Grace Marshall's Blog, page 5

Six pre-holiday tactics to avoid email dread

Going on holiday? Here are six email tactics to ensure you can switch off and recharge.

1. Pre-schedule your out of office

Instead of it being the last thing you do – or the first thing you do on holiday because you forgot to set it up before – pre-schedule your out of office, with start and end times. Not only is that one less thing to remember before you leave the office, you also avoid the embarrassment of being told your out of office is still on when you’ve been back for a while.

Consider setting your start time part-way through your last day, so you don’t get that last minute panic when something lands at 4.55 just before your out of office kicks in. As for your end time – how about giving yourself an extra day to catch up?

2. Emergency rules of engagement

Will you be contactable? Will you be checking? Set clear boundaries about what (if anything) you are willing to be available for and if it’s a case of emergency only, clarify what constitutes as an emergency and set a clear procedure for getting your attention – preferably one that doesn’t involve you having to check email.

I usually ask one of the Think Productive HQ team to be my emergency backup contact, and the arrangement we have is that if a client wants to check or book a workshop date, I’m happy to be texted. That way bookings won’t be delayed and I won’t feel the urge to check to make sure I’m not missing them. Personally I’m always happy to be interrupted with news that a client is ready to book.

3. Save in draft

One workshop delegate shared that when he goes on holiday, he asks his team to save in draft any emails they want to send him. Just before he’s due back, they review what’s still relevant and hit send. This saves him catching up on emails that are out of date, and also encourages his team to consider how they can resolve issues in his absence – rather than just ping them over by default.

4. The holiday heads-up

Sometimes an emergency is simply someone’s last minute planning: “Sorry this is last minute but can you just…?” To reduce avoidable crises, give the people you’re working with a heads up in advance, with plenty of notice so that they can get their requests and questions in when you’re still around. “I’m away from the 1st to the 16th, but I’m around all this week, if you want to discuss…”

5. Trust

Ultimately switching off is about trust. Trust in your team to handle things without you. Trust that the work will all be there when you get back. Trust in yourself, that you can pick things up again when you’re back, refreshed, recharged and ready to go.

6. Get your inbox to zero – yes before you go on holiday!

“Won’t it just be full again when I get back?” I hear you ask.

Yes, but it will be full of new stuff – not a mixture of old and new, things you’d forgotten about, things you overlooked, things you’ve dealt with but haven’t filed, and things you should have deleted a long time ago.

Getting your inbox to zero is about clearing the decks, so that you have clarity over what’s dealt with and what’s yet to be actioned (and you’ll be surprised at how that’s often far less than you imagine).

It gives you the opportunity to give people a heads up and set expectations, so if you do need to renegotiate that deadline, apologise for a delay, delegate or say a clear no to that request you’ve been deliberating over – you can do so before you go on holiday, not when you get a phone call while you’re navigating five lanes of traffic in Rome. You’re also less likely to wake up in the middle of the night with a cold sweat over that email you forgot to reply to.

And once you’ve done the hard work of clearing the backlog, you’ll know exactly what you need to do on your return. Coming back will be nowhere near as daunting. As one client found, “My recent return from holiday was also the calmest, least stressful ever! Not only did I totally switch off for a week to properly recharge, but I did not dread that ‘sea of unread emails’.”

Want to get your inbox under control before the summer holidays? Join me on the Inbox to Zero Challenge next Tuesday and banish inbox fear once and for all.

Why productivity needs to be much more than a “how do I?” question

When it comes to productivity, we’re so used to asking the ‘How’ question.

How do I improve my productivity? How do I switch off when the work never ends? How do I work better, faster or smarter? How do I get my inbox to zero? How do I master my to-do list? How do I stop procrastinating?

The problem is, even when we have the answer to the ‘how’ question, we don’t always use it. Too often, those brilliant productivity tips we pick up stay as ideas, rather than actions, as common sense rather than common practice. Worse still, they become yet another thing to do on our to-do list – another thing to add to our sense of guilt.

If we’re not careful, the tools, tactics and strategies we invest time, energy and attention into learning can become the very thing that adds to our sense of overwhelm.

A coaching client admitted the other day that in trying to make sure he took a lunch break, he noticed he was getting annoyed at this lunch break he was trying to cram into the day. It had become something that was taking time away from him, rather than giving him time.

Last year, in my 10 days of rest experiment, I found that getting to bed earlier, which was supposed to help me be more rested and relaxed was becoming a source of stress! When opportunity becomes obligation, it creates overwhelm. It goes from something that enables us to something that burdens us.

I’ve met people before who have said to me that their previous attempts at inbox zero had become an obsession that bound them even more to their emails. Or that they haven’t gotten round to writing their book yet because they haven’t found the right tool, format or process.

That’s because ‘how’ is only part of the equation. ‘How’ tells us the process, but if we’re not clear about the ‘what’ and the ‘why’, the ‘how’ becomes pretty redundant.

What are you working towards?

What’s your productivity goal? What are you procrastinating on that you want to finally get nailed? What specifically do you want to be different? What does better look like?

Is it about feeling calmer, or fired up? Is it about getting home on time, or being able to take up dancing again? Is it about eating your dinner in peace without emails nagging at you? Or replacing last minute panic with smug satisfaction?

If your answer is ‘yes, all of the above’ then that could be where you’re getting stuck. When you set one clear direction, you can find you hit other goals along the way, but if you don’t set one at all, you can easily find yourself ping-ponging in different directions and never actually getting anywhere.

More importantly, why does that matter?

The question we don’t ask anywhere near often enough is Why.

Why do I want to improve my productivity? Why do I want to leave work on time? Why do I want to get my inbox to zero? Why do I want to get more done?

Here’s an experiment. Take that ‘how’ question you’re asking at the moment, and turn it into a ‘why’ question. What’s your ‘why’ question?

‘Why do I want to stop procrastinating?’ seems like a bit of a ‘duh’ question, but stay with it for a minute. In fact, the more obvious it seems, the less you’ve probably actually thought about it.

Why do you want to stop procrastinating? Why does that matter to you? What difference does it actually make? And why does that matter to you?

For the client who was getting annoyed with his lunch breaks, it turns out he’s not all that bothered about food. He saw eating as an inconvenient necessity, and probably got a slight kick out of rebelling and proving that he could go without. The why that resonated more truly with him was about the break rather than that lunch – giving his brain a chance to reset and recharge.

Another workshop delegate recently discovered that her why wasn’t about her own productivity at all – it was about her team. She was quite happy with the number of hours she put in, and she revelled in the challenge of her work, but she was worried about some members of her team, that the cracks were starting to show in their resilience, health and family life. Her why was about leading by example, so that she could show her team it was possible to do great work at work, without sacrificing life outside of work.

Productivity is so much more than asking “How do I work better?”

That’s just the process.

If we want to make sure we actually put all those great productivity tips and ideas to good use, we need to be really clear, not just pretty clear, about our why (purpose) and our what (goal). Only then does the how become useful.

Otherwise it will just be another thing to do – and we have enough of those.

PS. I’d love to know your why and your what. Write a comment or drop me a line and let me know – and if you’d like my help, book a clarity shot session and let’s work on it together.

 

How does your soul rest best?

I first came across this beautiful question from Nigel Langford, a church leader who was speaking at a women’s leadership conference a little while ago, and given the week a lot of us have had with the EU Referendum in the UK, it seemed an apt topic.

How does my soul rest best? Here are 3 things I’ve noticed:

My soul rests when I know why I’m resting

“How do I find time to recharge, when life outside of work was just as busy as life at work?” a conference delegate asked me on Friday, after a session on emotional resilience highlighted the need to have recharge time. As I shared some insights and strategies with her, I realised it’s not so much a question of how we find time, but why don’t we?

So often we say we don’t have time, when let’s face it, there are plenty of things we do find time for. We just don’t have spare time after everything else. The truth is that we often see recharging as something we ‘should’ do in an ideal world, rather than an essential in our world.

Let me compare it to washing my car. I know I should wash my car more often, and it makes me smile when I see my car all clean and sparkly, but at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter that much to me whether my car is clean or dirty. I just don’t value a clean car all that highly. So in my world my car gets washed whenever my husband and daughter fancy some bonding time outside and there’s no gardening to be done.

On the other hand, putting fuel in my car is something I always do. Yes, sometimes I do let it run a little close to the line, but never to the point where it’s completely empty – and I never want to go there either.

If I think of recharging as a luxury, my soul won’t rest as long as there are other things to be done (and there are always other things to be done). Guilt stops my soul from resting. On the other hand, if I see recharging as fuel – it becomes the very thing that enables me to fulfil my other commitments. Rest becomes a mandate, not a guilty pleasure.

Which is it for you: luxury or fuel?

My soul rests when I know what to do

Part of the problem is we don’t give recharging anywhere near as much thought as we do our work. At work, we prepare, we plan, we brainstorm, decide, evaluate and review. We think about our goals and our values and commit our actions accordingly. By the time we get home, our brain is usually suffering from decision fatigue, and we can’t think much beyond the dishes, the kids and the TV.

We all recharge differently – what is it that you enjoy doing so much it gives you energy? If it’s not something you’ve given much thought to, start by noticing tiny moments of joy in each day, and capture it on a ‘pick me up’ playlist. You can then use this playlist as a selection to choose from when your brain is too fried to come up with ideas, as well as a prompt to plan your next deliberate recharge time – book in that yoga class, theatre trip, bike ride, night out or night in. Whatever it is that will help you to recharge, make it a date with yourself.

My soul rests when I make peace with what’s not yet done

Another note I made from Nigel’s talk was this: Rest is not the absence of labour but the presence of peace.

My soul finds rest not as much in the what, as in how I do it. The conference delegate I was chatting to last week said that she really enjoys reading with her kids at bedtime – as long as she’s not rushing or wrestling them into bed. In the right conditions, it’s not yet another job, but something that fills her with joy.

I can find rest in quiet moments and hearty laughter, in solitude and friendship, in conversations, music, cooking, hugs, in motion and in stillness. But I can easily be doing any or all of those things and not be at rest. In fact the moment I start thinking of something else I could or should be doing, I become restless.

My soul finds rest when I accept what is, right here, right now, and make peace with what’s not yet done, worked out or wrestled with. Yes I may be going back into battle tomorrow, but if I can be at peace with this moment, that’s when I can rest and recharge.

How about you? How does your soul rest best?

Do Dates vs Due Dates

One of the benefits of being Human, not Superhero (one of the nine characteristics of a Productivity Ninja) is that when you make a mistake, or as I put it, have a ‘doh’ moment, you can chalk it up as a point of learning, rather than a point of failure to beat yourself up with.

It happened to me this week with Father’s Day. This year I had bought my card well in advance, at the end of May. I remember feeling rather smug, and even thought of leaving it with my dad when I visited that weekend. But as it happened, we were busy enjoying ourselves, and when the time came to leave, the card was still in the wrapper, in my bag, and I thought to myself – it’s ok, I can post it, there’s plenty of time. Next thing I knew, it was Friday evening before Father’s Day, and I had missed the last post.

The problem with deadlines is they can have a tendency to creep up on us.

One minute they’re miles away, the next minute they’ve arrived. The time between well in advance and last minute panic doesn’t pass steadily – because let’s face it, there’s so much else going on.

It’s a classic case where a Do Date would be far more useful than a Due Date.

The idea was first introduced to me by fellow Ninja Dawn O’Connor, director of Think Productive Canada, who favours using the ‘Due Date’ field in Outlook Tasks as a ‘Do Date’ – the date you want to actually do the task rather than the date it needs to be done by.

Had I been looking for a Do Date to send my Father’s Day card, I would have picked a date much earlier in June to do this tiny task – given that I’ve been on the road all last week since Sunday. But because I was looking at the due date, I kept telling myself I still had time – until I didn’t.

The same applies for habits like getting to bed earlier, or leaving work on time. We can give ourselves deadlines for lights out or leaving the building, and overlook the fact that it takes time between deciding to stop what we’re doing, and actually making it out the door or into bed.

Think about it: what do you actually do on the way to bed, or out of the office? How much time does that actually take?

Granted, I don’t have the elaborate bed and bath time routines that my kids used to have, but I do at least have to get changed, go to the bathroom, clean my contact lenses, brush my teeth and set the alarm, and that always takes more than the minute I give myself when I decide it’s time for bed. And most nights I find myself picking stuff up on the way to bed – toys left on the floor, food left out in the kitchen, decisions to make for the next day like what to wear, conversations started with my husband that weren’t quite finished, and the book that I would love to be reading – had I gone to bed a little earlier.

The truth is, we’d probably have a much better chance of hitting that deadline if we give ourselves a defined time to start doing ‘bedtime’ or ‘work exit’, rather than just the time we hope to be done by.

What deadlines have a habit of creeping up and surprising you?

Whether it’s that big project with a deceptively distant deadline, a tiny task that theoretically could be done at any time, but in reality keeps falling through the gaps, or something you habitually find yourself running late on – what could you do with a ‘Do Date’ rather than a ‘Due Date’ for?

Let me know…

The “When-Then” Strategy

Want to make something a habit but hate the idea of scheduling? If so, the “when-then” strategy could be for you.

In many of my workshops and coaching sessions, people love the idea of breaking bad habits like constantly checking emails or going to bed late, or building good habits like Inbox Zero, weekly reviews and taking breaks.

Taking these ideas into action, however, can prove trickier.

“I find myself in need of a break so I quickly check my emails for some light relief. Two hours later, I’m still there.”

“I’d really love to get more sleep, but when evening comes, I start thinking of all the things I still need to do and end up ploughing through.”

“I’d probably come up with some much better solutions if I just give myself some time to think, but it’s really difficult to stop firefighting and work out a plan.”

These are all comments from people I’ve worked with, who have found the annoying truth, that building habits is a whole lot harder than just knowing what to do.

For some people, scheduling can be a great way of making the decision once and just following through, instead of relying on willpower to make the decision over and over again. For example, scheduling set times to process email or set times to go to bed, and set times for planning means that they don’t have to constantly evaluate “what should I be doing now?” throughout the day and run the risk or decision fatigue.

But scheduling doesn’t work for everyone.

For some people (myself included) too much scheduling can feel overly restrictive.

Personally, I can set aside a block of time in my diary to work on something, but telling myself I’m going to do the same thing every day/week at set times, gets my brain rebelling like a teenager with a rather pathetic but very powerful “but I don’t feel like it!”

Plus there’s the added complication that the nature of my work doesn’t always lend itself to structured days and routines. Sometimes my day starts at 9.30 after walking the kids to school. Sometimes it starts with a 7am email session in a hotel room before diving into a full day workshop. Some weeks I’m based at my kitchen table, other weeks I’m trekking across the county.

Cue the “When-Then” Strategy

All credit for the name goes to Caroline Webb – I didn’t realise I was doing this until I read it in her book “How to Have a Good Day”.

In this case, the “when” isn’t a set time, but a trigger, such as “When I wake up…” or “when I feel tired…” or “when I’ve finished x…”

So instead of “I will only look at my emails at 9, 12, and 4″ (which works for some people but not all), your “when-then” strategy could be:

“When I have finished this piece of work, then I will look at my emails.”

“When I log in in the morning, I will write my day’s to-do list first, then I will check email.”

“When I open my inbox, then I will start a timer for 20 minutes, and when that rings, then I will close Outlook and move on.”

“When I feel like I need a break, then I will give myself a proper break and walk away from my desk  instead of checking emails.”

Why does this work?

In “The Power of Habit” Charles Duhigg’s research found that a trigger is the most powerful part of a habit. Knowing what triggers a bad habit can help you identify and replace it with a different action. Telling yourself “I’m not going to check my emails” is about as useful as a smoker saying “I’m not going to smoke” and hoping for the best. Identifying the triggers however, can help you to identify the potential triggers or temptation, and deciding on a specific action you want to take instead.

When I gave up smoking many years ago, I identified lunch time as a trigger, so when I went for lunch, I’d ask a friend or colleague to join me. Instead of smoking I’d ask them to keep me talking, so there was something else for my mouth to do.

By pairing up certain triggers and habits, the more we repeat them, the more automatic they become. It always amuses me that my bedtime habit of going to the bathroom, taking out my contact lenses and brushing my teeth are so wired together that, on the odd day when I take my lenses out early, I can find myself brushing my teeth in the middle of the day, or putting my lenses back in before going to bed!

What else could you use this for?

You can also use a “when-then” strategy for building habits that are more situation-specific rather than time-bound, for example:

“When my brain starts churning with ‘to-do’s in the evening, then I’ll go into boss mode to review and make a plan for tomorrow, rather than go into worker mode for a night shift.”

“When I feel like I’m firefighting, then I’m going to take a glass of water, a pen, and a piece of paper to a quiet spot, write “don’t panic” at the top”, “take control” at the bottom and work out my steps to get from the top of the page to the bottom (thanks to a workshop delegate who shared this one)

“When I’ve lost focus, then I’ll take a break rather than try and plod on through”

“When I find myself procrastinating, then I’ll message Grace to hold me accountable.”

“When I can’t give a wholehearted yes, then I’m going to make it a clear no, and here’s what I’m going to say…”

“When imposter syndrome kicks in, then I’ll revisit my Champagne Moments folder.”

“When I catch myself checking my phone, I’m going to say to myself “Nothing to see here. Move along.”

“When I’m feeling overwhelmed with responsibility, then I’ll ask myself what will help me to be more response-able“

You get the picture. So what about you? Where could you use a “when-then” strategy? Drop me a line in the comments box below – I’d love to know your thoughts.

Certainty vs curiosity: which are you craving?

I’m just coming to the end of another week of school holidays and it always surprises me how after a while, my kids start craving certainty.

At the beginning of the holidays, they’re excited about taking a break from school and relishing the freedom from routine and structure. Towards the end, they’re getting restless, bored with the freedom, tired of coming up with ideas and craving the certainty of being told what to do. In fact I noticed them perk up the other day when my mum set up Chinese school at the dining table, gave them exercise books and had them writing lines!

As human beings we need both certainty and curiosity.

We need a degree of certainty – we want to know where we stand, what we’re dealing with, and what the heck we’re here to do.

But when everything’s certain, it becomes boring and arduous. We also need a degree of uncertainty. We want to explore the unknown, discover new things, be surprised, have a sense of adventure and wonder. We crave curiosity.

Both certainty and curiosity can be triggers for procrastination.

When there’s too much certainty, when my day becomes too predictable and I feel like I’m stuck doing the same thing again, I crave the novelty of reading something new, playing with a new bit of tech, or chasing a shiny idea down a cyber rabbit hole.

When there’s too much uncertainty, when I’m designing a new talk or staring at a blank page, I’m distracted by the pile of filing that needs doing, the emails that need replying to, that Facebook post I can easily comment on. Anything where I know exactly what to do, so I can get that little dopamine rush of accomplishment without having to ‘figure it out’ first.

And the world is full of distractions that can offer me both curiosity and certainty, and leave me with a nagging procrastination hangover and a more pressing deadline at the end of it.

But knowing which one I’m craving can help me to change the way I frame the work.

Need certainty = inject definition

If I need more certainty, I can give the task at hand more definition by writing some clear instructions:

“Get the file out”

“Call John to clarify brief”

“Brain dump for 10 minutes”

“Choose stock image”

“Outline bullet points”

“Choose x or y”

Need curiosity = inject discovery

If I need more curiosity, I can reframe the task with questions to send me into discovery mode:

“I wonder how much I can pay myself next month?” (get invoicing)

“I wonder which blog post has been most popular?” (dig into those web analytics)

“I wonder how many creative ways I could come up with to say ‘no’?” (start writing)

“I wonder what lessons I could learn from this?”

“I wonder how many of these I can get done and dusted in the next 57 minutes?”

“I wonder how I could make this quick, easy or irresistible?”

Changing the way we frame a task changes how we experience it – from something that deprives us of what we need, to something that satisfies our needs.

What do you need to inject more of into your work today – definition to create certainty or discovery to satisfy your curiosity?

Let me know…

Real World Productivity Interview with Richard Tubb

It’s great to read about ideal productivity systems, tactics and strategies, but what about putting it into action in real life? What does that look like?

In this 35 minute interview I chat to Richard Tubb, award-winning blogger, fellow productivity geek and author of The IT Business Owners Survival Guide, about what’s working for him – and what he’s still working on, including

The systems he puts in place that enable him to get things done as a self-confessed “scatterbrained procrastinator”


How he creates space for the things he loves to do – in work and in life


What happens when he falls off the wagon (often!) – and why perfection is not the ultimate productivity goal


The art of getting a good night’s sleep and his favourite apps for building habits


How Doctor Who inspires him in his productivity journey

 

Prefer to listen to this as an audio track instead? Here’s the mp3.

Over to you

What do you think of Richard’s systems and tactics? Are you a procrastinator like Richard? Do you find routines and systems help? Or does it work differently for you? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

And while you’re there, let me know – who would you like me to interview? Whose behind the scenes productivity journey would you love to get a peek into?

7 Ways to Ditch Perfectionism

Q. Help! I’m a perfectionist. I know it’s bad for my productivity but what can I do about it?

This was a question I had from a delegate at a recent ‘How to be a Productivity Ninja’ session.

I’ve spoken and written a lot about perfectionism in the past, but I realised it’s all dotted around my blog, books and workshops. So here’s a roundup of 7 ways to stop that pesky perfectionist streak from hijacking your productivity:

1. Lower the stakes

If perfectionism is stopping you from getting started and causing procrastination then lower the stakes.

Give yourself permission to start badly, and space to improve it later. And if ‘getting it right’ feels like a tall order, then experiment with one of these seven alternatives to being right.

Remember, imperfect action beats perfect inaction every time.

2. Be mindful of the trade-off

If perfectionism is stopping you from finishing, this quote from Chief Ninja Graham Allcott is apt: “The last moments spent on anything are rarely the best ones.”

There comes a point where each extra ounce of effort you put in gives you less and less payback – to the point where you could either spend twice as long on one thing and make it marginally better, or you could have two things done well.

Be mindful of the trade-off and choose wisely.

3. Set limits

Experiment with setting limits. Use a timer, or limit yourself to a certain number of drafts, edits or rewrites. Set external deadlines with people who will hold you accountable.

Make sure it’s a real deadline with real consequences. So for example, if you’re putting together a presentation, book the meeting now in everyone’s diary, including the meeting room, for when you’re going to deliver it, rather than waiting until you’re comfortable that it’s done or perfect.

4. Focus on ‘shipping’

This idea comes from Seth Godin, who points out that there is no value to what you’ve been working on until it’s actually being used. An imperfect published paper will always deliver more value than a perfect draft. Focus on getting it ‘out there’.

5. Choose progress over perfect

Perfection in practice means focusing on what’s wrong. Progress is about focusing on what’s good and what’s going well and building on that. Over time, this helps you to become more comfortable with when good enough really is good enough.

Practice writing a ta-da list to help you focus on progress instead of perfection.

6. Swap ‘but’ for ‘and’

If perfectionism is turning into fault-finding and being over-critical of yourself, experiment with using the word ‘and’ instead of ‘but’.

7. Choose where you apply your perfection

High standards and attention to detail is a strength, and strengths can be overused. Some things are worth that level of attention, but not all things.

Not everything has to be gold-plated. Some things can be silver-plated, bronze-plated or just plain done. So be ruthless with your perfectionism. Only apply it to the things that are really worth it!

 

Over to you

Are you a perfectionist? How does it affect your productivity? Which of these tips would you choose to put to action? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Love the ideas but don’t know how to put them into action?

My clients tell me I have a knack of getting them doing stuff (not just thinking about them!) and of course that’s where the magic happens. Book a session with me and let’s get this working for you.

Hate typing? 5 procrastination-busting alternatives

 

Q. I prefer writing by hand & am now stuck/prevaricating on the typing up stage. Rally hate sitting typing at my computer. Eek..

 

This was a question sent in by Frances, one of my readers. It’s funny what can trigger procrastination. If typing is a bugbear for you, try one of these alternative strategies instead:

1. Take pictures. If you have hand-written notes and don’t want to type it up, why not take a picture of it instead and store it in something like Evernote?

2. Record it. Record an audio file instead of typing it out in an email. Do a podcast or a vlog instead of a written blog.

3. Dictate it. Use dictating software, hire a professional transcriptionist, a student or someone via People per Hour or Fiverr.com to type it up for you.

4. Co-create meeting minutes. I took part in an online brainstorming meeting recently where the host shared a Google Doc and gave everyone access to type. Everyone could type their ideas into it, and while someone was speaking, someone else could be typing. Someone even nominated themselves as spell-checker as we went along! By the end of the meeting, we had a comprehensive set of notes without anyone needing to go away and add ‘type up minutes’ to their to-do list.

Finally, if you find that you can’t get around it, and you just have to get on and do it, then

5. Treat it like going to the gym. Something you resist to begin with, but you know you feel good about afterwards. Do it in short bursts, use a timer, put on some energising music to get going, and give yourself a reward after.

What are your biggest procrastination bugbears or productivity challenges? Let me know in the comments below.

Imperfect action beats perfect inaction, every time.

Imperfect action beats perfect inaction, every time.