Episode 87: Why working harder isn’t always the answer (and what to do instead)

00:51 Welcome to Unfrazzle, a podcast for solo business owners with a big vision who are ready for a kinder more sustainable approach to productivity. I'm Louise Miller and each week i share bite-sized insights to help you step away from the hustle stop faffing and stay focused so you can make your brilliant ideas happen and make a bigger impact in the world Before we dive into today's episode, if you enjoy what I'm sharing here on Unfrazzle and you'd like to support the podcast You can buy me a cuppa by going to BuyMeACoffee.com slash Louise Miller and making a one-off donation. I'll pop a link to that in the show notes Okay grab yourself a cuppa and let's get started Today i'd like to introduce you to Barbara and Margot So they both have a lot to do today And they're both feeling the pressure

01:40 They need to deliver something to a client. They have calls booked in their diaries and they need to create a landing page for a new thing that they're offering in their businesses, and as with so many of us their inboxes are also overflowing and they've got loads of notifications that they haven't yet responded to in their socials! So let's spend a bit of time with Margot first... So Margo wakes up and immediately grabs her phone and starts to scroll to see if she's missed anything interesting She knows she's got a lot on her plate, she is feeling a little bit stressed already so she decides to skip breakfast and instead jumps in the shower and then grabs her laptop with that towel still on her head. And she heads straight into her inbox and replies to a few messages looking at the things that have come in overnight. She also hops onto her socials again just see what was going there

02:25 And then she looks at the time and realises that she only has 10 minutes before her first call of the day, so she rushes off to blow dry her hair falls into her seat and fires up Zoom just in time for her call. So after a call she has another quick check of her inbox on her socials runs and grabs a coffee sticks a slice of toast in the toaster looking at her notifications and responding to some of the comments on her phone as she waits for the kettle to boil She then decides to start on her client work. So she spends a little bit of time working on the things she's promised to deliver for her client and then she realises that she needs to jump into her inbox, go and check something so she heads over to email and then she sees that one of our business buddies has emailed asking her for some help with something. So she has a quick read of that, decides it probably won't take long to respond. And so hits reply and sends a response to her friend

03:17 Now that actually takes a bit longer than she'd anticipated because she realizes she's got a couple of resources that would really help her friend out so she needs to go and track those down as she's replying. So it takes her a bit longer than she thought, and before she knows it an hour has gone by and she realizes her next call is coming up soon and she hasn't yet prepared for it. She stops what she's doing and preps for that call. And then after the call is over she has a few bits and bobs to do off the back of that conversation and she wants to do that before she forgets And then it's right back to the client work, which seems to be taking way longer than she'd anticipated. So she down tools for lunch again grabbing that on the fly responding to notifications and getting sucked into other stuff on her socials while she's at it and then comes back to her desk has another quick look at her inbox

04:02 She's now really starting to feel the overwhelm and is very easily distracted but she knows that she needs to sort this thing out for her client because she promised it to them today. So, she sits down and does her best to focus on that but before she knows it, it's time to collect the kids from school so she runs out the door spends the evening with her family but then fires up the laptop again later on in the evening so that she can get this thing finished and over to the client apologizing that it said a little bit late So she ends her day feeling exhausted, feeling defeated really annoyed with herself because that landing page that she wanted to do still didn't get a look in.

04:39 So now let's meet Barbara. Barbara has the exact same stuff on her plate, she's got that work for a client that needs to be done she's got calls in her diary, a landing page he wants to do and an inbox that's overflowing of notifications she needs to respond to so Barbara wakes up and heads for the shower then she makes breakfast and sits looking out the window while she sips her coffee and then heads to her desk And once she arrives, she looks at her calendar and she looks up the list of priorities that she wrote at the end of the day yesterday. She allows herself five or ten minutes to decide how she would like her day to look so she can see if she has an hour before her first call. So she decides is going to start on our landing page in that time then she'll have that call then she's gonna spend a little bit of time on socials and checking out email after that before prepping for their next call

05:32 After that call she's going to remind herself what she needs to do for her client. Then, just gonna stop for lunch take a walk get some fresh air and settle her brain then after her lunch her plan is to focus on the client work and get that finished And then look at her inbox in our socials again before heading out to pick up the kids And although the day might not have gone perfectly, there were a few moments when she got distracted by her inbox or by something going on in socials. Generally speaking, her day kind of panned out as she had intended because she'd chosen what she was going to do with each part of her day so if she did get distracted she had real clarity about what she was supposed to be doing and could get back to that more quickly So all of that meant that by the end of the day

06:19 Barbara was actually feeling a real sense of achievement. She knew that she'd delivered what she needed to for her client, she had chipped away at her inbox and her socials and the most important things had received a response And she also knew that she had at least got started on that landing page Because she'd sat and thought about it, and looked at the time she had available. She knew she wouldn't have time to do everything And she chose to be okay with not actually finishing that landing page just as long as it was started So that's why she chose to do that first right knowing that the client work would get done regardless Barbara has no trouble doing things She's promised for other people but she does need to be more intentional about the things she does for herself when she knows that about herself

07:01 So instead of just diving straight in, Barbara took the time to slow down. She actively decided how her day would look and for the most part it worked out well for her. Whereas Margot was bouncing around all over the place, never fully present with anything she was doing and more easily distracted because she had mistakenly believed that when you have a lot going on and a lot to do, the best strategy is dive right in and barrel through it all but she actually ended up getting less done and feeling really rubbish as a result And you might think, oh it's not that bad. It's just one day but Margot is so bought into the idea that when she's busy she just needs to work harder and needs to work faster that she moves through every day like that jumping in with both feet not giving herself time to think

07:47 And so days, weeks and even months can go by without her giving enough focused attention to the projects that she says she wants to be working on but never makes time for. And so she doesn't make the progress that she knows she's capable of making whereas Barbara on the other hand, she is in the habit of pausing, slowing down, of making intentional choices about what it is that she's going to do and as a result, she gets more of those projects done and she's making a bigger impact So are you more Barbara or Margot? Can you see how ploughing ahead with your head down and never pausing for breath is actually counterproductive.

08:27 And how by slowing down you can actually speed up and get more done. It might seem counterintuitive but I promise you that it's true, and to help prove that to you i am putting the finishing touches to a new thing right now that will help you be more Barbara. It's going to help you slow down and be proactive about what you're working on so that you spend your precious time on the things are important and impactful Rather than bouncing around all over the place and actually not getting as much done. So I'll be sharing more about that very soon, this is going to help you have your most productive month of the year so far it's a brand new way of working with me and it's completely free! Do make sure you are on my mailing list so you get all of the info about that when it's ready. I will pop a link to that in the show notes. I would love to see you there but in the meantime I hope that this helps and I look forward to seeing you again soon

09:18 Thank you for listening to Unfrazzle. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with a friend who needs a dose of calm productivity in their life and I'd love it if you could leave me a rating and review as that will help more people discover this podcast! If you would like to hear more from me to help stop faffing and take back control of your time, you'll find the link to join my mailing list in the show notes and I would really love for you to join us so thanks so much for your support and look forward to seeing you next time