[spp-player url="https://episodes.castos.com/wpbuilds/wpbuilds-episode-138.mp3"]
In this episode:
Discussion - Are we happy with how we manage tasks
Today, the podcast talks about tasks. Not so much the tasks themselves, but more the way that we approach them.
A few weeks ago, I posted a
poll in the WP Builds Facebook group asking people about their approach to getting tasks completed. At the core of it was the fact that I (as in me, Nathan Wrigley) get pretty caught up in a task and I find it quite hard to move on to do other things until the current task is complete. I'm not joking about this, I really do. I find it hard to do anything else, be that something work related, or something utterly unrelated to WordPress and websites!
I got to thinking that this is a failing of mine and perhaps it's something that I ought to address, but just to be sure that I'm the only one who behaves like this I created the poll with the following three options:
This is a thing that I don't always like about myself and I just wonder how many of you are like me.
When I start on some task, I get fixated upon it. I find it very hard to break off that task to complete another task until it is done.
There are so many reasons why I would change this, but I wonder if, in the end, it's a good quality.
- I struggle to stay on a task for any length of time
- I can go from one task to another, and it's fine
- I have to finish what I'm working on before I move on (this is the one that i best fit)
You can see that there were not too many options (aside: don't limit the ability of other people to add options to the poll in Facebook as I did).
The results were as follows on 15th July 2019:
- 36 voles
- 18 votes
- 17 votes
Which is interesting because I'm in the minority. It would seem that the majority find it hard to gain focus on a single task, fully half of the respondents, and the remaining half as split down the middle being able to flit between tasks and fixating on one task at a time.
So...
Are these universals (to a greater or lesser degree):
- We all will feel we have wasted too much time and not prioritising our tasks (we are running a business - time is money etc.)
- We we all think we have a system that nails it until we revert back to 1
- We probably need a balance of easy tasks (to feel we are achieving without pain), but need some harder challenges to stop the boredom of our existence
- We do achieve more with a single focus (no stopping and starting time) but we probably also undervalue distractions and how they can widen our vision and keep us human
- Dealing with tasks becomes really hard when our overall purpose and aim in life has been lost
- You are probably a sociopath if you don’t struggle with these things! ;-)
A few “tasks” that could trip us up
- Learning tasks. You start and there is always more to learn. Where to get off / stop? Stopping a starting make things hard, but how much do we need to know right now?
- New products. There is always something which could extend or make your business better (so so we put time in the calendar for it or look at it as and when needed?).
- Social / networking (is this a task or just some down time?)
- Ignoring things with money
- Ignoring customers (service)
- The future of our business (the industry)
As always, it's great that the WP Builds community feel like they can chip in to help others out and offer their opinions, as as such...
Some great points:
Adam Lacey (
Nick Gulic,
Kyle Van Deusen,
Mark Werle) - all can get fixed when the interest and motivation is there. Depends on the task
Sunil Posse - is a developer because like solving problems
Chris Hughes - self discipline right up there with working for yourself
Matthew Granat - I always seem to get fixated on the one project that is the least urgent (yep my flat was never cleaner than when I had to finished my final dissertation)
Chantal Edouard-Betsy - I’m the same Nathan ... which works with my model.
Sara Jackson - I struggle with getting started but once I'm in the zone, I'm ok.
Mor Cohen - Deadlines keep me in check. If there is no deadline, I tend to go off on tangents and find multiple rabbit holes to occupy my time.
Rachel Seago - works better under pressure (yep - so easy to have too much or little of that)
Dave Toomey - offered a gif with a dog distracted by a squirrel - yep!
Lori Berkowitz - could not pick as it depends on the task
We don't have all the answers, but it was a really interesting chat nonetheless! I hope that you enjoy it.
Mentioned in this episode:
The WP Builds Facebook post that inspired this episode.
