100% JOB TIPS:
Have you ever heard of Parkinson's Law? It's a humorous adage that states "work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion."
How does Parkinson's Law relate to deadlines? My theory is that if you set a deadline, especially a tight one with concrete consequences, you favorably capitalize on Parkinson's Law, by reducing procrastination and perfectionism.
I am sure you have had the experience of getting a deadline in college for a term paper 2 months before it is due. I am also willing to bet that 90% of the time you didn't start writing until
Perfectionism is also a great time killer. By worrying that our ideas are not good enough, we refuse to make the necessary decisions needed to take action. If you only have a couple of days to come up with a killer presentation to land a large client, you are much more likely to be motivated to make quick, strategic, intuitive, and creative decisions to complete your task on time, potentially even producing higher quality work than aiming for a fluid deadline several months down the line and mulling over the perfect pitch (which doesn't exist). Deadlines are lifelines because they foster creativity and enable confident decision making.
My 100% job tip: set a tight deadline, impose consequences, quell perfectionism, boost creativity and accomplish more at work.
LINKS:
Concise Financial Post article on the power of intuition.
Article on Strategic Intuition by William Duggan.
Image streaming technique for super charged creativity by FinerMinds.
Without the last minute nothing would get done? True or false?
Aimee (posted 10 minutes before going to meet Hamza to deliver his footage :)
Unless you’re a disciplined freak and expert in time management using the GTD methodology who NEVER procrastinates, without the last minute, NOTHING gets done! (In my case anyways!)
ReplyDeleteGod I can so relate when you talk about term papers in college. I never learned my lesson, always at the last minute.
I perform better when I’m almost out of time before the deadline , the adrenaline level is at its peak. You don’t have too much time to think or over-analyze, you have to trust your intuition and that’s it. The last minute keeps us out of our comfort zone, stimulated and boosts creativity! (I miss that feeling!)
The only downside of tight deadlines is that we sometimes tend to over estimate our capacities to get a job done in an impossible time-frame, which leads to failure or heavy delays in a project that is splitted into many milestones.
Tight and realistic deadlines FTW! (oh, and consequences too!)
I know that if its your own project, your motivation level is higher and it is easier to stay focused on your goal.
Keep up the good work!