5 Tips To Overcome Procrastination

We’ve all been there. There’s deadline to complete a deliverable but it’s at least a week or more away and we tell ourselves “I’ll get to it later”. The days go by and suddenly it’s the day before the deadline, your calendar is already full with other commitments and you haven’t even started. You have a couple of choices - miss the deadline and deal with the consequences or stay up half the night to get it done and potentially deliver a less than stellar piece of work. Not only are you adding to your stress, it’s unlikely you’ll produce your best work under these circumstances.

So, what can you do instead?

• Get a handle on your calendar. Don’t just block off time for meetings, think about all the regular commitments you have a block off time for them too. This will help you see how much available time you have for other commitments.
• Eliminate Distractions. Avoid constantly checking email, text messages and LinkedIn messages throughout the day – resist that urge. It’s a time suck and can really impact your ability to do the important stuff. Instead block off time at a couple of points in the day to check these things – perhaps just before lunch and just before the end of day would work for you.
• Evaluate what resources you need to complete this deliverable. Maybe you need information from other people or perhaps research is involved. Initiate getting this information as soon as possible.
• Estimate how long it will take to complete the deliverable once you have all the information you need and then add 20% to your estimate. We tend to underestimate how much time it takes to complete a task.
• Decide when you’ll complete it. Most people have more energy and brain power at the start of the day and our supply gradually depletes as the day progresses. If possible, try to schedule time in the morning to start work on this deliverable. If you can complete it in a few hours you may be able to block off the time in a single sitting to get it done. If it’s a bigger task, chunk it up into smaller pieces and block off that time in your calendar.

Follow these simple steps and you’ll be much less stressed the next time you have a critical time sensitive deliverable to complete.