The Clock Is Ticking
Here’s a confession of a personal failing I have: I’m optimistic. Okay, so most readers would agree that optimism is probably a good trait to possess and I’m not disappointed by it. However, the confessional/personal failing is related to the result of my optimism: An unrealistic sense of what I can accomplish in a day.
If I were to sit down and plan out my week at the beginning of the week, it’s not unusual to think to myself "I can schedule 7 one-hour appointments in my day, each day, and that will make for a very productive week". So I do that. I block out hour-long chunks of time and schedule appointments in each block.
Then reality hits as the week progresses: Clients paying for an hour consult expect a full hour, not 50 minutes. Sure, some don’t care but some watch the clock pretty closely. Other clients, in spite of my best efforts, have a hard time wrapping up at the end or tend to stay a few minutes longer for chitchat on what they believe is not billable time (while billable clients are waiting outside the door). Clients are late and beg that we tack on the missing fifteen minutes on the end of the session (cutting into the time I’d planned to do other things).
I’m not saying that every week is like this, nor am I saying that all of my clients are like this. But the small things add up. It might be a phone call here or a delay at the restaurant during lunch there or an unexpected detour on the way to work in another morning.
So, my problem is that I’m optimistic in terms of my ability to complete the tasks within the period of time I’ve assigned; and I’m optimistic that the world won’t turn against me with one ironic twist after another.
My solution, which is far from perfect, is to build some margin into my day. If I’m expecting one hour sessions with clients, I should schedule them with a half-hour buffer zone in between. I won’t be twiddling my thumbs during that time, I’ve got calls to return and I can do a bit of marketing, and take a little bit of "me- time" to clear my head.
And do you know the result I discovered? I’m more productive. It seems counter-intuitive to say that, especially as the optimist that I am, but it’s true: I’m not rushing from one thing to the next as the day progresses and then furiously trying to catch up at the end. Instead, my day is calm and ordered.
Okay, I lied, it’s not calm and ordered. But it’s calmer and more ordered than it was… Most of the time! But I confess that there are still days when I forget that the clock ticks as quickly as it does and I think I can do it all.
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