at the handoffs between the silos. So, it’s a really awesome opportunity to make a really big change.

And I’ll tell you a quick story around this. I was helping a state trying to shorten its foster parent application processing time. And this is really important because, while grandparents, or aunts, or uncles have kiddos in foster care in their home, they’re not getting paid, they’re not getting any financial support until they complete this really byzantine paperwork process. So, it’s really important to get it down.

So, I’m following the claim in this case from start to finish, and this is the advice that anybody can use. If it’s a claim, if it’s a case, if it’s a customer, whatever it may be, follow up from start to finish. When it goes through the fax machine, you go to the other end of the fax machine. When it goes to the mailroom, you go to the mailroom.

And so, I was following this one foster parent application through the office, and I get to this woman, and she says, “Well, now I have to request the applicant’s driving record from the DMV,” and she pulls out the carbon copy triplicate paper, you know the kind you have to like press really hard and it’s different colors, and she says, “Oh, I hate this step so much. The DMV lives in the 19th century. I don’t even have stamps. Like, it takes forever. This sucks.”

And I walked over to the DMV because I’m following the real application, and I say, “Hey, can you show me how you’re processing the driving record request?” And the woman there says, “Oh, yes. We use this electronic system, and the request come in, and we process them same day.” And I said, “Well, wait a minute. I saw a carbon copy paper. Where does that come in?” And she said, “Oh, you were at child welfare. Those people are in the 19th century. They keep sending this carbon copy paper. Why the heck won’t they use my electronic system like everybody else?”

And so, I was able to connect those two individuals and, overnight, shaved 32 days off a process, removed a cumbersome step that nobody wanted to do, and make everybody’s lives easier simply because, in most bureaucracies, nobody ever sees or owns the end-to-end process. And so, if you can just crawl through it, follow your person, you will be shocked at the amount of insights and improvements that you can make.

Pete Mockaitis
You know, Marina, this is the first time someone has made government work sound exciting to me. It’s like, “Oh, my gosh, what a huge value-add,” sorry, consulting language stuck with me. That’s like a huge amount of value for what sounded somewhat easy. Marina, maybe you did a lot of work over many days to pull this off, but that didn’t sound too hard. And, yet, that’s a huge improvement in people’s lives that’s quite touching. And those opportunities exist when you’re inside big bureaucracies.

Call me optimistic, but that almost sounds like a positive, “Oh, I’m in a huge bureaucracy.” “Oh, lucky you. There are so many improvement opportunities you can probably just grab that make a huge impact for not a lot of effort. That’s kind of a cool place to be.”

Marina Nitze
I would agree with you. I’d agree with that. The bigger the fire, the more interested I am. But even if you’re at a smaller bureaucracy, there might be handoffs you do with other outside partners, or maybe you’re interacting with the government as a nonprofit or something. Go follow that application process through and see if there are inefficiencies to be had.

Pete Mockaitis
I love it. Okay. So, we talked about the space between the silos, and following from start to finish. What are some of the other approaches?

Marina Nitze
Picking up the pen. So, I first learned this one, at the VA, for a while, we were missing one of our senior leader roles. We hadn’t hired for it yet and so we were kind of distributing that role’s tasks among the staff. And one of them involved having to go to the White House for a meeting, which sounds really exciting, like everybody would want to do it, but that means waiting in the security line for two hours in the hot sun.

So, I, as the new person on the team, got tagged in to take on this meeting, and I was supposed to write the President’s management agenda, which is a pretty big deal in Federal Government, and one of the tasks of that meeting was, “Hey, can someone write a technology goal on a slide?” And so, I’m looking around figuring other people showed up with their ideas, but, no, here was the blank slide, and so I said, “Oh, I’ll do it. I’m going to write down that the VA should have the first agency digital service to this team, and it should have 75 employees reporting to the CTO,” which was me.

And I assumed someone would come along and edit my slide or delete it or modify it, but, nope, it kept moseying along through the process, and then, lo and behold, the President is announcing the President’s management agenda that includes the goal of having 75 technologists assigned to this CTO of the VA, which is me.

So, then I got to take that slide that I had written because I had picked up a pen and take it and justified hiring these 75 teammates that I really, really needed. And that was a great way in the Federal Government but I since used it all the time to include…we have a story in the book of someone using that to change their condo’s pool policy because there was a lot of bickering around, like, “Is the Homeowners Association going to let us have the pool opened during COVID?”

And I said, “Well, why don’t you write the policy that says it’s open, because then the person that wants to keep the pool closed, they’re going to have to also write a policy and shows up and like get counter votes, so you’re actually raising the bar and effort for them, and making it easier for everybody to do what you want.” And this worked pretty consistently among everybody that I knew that was having this pool problem.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s so cool. And what’s funny, because there was a bit of resistance there, so it’s like, “Ugh, writing a pool policy, that sounds kind of boring and lame. And what do I know about pool policies? I’ve never written anything like this.” But, at the end of the day, everybody just makes it up. Someone just makes it up. You just made it up and you got 75 employees. That’s pretty cool.

And someone else is just making up a pool policy. It’s unlikely that they’re consulting with someone with a tremendous deep expertise in pool matters from an insurance company or law firm, but that’s conceivably possible. But the most parts are like, “Oh, I guess this makes some sense when it comes to having a pool, so it’s the policy. Any input, feedback? Okay, here we go. This is the policy.”

Marina Nitze
Yeah, if you look around, no offense to your particular Homeowners Association, but if you’re looking around it, it’s just made of other regular humans that are just like you and me so there’s no reason why you can’t write a pool policy. And, yeah, maybe somebody will have an edit to it, but if you want the pool open, pick up the pen, draft the policy, see what happens.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. I dig it. Marina, this is awesome. Keep going.

Marina Nitze
All right. I’d love to share a Harry Potter analogy here because I think this is a really, really effective one if you’re ever working with technology. So, there’s a concept called strangling the mainframe, and it’s the idea, like, say you’ve got an old, old system. Everybody’s got one in their company if it’s around long enough, and everybody thinks that the goal is to shut off the old system.

But the old system ends up powering a little bit of everything. It’s going to power HR, IT, something maybe, and everybody’s trying to have this magic huge perfect plan to turn off the old thing and one day magically turn on the new thing. And I’ve never, in the history of time, seen that worked. Like, in all of Western civilization is actually powered by these mainframes.

And so, my best analogy here of how to actually fix this problem, if it’s something you’re facing in your workplace, is a Harry Potter one. And this is a spoiler alert, so if you don’t know how Harry Potter ends, you should skip ahead 60 seconds. That is Voldemort is the mainframe and Harry and his family and the whole wizarding world are trying to destroy the mainframe head on, and it doesn’t work. The mainframe gets more powerful than ever. And after six and a half books, Harry’s lost most of his family, there’s billions of pounds of Muggle property damaged, and Voldemort is stronger than ever.

But what does work are finding the Horcruxes and slowly peeling off bits of the mainframe’s power one bit at a time. So, if you think about it in your organization, maybe you could pull off a little bit of case management, maybe a little bit of claims status tracking, maybe a little bit of HR, such that, at the end, you have a small enough of a puzzle that you can actually replace it in, say, six months or one year.

And so, this is a technique that we use all the time. Even if your company is working, frankly, off of like a really advanced spreadsheet, you still often can’t turn it off overnight. You got to peel off piece by piece. And this can be a really amazing bureaucracy hack and tactic if you’re trying to make change because there may be some new innovation that you want to have seen.

One example here would be around the unemployment claim backlog. In a lot of states, they had a strangle a mainframe tactic of helping stand up a claim status tracker because that’s what everybody wanted to know, “Did you get my claim? When is it going to get paid?” And the mainframes couldn’t support that, but many states stood up and, literally a week, a claim status tracker where everybody checked their status just from their mobile phone by building this little piece off to the side that just syncs to the mainframe once a night.

So, just want to encourage folks to think creatively about how they might strangle their mainframe and what their first Horcrux might be.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s really cool. That’s really cool. What comes to mind is I was in a Facebook group all about professional speakers, and this was only like four years ago, and someone took a photo of a dot matrix printer at a rental car location, and said, “Dot matrix printer is still holding town at the rental car agency.” It’s like, “Yes, that is so weird that those still exists there.” And then that’s intriguing, if you think about it, in terms of…and I don’t know the rationale for why those are still there.

Marina Nitze
They’re all in airports, too. Airport manifests are printed on dot matrix printers.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, and maybe that is or is not relevant but if we’re genuinely waiting, I don’t know, an extra 30 seconds per person in line for the dot matrix thing to go through that, then it sounds like it needs to be replaced. But if it’s plugged into a mainframe, or a bigger computer sort, then I guess it’s quite possible that you have an alternative means by which the information is sent to a different printing thing.

As I zoom into these conversations, how I imagine they would go, it’s like, “Oh, well, we can’t change that because it’s connected to the thing. And that thing runs everything, so just don’t even touch it, don’t even think about it. Just forget about it and move on.” And then most of us are not so persistent, shall we say, or stubborn, however you’d like to phrase it, as to dig in a little deeper and further. But if you were to do so, peeling off a little bit at a time is likely to get us a lot farther.

Marina Nitze
Absolutely. That’s the message.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Cool. Let’s hear another.

Marina Nitze
So, if you’re kind of a staff-level person, a recommendation that we have here is really think about tailoring your pitch to who you need to persuade to your way of thinking. And one of my favorite bureaucracy hacks here was done by a colleague. We needed a bunch of IT executives to approve an API policy. An API is an application programming interface. It’s something that lets two computers talk to each other.

But if you don’t know what an API is, that just sounds like a huge security blackhole, like, “Wait a minute. I’m going to let another computer connect to my computer and take data out of it? Like, that sounds like everybody’s going to hack it and take all the private data out of it. That doesn’t sound safe.” And so, people were pretty opposed to it.

But because they were senior leaders, they had no safe place to ask basic questions about what an API was. They were too senior to ask the basic questions. So, we had to set up a space for them to learn, so we had a session called APIs for Executives, and we held it in a fancy room and had some fancy speakers and fancy invites, and invited them to come.

And at the beginning of the presentation, it said, “You know, hey, we know everybody here knows what APIs are, but just in case,” and then gave a basic 101 review of APIs so that it gave those executives a safe place to learn so they could actually engage in the conversation. And if we hadn’t done that, they would’ve just blocked our policy from day one from a place of fear.

Pete Mockaitis
It feels really brilliant in terms of so you knew exactly what your roadblock was. It’s like, “These folks don’t understand what an API is and they’re afraid to ask. And I can’t just say, ‘Listen, bud, I know you don’t know what you’re talking about, so let me lay it down for you.’” You knew that wasn’t going to fly in this environment.

And so, I’m curious about how you presented that, it’s like, “Oh, wouldn’t you know it? Like, crazy coincidence, this event is happening,” because you had agency in creating the event. So, how did you play that game?

Marina Nitze
Well, it was just about framing it in a totally respectful way. So, like, yeah, it does sound a little bit manipulative. I fully acknowledge that but we had to find a safe place to get them to learn. And having an event called API 101 wasn’t going to do it because they were going to be afraid of, like, being seen in front of their direct reports, potentially, as not knowing. So, we had to create a place that they would feel safe.

And we had a little bit of an advantage. We could also invite them to a fancy White House office room for the event, but you probably have an equivalent wherever your organization may be of creating some sort of safe space for people to learn without making them feel dumb. Because if people feel dumb or threatened, they’re not going to engage with you in a constructive way.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that’s good. All right. Marina, you can just keep going all day. More hacks. Lay it on us.

Marina Nitze
Something that I think is really overlooked that we really encourage is when you’re understanding how process works or when you find a change that you want to make, you have to understand the internal employee impacts of that process the same as you understand how you may want to change it for that end-user or for your customer.

So, often your internal employees have particular risks or incentive frameworks, like their position description said they have to do this or that. Their practice manual says they have to do this or that. They have more steps to do in a day than they can possibly do. So, if you show up with your, like, bright, fancy, new idea for outside customers, that you’re going to have a new customer support model or you’re going to have a new product that makes the internal people have to do seven more steps on their already-over full plate, they are going to resist you, and they are going to fight you.

But if you can understand kind of like my story earlier about the DMV, like neither of those women, they were both busy. They didn’t want to fill out carbon copy paper and mail it to one another. Like, they were happy to take that step off their plate, but you had to acknowledge that it existed in the first place to understand how you could kind of trade, and say, “Okay, I’ll get you two more internal efficiency gains and, in exchange, I need you to do this one extra step that’s going to help my actual project goal.”

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. Well, now, could you tell us a little bit about what not to do when it comes to hacking a bureaucracy? If we want to make something happen, we’re inside a bureaucracy, we’ve got some really cool things that we should do, what are some things that we absolutely should not do?

Marina Nitze
Yeah, this is a mistake I see people make all the time, and I made it myself a lot in the beginning, which is you can’t try to make the bureaucracy care. Bureaucracies do not have feelings. They have decision criteria. And something I see a lot, and I see this especially in IT, where you want a new IT application approved, or you want to be able to use a spreadsheet software because it’s going to make you more efficient.

But the argument that, like, “Hey, if we don’t get this, there’ll be foster children that are homeless, or there’ll be veterans that don’t get healthcare.” Those are not approval criteria on the approval form. They’re not part of the decision matrix. So, you can beg and plead and make the emotional arguments to the end of time, but if you don’t actually fill out the approval form and meet what it needs, you’re not ever going to get to the goal that you actually want.

So, a big mistake I see people make is trying to make the bureaucracy care. And what, instead, you should do is understand what the bureaucracy cares about and meet those needs even if it may be frustrating and not feel particularly emotionally fulfilling in the moment.

Pete Mockaitis
And so, what’s interesting here is we’re talking about the bureaucracy, it’s like an entity because I’m thinking of it like The Borg. It’s like an entity, a person, a corporate thing unto itself and that doesn’t have feelings. I get you. Like, if we defined bureaucracy as a series of steps or processes, then maybe, first, we should get your definition of bureaucracy. I guess individual humans within the bureaucracy might care, and that could maybe motivate them.

It’s like, “Wow, you’re right. This is a big problem and we need to do something.” So, you maybe even enrolled them and you’ve gotten them on board with some emotions, but you’re not really going to get any traction in terms of making it happen until the actual steps of the form or process or whatever are getting adjusted. Is that a fair synopsis?

Marina Nitze
Absolutely. You might win them over to pay attention to you first, to take your form first, but you’re not going to win them over to allow your half-filled out form to get approved.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Understood. And then since we’re saying the word bureaucracy a lot, could you define it for us?

Marina Nitze
Yeah. In the course of writing the book, we actually tried to find something that wasn’t a bureaucracy. And this quest took us even to, like, a co-op grocery store in Brooklyn, California. It turned out it was still a bureaucracy. It’s any organization of any size that’s run by a series of processes and rules, both written and unwritten. And unwritten I think is really important, too, because, at the end of the day, like if there is a process, if you have to go through Bertha, and Bertha considers your form in a particular way, and she is the gatekeeper there, it’s important to understand that as an unwritten rule.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, thank you for that. So, anyway, more don’ts. What else should we not do?

Marina Nitze
Yeah, my other one is beware of the obvious answer. I, literally, have a TextExpander keyboard shortcut on my computer, where if I typed the word just, it will delete it, so it will not let me type the word just because that word is what gets tons of people in trouble, especially if you’re new to a problem or to an organization. Do not show up and say, “Well, why don’t you just do X, Y, Z?” because the odds are that hundreds of people have had your idea before, and there are some reason why it is not been done already.

So, before you say, “Why don’t you just do this?” it’s really important to kind of, first, keep that idea to yourself, but dig in, try to find people who had that same idea, see who has tried what, where didn’t it work, because maybe that the solution is not impossible. That’s not all what I’m saying, but it’s a lot more complicated than the obvious answer that it may seem like you have.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. And articulating the word just out loud can, I imagine, enrage some people, like, “Who do you think you are? Oh, I guess we’re all just idiots, Marina. Excuse us for not having just made an online form. Pardon our foolishness.”

Marina Nitze
Correct. Absolutely.

Pete Mockaitis
I’ve often coached people, like, “Don’t say the word obviously ever. It doesn’t help you out.”

Marina Nitze
That should be a TextExpander shortcut, too. Absolutely.

Pete Mockaitis
And so, just is in that same category in this context. So, okay, any other don’ts?

Marina Nitze
I think those are my two main ones.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And I want to talk a little bit about the emotional component here. I think some folks have a feeling that if they try to hack it through the bureaucracy, their bosses might think that you’re trying to undermine their authority, or you’re trying to circumvent them or their system, or you’re going over their head, like you’re committing some kind of a no-no. Can you tell us, to what extent are these fears real? And if we have them, what should we do about them?

Marina Nitze
Yes. So, my approach there would be to build a stakeholder map, and that’s something we recommend in the book. And a stakeholder map is usually such a valuable tool that we explicitly recommend that you never share it with anybody and that you don’t put it anywhere that somebody else can find it, because everybody’s got those different perspectives, like you were just saying.

You may have a boss that is threatened by you shining. In which case, if you really want to see your initiative take hold, the way to do it might be to give your boss credit for having done it. Or, you may have a boss that is really like a rule-follower, and so the way to get around that is to follow the rules. You may have people that are very motivated by getting a promotion and, therefore, you have to understand what is the criteria for them getting that promotion, and how do you help them achieve that in the course of helping you achieve your initiative.

So, by mapping out kind of who each person is, what their resources or power structure is relative to the decisions that you need made, and what are their risks and incentives, you can start strategically figuring out how to move forward so that you can get your initiative done, whether that means, again, giving some people credit, distracting some other people with a different shiny toy, and then maybe even changing some position descriptions themselves so that people’s motivation to do their regular work is shifted to help support what you’re trying to get done.

Pete Mockaitis
There’s so much wisdom here, Marina. Thank you.Okay, so when you’re making this map of things with the stakeholders and what they want, I’m curious, are there a few key categories of drivers, of things that people tend to really want or not want that we might tick through as we’re trying to fill out that map? Because we might say, “Huh, what does Paul want? Hmm, nothing’s leaping to mind.” Could you give us a few starter categories to help get those ideas flowing?

Marina Nitze
Yeah, absolutely. I think we have, like, two pages of bullets in the book as additional brainstorming exercise. But people think about what their recognition is. Some people, for example, actively avoid the limelight, and some people really want to be seen in it. Money, which could be tied to promotions or raises or getting more budget line item for their own program.

Some people want to be perceived as innovative, and some people want to be perceived as rule followers. And then it’s also important not to overlook the literal lines of like, “What is this person supposed to be doing? And what are the lines, whether they’re grey or bright lines, of what they’re not supposed to be doing?” And how might you need to adjust those to accommodate the kind of different kind of work that you might need them to do.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, Marina, it seems like as you described this, you sound like such a master, and, hey, you’ve got a lot of experience in some organizations, you’ve learned some things the hard way, and you’ve codified some of it. So, beyond simply reading your book Hack Your Bureaucracy, do you have any tips on how we can, generally, become all the more savvy and hip to this skillset?

Marina Nitze
Yeah, I think this is one that anybody can learn. I don’t think you have to get a bachelor’s degree in it by any means. And so, I would start with just identifying a problem in your space of, again, whether it’s you’re annoyed by a Homeowners Association rule, or since this podcast is about being awesome at your job, something in your immediate department, or maybe at a slightly higher level on your organization that you want to change.

And then I would go about trying to change it. Talk to your peers. Enlist other people in the journey of making the change. Try the normal way. Understand and ask why, “Is it the way that it is? Is there some law or policy, or is it just that a CEO, three CEOs ago, said that it was the case, and no one has ever questioned it since?”

And then you can build up your skills there. I would definitely recommend picking problems, if at all possible, that don’t involve life or death as your first bureaucracy hack. Pick something a little bit lower stakes. And then as you build up your bureaucracy-busting muscles, you can take on harder and harder problems.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, Marina, tell me, anything else you want to make sure to mention before we hear about some of your favorite things?

Marina Nitze
One last thing I’ll just say is it’s also a lot of this sounds like you’re really in the weeds, and it definitely is, but it really helps to hold a north star. And that was something that I built early on when I was at the VA. But literally, it just started with a bunch of Post-It notes, but saying like, “What could the VA be? If we get through all these bureaucracy hacks, like what is the VA at the end of the rainbow, as it were?”

And, actually, so the Federal Government has an equivalent to the Grammy’s or the Emmy’s called the Sammy’s. And the VA won the Sammy for the whole Federal Government for customer service two weeks ago.

Pete Mockaitis
Congratulations.

Marina Nitze
And that was such an incredible vision, that from ten years ago, that it wasn’t even on my vision board. So, I just encourage you, it’s nice to have a north star, and it can also motivate you through the dark times to know, like, what the big picture you’re working towards is even if you have to make a lot of concessions along the way.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, now, could you share with us a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Marina Nitze
Absolutely. It’s Lily Tomlin, and it’s, “I always wondered why somebody didn’t do something about that. And then I realized, I’m somebody.”

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite study or experiment or bit of research?

Marina Nitze
I love re-reading Daniel Gilbert’s Stumbling on Happiness, and the research that you’re just kind of as happy as you were before no matter what bad things happen to you, or no matter what decisions that you make. That helps make some decisions feel a little lower stakes.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And a favorite book?

Marina Nitze
Well, a book that I really modeled our book off of is The Success Principles by Jack Canfield because I love that you can just open to any page and get like a little mini dose of inspiration without having to commit to reading a 300-page book.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And a favorite tool?

Marina Nitze
Definitely the stakeholder maps or the journey maps, that it would be like when you’re mapping out a process from end to end, all the different steps, all the people working at the steps, what the error rates are, what the volume rates are, what the wait times are. I love those immensely. And maybe, as a meta toy, it would be my enormous dry erase board sticker because it takes up like my whole wall, and it’s where I draw all my maps.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, so it’s a dry erase board but it’s like a Post-It, or you say sticker?

Marina Nitze
Yes, it’s from 3M. Yeah, it’s like six-by-twelve feet. You can buy them in different sizes. And mine, I’ve had it for five years now, and it’s held up perfectly, but I accept I’d have to replace them.

Pete Mockaitis
But you could reposition it with the adhesive.

Marina Nitze
I had never tried that. So, yes, you could reposition it, but most of my vision was if I got it…you know how you dry erase something for a while and you’d kind of have that red hue that you can’t get rid of? I envisioned, I could just, “Oh, great. I can just unstick the board and put up a new one.” But I haven’t even had to do that yet, so.

Pete Mockaitis
Then you get it done.

Marina Nitze
Yeah, I use it all the time.

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite habit?

Marina Nitze
Inbox zero. It took me many years to get to that point but now I get super anxious if I even have, like, five unprocessed emails.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, Marina, maybe we need to have you for a whole another episode to discuss that.

Marina Nitze
It took a lot of work to get there.

Pete Mockaitis
So, a quick follow-up, what have been some of the most game-changing insights, or approaches, or tools, or hacks to pulling this off?

Marina Nitze
One, definitely, the snooze feature in Gmail helped a lot because some email it’s a hotel reservation one, or something about a meeting agenda for next week. I snooze it till one minute before I need it so it gets out of my inbox but I know it’s going to appear when I need it. Another piece is really from David Allen’s Getting Things Done, which is I just have to make a decision about what to do in the email.

I don’t have to do the thing, so that reduces the friction of like, “Oh, my God, I don’t have time to write a 20-page report.” But I don’t have to. All I have to do is capture it in my to-do list that I have to write a 20-page report, and then I tag the email as having a task, and then I can get it out of my inbox. I’m also a pretty merciless un-subscriber, and I love apps like Matter, for example.

Anytime I get an email newsletter, something I’m supposed to read, that automatically gets forwarded to Matter and delete it from my inbox, so that when I’m in the mood to read, or David Allen, in the context to read, I can just pull up my Matter app and I get all my reading material in one place so it’s not in my inbox.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Is there a key nugget you share that really seems to connect and resonate with folks; you hear people quote it back to you often?

Marina Nitze
Yes, it’s the idea of cultivating the karass. Karass is a concept from Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle, which is that, in the book, that God has hidden other people on the planet to help you accomplish a goal. We use it in a little bit more of a secular way, which is imagine if, instead of thinking that all people in your agency or your department are out to get you or out to slow-roll you, imagine that there are people that are out to help you, and they are just hidden around as security guards or secretaries or accountants. And how can you find them and then band together to get your goal accomplished?

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Marina Nitze
HackYourBureaucracy.com. We have a blog where we’re continuing to share more bureaucracy-hacking tactics and stories. And then you can follow me on Twitter at @MarinaNitze, N-I-T-Z-E.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Marina Nitze
Yes, find your karass. I mean, the best allies I had when I was in government trying to get through some of the hardest projects were literally the security guards and the executive assistants. And so, you just never know who your best allies are. So, go out there, meet as many people as you can, and hack your bureaucracy.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Marina, thank you. This has been a treat. I wish you many successful hacks.

Marina Nitze
Thank you so much. You, too.

Aug 29
0

795: How to Stop Being Crazy Busy and Take Back Your Time with Zena Everett

By | Podcasts | One Comment

 

Zena Everett reveals the time-wasters to drop in order to make time for what matters.

You’ll Learn:

  1. The top things slowing us down at work 
  2. The questions to ask for effective prioritization
  3. How to say no nicely 

 

About Zena

Leadership Coach and Speaker Zena Everett is the author of Mind Flip, Take the Fear out of Your Career and the award winning Crazy Busy Cure. 

Originally a recruitment entrepreneur, Zena sold her business in 2007 then studied an MSc in Career Management and Coaching. She then took further postgraduate qualifications in psychological coaching and leadership with neuroscience (MIT Sloan Business School). She has coached on the Executive MBA Programme at Oxford University’s Saïd Business School and is a member of the Associate Faculty at Henley Business School. 

 

Resources Mentioned

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Zena Everett Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Zena, welcome to How to be Awesome at Your Job.

Zena Everett
Delighted to be here. Thank you for having me.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, we’re talking productivity and time stuff, which is a favorite topic of mine, as well as listeners. And I love your book title so much The Crazy Busy Cure: A productivity book for people who don’t have time to read productivity books. Please lay it on us, Zena, what do you mean by crazy busy? And how is your book sort of distinctive in that it’s for those who don’t have time to read such books?

Zena Everett
Yeah. And I’m nervous about talking about productivity because that sounds like we’re trying to get people to do even more and more, and I’m not sure we are, really. I think we’re getting people to separate the meaningful from the meaningless. But I’m a coach, and my clients kept saying to me, “Oh, yeah, I’m really crazy busy. I’m crazy busy,” and it just was kind of going through our head all the time. And I thought, “This isn’t a good thing.”

You know, the type of person, they’d be late for a session, and everything would kind of be thrown across the table, and they haven’t thought, and they have no time to think, and I’d been asked to coach them because they were causing bottlenecks for everybody else in the organization. And I just thought, “Gosh, this is really interesting. Why are people so crazy busy? Is it them?” and it is to a certain extent, but it’s also a systemic thing. So, that’s what I got really interested in.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And so, your book is for folks who don’t have time to read such books. I’m curious, is there a particular…where my mind goes in reading that is thinking about sort of like a time ROI, and Chris Bailey talks about this, in terms of like minutes spent on a thing will yield more minutes back to you for having done so. Are there some particular insights or tools or tactics that are really transformational along these lines?

Zena Everett
Even when you say things like that, it makes me get a bit stressed because that’s sort of minute ROI and all those kinds of things. What I realized is that I found some great research by Bain, actually, where I know where you were a long time ago. So, what they talked about, this whole concept of organizational drag, so I realized that crazy busyness is a thing and it’s got a name, which I call productivity drag.

And these are all the things that kind of slow down the system, that makes it really hard to get any work done. And that is excessive complexity and collaboration, so we want all organizations to be inclusive, but having too many people around the table just means you’ve got too many competing opinions and competing agendas, and often nobody there who’s strong enough to align those and ask the right questions.

So, there’s too much complexity, digitization – amazing because this is how we’re doing this, but sometimes it can layer a layer of fake work, crazy busy work on top of the real work, and I definitely put messaging and teams and social media in there. And then there’s excessive organizational complexity, where there are just far too many systems and processes.

And then overservicing, actually. That’s the fourth, which I realize sometimes I do. I overservice some clients who actually, in terms of ROI, I don’t get that much back. And that can happen when you’re in a business partnering role. So, I think you’ve got those kinds of systemic organizational factors that slow us down. And then you’ve got our own ability to not say no, possibly, or please everybody, all that stuff that gets us here in the words of Marshall Goldsmith, but don’t get us there.

So, I think you combine the two, and that’s why it’s just so hard to get anything done. And you know as well, Pete, that we are switching all the time, aren’t we? Most of our tasks just take a couple of minutes. We’re switching, switching all the time rather than actually doing deep work. And there’s umpteen things being written about deep work and flow, but that’s the holy grail of this stuff, isn’t it?

Pete Mockaitis
Certainly. Okay. So, that makes sense in terms of a cocktail for crazy busyness if you’ve got some organizational drag things going on, a bunch of complexity and collaboration, and overdoing it, and then our own difficulties internally putting together, and there you go, crazy busy, here we are. So, I’m curious, where do you recommend folks start? If they find themselves in a crazy busy situation and we want to get out in a jiffy, what do you recommend as some of the first key steps that make a world of difference?

Zena Everett
I always think our grandparents could run this kind of work because it’s so obvious. It’s first principles, isn’t it? I think it’s going back to people to say, “Actually, what am I really measured on here? What’s my job description? When I’m next in front of my boss or a promotion board or something like that, what do I want to talk about that I’ve actually achieved? And does how I run my role and spend my days reflect that?” because very often it doesn’t.

You know this, we sacrifice our priorities on the altar of everybody else’s urgent demands. So, I say to my clients, “Right. Actually, what is the difference between you and an outstanding performer? What are they achieving? What’s the gap? That’s where you need to focus your time.” So, all that stuff you say yes to, well, we can spend a lot of time saying yes to discretionary activities, all the other things that come our way, all those curve balls, some of which are career-enhancing because they’re interesting, or we’re learning, or they give us access to new networks but, actually, me making you more crazy busy, because I haven’t finished my work, and I say, “Well, look, Pete, would you mind?” isn’t a good thing.

So, that’s why I say, right, just take a step back actually and slow things down to go faster, and actually work out, “What is the top level of my job description?”

Pete Mockaitis
Well, Zena, can you tie that together for us with an inspiring story of someone who escaped crazy busyness by following such a process?

Zena Everett
I’ve got lots of examples, actually, so maybe I should sort of kind of talk about Captain Fantastic. So, I think my typical client would be somebody who got promoted, maybe they’ve been great at their job, they’ve always been hot on execution, worked harder than everybody else, long hours, just delivered. If a job’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well, all that kind of stuff.

And then they’re doing really well at the job, and somebody says, “Hey, look, here’s an intern. Take them on. They know nothing. They’re clueless. Well done,” and nobody ever says to that person, “Right. You’re already spending 120% of your hours doing your job.” Nobody ever says, “Right. This is how you need to make your job more efficient to find time for managing those people.”

Anyway, invariably, they do, and then they end up having a team around them, and that’s often my absolute definition of a crazy busy client. It’s somebody on that sweet spot who’s managing their own contribution but they’re running a team as well, and they probably got a team of mixed ability, maybe some people they’ve inherited or they’re brand new and so on.

And those are the people that I would love to coach, and I have a really robust discussion with to say, “Right. You need to go back and talk to your boss about how much time you should be spending on your own work, and how much time you should be spending on management.” And we don’t talk about time in that respect. I think it’s rare.

Our manufacturing cousins would be everything is timed on the production line, isn’t it? We’re really sure about how long it takes to do when, and everything is fairly timed. Whereas, it’s rare that somebody says, “That report should take you 45 minutes. If you just do it once, do it properly, get it done, it’s about 45 minutes, and this is what good practice looks like.”

So, we’re nervous about micromanaging people, that’s what managers say to me all the time, “Oh, I really don’t want to micromanage people” But, actually, I think we’ve got to be about old school about this, and give some people some sense about how to structure their days, how long tasks should take, and get them to put some kind of rigor and discipline in them.

Because, at the moment, what we know is that work is just cannibalizing into people’s personal time. We’re getting our tasks done but we have this low level of anxiety, hopefully, only low level, no worse than that, because we always feel anxious because there’s just so much to do and we never get to inbox zero, do we, or whatever it is, and there’s always more projects, and there’s more things we can be doing, and never mind all the liking and posting and all that kind of crazy nonsense.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yeah, that’s a great tip right there in terms of when it’s knowledge work, it can be super fuzzy with regard to you can do a report in 45 minutes, you could do a report in four hours, and I find those guidelines quite helpful, myself, both on the giving and the receiving end because sometimes it really is essential. I’ve spent all day on an email before, and it was absolutely the right choice. That email was mission critical and involved tens of thousands of dollars, so felt great about that.

And the other times, you can go way overboard on something that is like, “No, you just have to kind of check the box so that we know that’s checked, and then we’re fine,” or, “Well, this is going to be edited by six more people anyway down the road so no need to stress it too much because it’s going to be revised like the Dickens so just go ahead and get the rough outline and structure starter point in play and then we’re good to go.”

So, yeah, I think that is helpful as opposed to micromanage-y. And do you have an idea, or thought, or guideline for when does something become micromanagement versus is it just good wholesome quality guidance that is useful and appreciated?

Zena Everett
I like a bit of wholesome quality guidance but I think once we get people cured from crazy busyness, they’re much better managers, and then they’ve got time to say, “Pete, what can I back off and let you get on with?” I think that’s the thing is to have that continuous conversation. And when people are maybe working partly from home and partly in the office and juggling all that kind of stuff, sometimes we need more help than people expect, sometimes we need less, so you can’t overcommunicate on this kind of stuff.

But my real bug bear that really drives me mad is this whole culture of continuous synchronous working. So, this feeling the need to send you Teams Messenger, or WhatsApp, or something, and you respond to that immediately, and I think that is a thing that really slows people down because, aside those occasional days when you spend a whole day on an email, and you probably need to take a step away and come back and look at it again, and maybe sleep on it, all those things, that’s fine.

But, fundamentally, most of us, as you very well know, we’re just switching tasks all day, aren’t we, because people need us, and people need us now. So, I get my clients to have more meetings, which they aren’t that happy about, but better. I’d get them to put some real rigor into their meetings and sharpen up.

Have you ever said to somebody, “Oh, look, do that meeting for me?” and you think, “Great. I’ve saved myself a couple of hours there.” And then the person comes out of the meeting, and you say, “All right. How did it go? What happened?” and they brief you in about two sentences, don’t they, “Oh, yeah, we did this and Jim is doing this. That’s it.”

So, I’m always curious by how my clients can spend so much time in really rubbish meetings that they shouldn’t be in, but they don’t have time to say to you, “Really liked how you write that report. Actually, you can try and make it quicker now,” or whatever it is. So, there’s definitely something about communicating properly once rather than having this continuous stream of consciousness where we feel we should be connected to our teams, well, almost 24/7 in some cases. This drip, drip, drip of Teams messages.

So, I think if we can kind of eliminate that and get people to work away on their own, do some deep thinking, work in flow, all the kind of basic productivity stuff that we’ve all been reading about, and then come back, and then connect and have proper rigorous meetings, life would be so much better. But there seems to be a lot of wasted time in inefficient meetings that we could do something about.

And I think that we need to use technology better so that it’s just a kind of briefing rather than a discussion, or a celebration, or a brainstorm, or decisions to be made, obviously, then there is no reason for that to be a meeting. Our manufacturing colleagues would never get everybody to down tools at the same time because it’s such an expensive investment of time but we’re frivolous with our time. That’s a very long answer, isn’t it?

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I was agreeing with you with regard to that manufacturing analogy. It does feel kind of silly to say, “Okay, hey, everyone, stop. Stop things you’re doing, put down the chainsaw or kind of whatever is going on there, and we’re going to chat about this thing.” It’s just sort of a head scratch, like, “What? Why? What’s happening right now? And why? This doesn’t seem so critical. Is there an emergency? Like, is something catastrophic occurring?”

It’s fuzzy and yet, in professionals, that world is still plenty expensive to have whatever, six, ten people in a room all at the same time, and there is that interruption of flow factor in there as well. So, that really puts in the context that, “Yeah, those meetings are destructive.” So, I’m curious, when you mentioned people-pleasing and not saying no, do you have any pro tips on how we professionals can do that better? How does one decline a meeting politely, diplomatically, effectively in a none career-limiting fashion?

Zena Everett
Well, how do you do it, because you must do it all the time?

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I sort of have the luxury of being the owner/CEO, and so there’s nobody above me to ask me things. So, then it’s like this great mass of the external world which I have license to engage or disengage as I please. So, in a way, I’m spoiled and I don’t have that much of a problem.

Zena Everett
Do you ever feel guilty if you say no to people?

Pete Mockaitis
Well, my wife, I would.

Zena Everett
You should never say no to your wife, ever. What are you saying no to your wife about? Let’s talk about that. Let’s get your wife on.

Pete Mockaitis
I guess when I was an employee, I did, it’s like, “Oh, shucks, I’m invited to this meeting. Oh, I don’t really think it’s viable for me to be there? How do I say this just right?” so I did have those consternations and worries. So, what do you recommend to folks inside organizations?

Zena Everett
I hate that word stakeholder. It’s really kind of cliché, isn’t it? But I think you have to work out who your best stakeholders are. Everybody in this kind of field of time management, we’ve got Pomodoros, or frogs, or something, and I love that antelope and field mice analogy. Do you know that one?

So, you’ve got to know who your main stakeholders are. And I love the analogy of the lions who only chase antelopes. So, they know that they can’t spend their whole day chasing after little furry critters because it’s not worth it. The calorific intake that they need, they wouldn’t get from lots of small things. It’s not worth it. They just let them go.

Whereas, we love to chase anything, don’t we? We love the dopamine hit of crossing something off our list, and our brains can’t distinguish between whether that’s a significant thing, an antelope that we can feed off or if it’s just a load of small field mice. And I am as guilty as anybody of writing small stuff down just to have the pleasure of crossing them off.

So, we’ve got to know who our antelopes are, and so that can be significant tasks, when we’ve got some big goals and we’ve broken them down, yes, sounded stuff, but, actually, we also need to know who those antelope people are as well. Apologies to any vegans who are finding this distasteful. But I think you got to know who the important people are.

And you can’t just jump and overservice people, and you’ve got to know who to say, “Yes, great. I’d really love to get involved,” and go through that thought process, “What’s good for my career? What am I trying to achieve? Where do I need to increase my visibility? If I do this, is this going to give me a new skill? Is this going to give me access to new networks?”

Does that sound calculating? I think we’ve got to be sensible about this, and some people are better than others. There’s so much about saying no, isn’t there? You just say no nicely. Don’t over-explain. Our Royal Family have got an expression of saying, “Never explain. Never complain.” And I think that’s really good. So, the more detail you go into about why you haven’t got five minutes, clearly, you’re shooting yourself in the foot. But you can just say, “Look, I can’t do it.”

But I try and get, I run these “Crazy Busy” sessions, and I teach people, just say, to sequence, “I can’t do that now but I’ll do it, don’t worry. The first available space I’ve got is 8:00 o’clock tomorrow,” or whenever, “Wednesday week and I’ll do it then,” whatever. Hopefully, they’ll disassociate themselves by then. So, I think we need to get into the habit of pushing back, and I think we just need to say, “Yes, I can, and this is when I can fit it in.”

Again, our manufacturing colleagues, if I came to you, and said, “Look, I don’t know, here’s my test tube. Test it in your testing laboratory,” you wouldn’t say, “Of course, I’ll stop the whole line, all those other test tubes will go crashing off the sides.” You just say, “Yes, of course. We start again at 3:00 o’clock, and yours will be the first on there.” So, we’ve just got to approach our work in the same way, and say, “Yeah, I can schedule it in then. How’s that?” And if that doesn’t work, then find somebody else to do it the nicest possible way.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. So, we got that great clarity associated with who the people who really matter, and what is the work, and the projects that really matter, and the things you’re being judged or graded upon. Cool. And so then, I’d love for you to elaborate on the just say no nicely. Do you have any favorite phrases, scripts, verbiage?

Zena Everett
I’ve learnt, one of my clients taught me to say, “I’ve noticed…” so that’s a very nice way of dealing with things because I think the people that cause the greatest problems, actually, are the ones we can’t say no to. We soon learn to say, “Yeah, I can’t do that now. I’ll do it later,” or, “Actually, I really can’t get involved in this. I don’t have the capacity.”

But the ones that are the real problems are the, “You sending me a message, say, at 7:30 every morning when you wake up, saying, ‘I need this for a meeting at 9:00,’ and you’re my boss, and I’m terrified of you, and so I don’t know how to deal with it, and I’m hardwired to do it straightaway.” So, “I’ve noticed…” is a really nice way to start a conversation, to say, “Pete, I’ve noticed that you’re often sending me emails at 7:30 asking for information. Oh, that’s no problem. I love doing it for you, but…” okay, maybe not quite as revolting as that.

“But how about I have sight of your diary. Once a week, you can show me what meetings you’ve got coming up and then I can make sure I schedule time to get all that information from you?” So, “I’ve noticed…” is a really nice way to talk about someone’s behavior and how you want it to change rather than making it personal.

So, I think that’s a conversation-starter to say, “How can we do this and get a bit more organized?” because crazy busy people are a real problem for everybody else, because they’re multitasking, they’re always missing deadlines, everything at the last minute, they’re perfectionists often so that slows things down because perfectionists are more likely to procrastinate. They cause problems for everybody else, so we almost need to learn how to have conversations with crazy busy people so we’re not crazy busy by default. It’s not pushed down the chain.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. So, let’s say we’ve done all those things masterfully in terms of we’ve gotten clarity on what’s important and who’s important, and pushed back effectively on, “I’m not going to that meeting. I’ve noticed this behavior. I’m going to schedule some time to do these things.” If we’ve tamed the external world, what are some of the top things we got to focus in on with our internal world?

Zena Everett
Okay, I’ve gone on the external world. Often, when I talk to people about what sucks up their time the most, they talk about emails and messages; so emails, meetings, and messages, systems, processes, inter-team communication, networking, so I just add to your list. I would usually encourage people to have a talk about internal communication, like, “Can we stop emailing each other? Can we just talk? Can we go and have lunch and get all this dealt with rather than, again, this kind of James Joyce stream of consciousness all day?”

I think our internal world is often that people-pleasing, those messages we’ve internalized, “If you work harder than everybody else, you’ll do well,” the stuff. We look at maybe our parents, caregivers, people from our early lives that we’ve observed, they worked incredibly hard, they’ve done well. Actually, the world is slightly different now. It’s the thinking that makes the difference. It’s the creativity, it’s the innovation, it’s the space to lead, it’s time to think for us.

So, I think we’ve got to realize that, actually, the whole MO for getting us to a certain level in our careers has to shift when we want additional responsibility because we can’t run around like a headless chicken looking stressed. So, I think it’s some real self-talk about, again, like I said, Marshall Goldsmith is, “What got me there,” I love that expression, “won’t get me here,” thinking, “What does a high-performer in my organization look like? What are people saying about me? Am I giving off a vibe that I take it all in my stride, I’ve got capacity for other people? And have I got time to network?”

I’m interested in your thoughts on this, but I think that’s so important for career success, and I’ve heard you talk about this. I think people who got their heads down in their job and not networking, they’re not saying, “Pete, what are you working on? That sounds really interesting. Let’s have a chat about it. Let’s grab a coffee,” they’re not just reaching out. They’ve got their heads down, and, actually, in most organizations that I work in, those aren’t the people that do well.

The people that do well have got their heads up and they’re visible and they’re picking very carefully the projects that they get involved in because they want to be seen to come up with the gamechangers. But our brains fight against this, and it can be in our DNA just to do lots of busy stuff. And then there’s all the real kind of mother hen managers, I talk about in the book, that are the ones that are…they remember everyone’s birthday, they do all the emotional labor, they’re collecting the cups after the meetings.

They’re doing other people’s work for them because they don’t want to share out across the team because they’re worried that their colleagues are too busy, all that kind of stuff. And, actually, they’re the ones that crash and burn. They simply don’t get promoted.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Those are some good flags and watchouts there. Yes, I think I’ve noticed that as well as those with their heads up and around and aware, being thoughtful and selective, and networked and building relationships, do often seem to be advancing better than those who have their head down. And, I guess I’m an extrovert, but it sounds like more fun to me as well in terms of how you’re operating. So, you mentioned self-talk, are there some key mantras or I guess maybe cognitive distortions to tackle head on or how do we get our heads right?

Zena Everett
Well, I’m a bit of a “Just don’t do it” person. I think people really have to learn to say no to stuff, and that’s a big…like, we’ve just talked about. But, actually, even if they’re not saying no to somebody else, just think, “It’s really tempting for me to read that, get involved in that, but, actually, that’s not a priority. My time is finite,” so I think that’s important.

The voice that I want my clients to hear from me, “Why am I doing that? What’s my highest and best use here?” And the way that we manage our money, that idea of best use of treasury, is the same thing, “What is the highest and best use of my time? What is it that only I can do?” It’s a great question if you’re a manager, “Out of everything I can do, what should I be doing? What is it that only I can do on my team? And that’s where I should be adding the most value because that’s my greatest contribution to the business.”

So, I think those are the kind of reflective questions that we need to go through, “And why am I doing this? If this is my hourly rate, why am I doing this? Shouldn’t somebody be doing it?” We know when people are supposed to be more strategic and not get involved in the weeds. Sometimes that’s a bit scary because they think, again, I’m talking about guilt a lot.

But that can almost feel indulgent, couldn’t it? I’m really thinking about this kind of stuff where it’s actually, “Should I just be on the phone or getting involved in this kind of bring stuff to show that I’m willing,” but, actually, businesses want people they develop to spend more time being strategic and more time thinking. So, that can be something that people really need to talk themselves into to think, “Look, this is okay. I might be right at the top of my comfort zone and really enjoying it, and it feels good.”

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, we’ve got some good tidbits here. I guess I’m curious, having worked with so many different coaching clients, can you share a couple of the approaches, tips, tools, interventions that have been just the most transformational and yet also easy?

Zena Everett
Okay, I’m thinking about this. I love the whole towering strengths exercise which, again, is from Marshall. I’m doing PR for Marshall Goldsmith, it seems like.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, we had him on the show recently. He’ll appreciate the reverberation there. So, let’s talk about that.

Zena Everett
So, he has a great exercise where you work out what your towering strengths are. So, that could be, “I’m a really hard worker,” and then what happens when that goes into overdrive, “Right. Well, actually, I’m a complete control freak. I really don’t like to leave anything not done exactly right. I don’t want any loose ends.”

So, when my towering strengths have been super hardworking, when it goes into overdrive, means that I just throw myself at everything in. I don’t stop and think, “I think hard work is going to get me through.” So, the towering strength versus overdrive exercise is really helpful because our towering strength is often what creates a kind of glass ceiling for us later on in organizations because that becomes the problem.

So, maybe, I mean, you and I work for ourselves. I know my towering strength is that I’m pretty strong, I’m very independent. When, actually, that towering strength goes into overdrive, it means that I can be a little bit slow in saying, in asking for help and getting support because I always think I can figure everything out on my own. So, that’s an exercise that I think can be really interesting for people.

And then I do love all those magic questions. If you went back into work tomorrow and everything was fantastic, what would be different? I think that tends to shift people because they say, “I’m stuck and I don’t know,” but you just kind of take them to the sunny opens and get them to look back, then they come up with ideas.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, Zena, tell me, anything else you want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear about some of your favorite things?

Zena Everett
Yeah. So, any kind of Productivity 101 is about scheduling. If it’s not scheduled, it doesn’t happen. So, I get people to pimp their calendars because our calendars are full of meetings, and full of calls but they don’t have tasks in there. So, I get them to understand their priorities, which is the P, to insert into their schedules, it’s got to be meaningful, the M in PIMP, because otherwise they’ll let somebody bump up their tasks and take priority.

And then the final P in PIMP is for prompts, which we know that people have got to have a prompt so that they don’t have…to remove the element of choice, “So, I finish doing this meeting. I’m going to put the kettle on, make a coffee, and then I’m going to go straight in and do that, write that bit of report, or whatever it is, for an hour. I’m going to set myself a timer and do it,” to remove as many options as possible.

So, I make people pimp their schedules, and actually schedule tasks in so that we feel that we have some greater sense of control because what I’ve noticed with people is they’ve got no time for actual work. They’ve just got so many meetings, so many different demands that they’re doing. They don’t have time to actually stop and think and do some deep work, so that’s going to be scheduled. So, your antelopes have got to be scheduled and also your field mice.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Thank you. Well, now could you share a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Zena Everett
Well, I have to say I like, “Just don’t do it.” That really works for me. And I tend to think about that first, “Why am I doing this?” Yeah, so just don’t do it. That’s the opposite of “Just do it” that we attempted to do. I think a lot of brain, just doing it, causes organizational drag, “Why are we actually doing this?”

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And do you have a favorite study or experiment or bit of research?

Zena Everett
I love Dunning-Kruger. Shall we talk about Dunning-Kruger?

Pete Mockaitis
Let’s do it.

Zena Everett
I love the Dunning-Kruger Effect which is a cognitive bias. So, a hapless criminal, I think in the ‘90s, went and robbed two banks with just lemon juice on his face. And he robbed one bank and then another one thinking that he’d never get caught because lemon juice is an invisible ink. And, of course, he was arrested swiftly.

So, Messrs. Dunning and Mr. Krueger, psychologists, thought, “How can somebody so hapless have so much confidence?” So, they discovered this thing called the Dunning-Kruger Effect, they did various research on students and realized that the people with the least ability had the most confidence, and vice versa. So, they call it Dunning-Kruger effect, so the less you know, the more confident you are.

And, of course, the opposite of Dunning-Kruger is that when somebody becomes an expert in something, sometimes they can have a bit of a confidence wobble because then they’re worried that, actually, they realize all the stuff that they don’t know because they’re benchmarking themselves against their peers who are other experts.

So, I see in mid-life that sometimes people have confidence wobbles, or they call it impostor syndrome, “All of a sudden, I was great at my job. And now I’m feeling a little bit hesitant and losing confidence.” So, I love telling them about Dunning-Kruger, “Actually, that’s really good because you just realized you know what you don’t know.” So, I’m a bit anti all this stuff, particularly, thanks to all kinds of stereotypes, but there’s lots of coaching for women around the impostor syndrome, “Oh, just relax about that. Don’t put yourself in those situations.”

I say to my clients, “That’s great if you’re feeling like an impostor. That shows that you’re really pushing something, you’re doing something new, but it’s also that you’re just realizing that maybe you need a little bit more preparation time to really feel confident. You need to put some more hours in but it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t keep on going.”

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, that’s great. And a favorite book?

Zena Everett
Okay. So, I’m a big fan of Alan Weiss. I love his Million Dollar Consulting book, I love his Money Talks, I love his kind of raw ambition and confidence and aspiration. I think it’s great. I recommend his books frequently. So, he’s talking about this whole idea about charging for what you’re worth.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite tool?

Zena Everett
I don’t think I have a favorite tool. In fact, I’m quite nervous about people who like a software for everything because I think a whiteboard, where you map your projects with some really good Sharpies and some great Post-It notes so you’ve got visual management is a fantastic tool. So, there you go, an old-fashioned whiteboard where I can actually see it. That really works for me. I’m neurotypical. I’m much more visual than I am, so give me a whiteboard and a spreadsheet any day, though I think that works.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite habit?

Zena Everett
I’d like to come up with some great productivity habit. I’m very motivated by a great cup of coffee, so that’s my favorite reward. Rewarding myself with a good cup of coffee.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And is there a key nugget you share that really seems to connect and resonate with folks; they quote it back to you often?

Zena Everett
“Why am I doing this?”

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Zena Everett
My website is ZenaEverett.com, and I send out a monthly article on productivity and career success. So, if people want that, they can either sign up for my website or just drop me an email and we’ll add them to our system.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Zena Everett
Work out what your antelopes are and make sure that your diary reflects your priorities, not other people’s.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, Zena, it’s been a pleasure. I wish much luck and very little crazy busyness.

Zena Everett
Thank you. You, too.