They say that it’s always a good thing to have a certain level of self-awareness about your faults, and I’m well-aware of my worst characteristic: I’m a procrastinator. This is undoubtedly the biggest difference between my work-self and my personal-life-self. While in my day-to-day life I still suffer from procrastination, years of being a perfectionist first as a student and eventually as a PR professional led me to teaching myself ways to overcome this unfortunate trait of mine. I may leave things for last minute when I’m off the clock, but I’ve conditioned myself through a series of tricks I’ve picked up along the years to never procrastinate while I’m at work. Here are a few tips that have worked for me.
- Include time frames in your to-do list. Plan out your entire day in advance, and identify next to each to-do item a time frame that you have to complete that task. If I know that I only have 45 minutes blocked off to do something, that stops me from waffling on starting it.
- Focus on the end game. We do a lot of writing in our profession, and the creative process can take time and can be intimidating. Your first draft is usually not perfect (nor is your second, third or fourth). Intimidation often leads to procrastination. Focus on the end game where your client and your team are thrilled with the great work you did, not on the difficult process of getting started.
- Tell your neighbor what’s up. I sit next to Andie, and several times a day I’ll tell her “dude, if you see me getting off task, remind me what I need to get done.” That’s the beauty of working in an open concept office – you’re surrounded by people you can recruit to remind you that you can’t afford to procrastinate.
- Understand and respect your internal clock. I don’t know whether it’s nature vs. nurture, but I think some people are simply born early birds and some are night owls. There’s very little we can do about it. I’m an early bird, and whether I start working at 6 a.m. or 11 a.m., either way I’m burnt out by 4 p.m. When I don’t feel like getting started on my work day, I remind myself that it’s going to be much harder later in the day. For night owls, I suggest you do the same.
- Just do it! At the end of the day, the best way to tackle procrastination is with action. The work has to get done, so just do it. Easy as that.
