Getting Things Done

The question of the best marketing advice I ever received was posed on Sparkplug CEO as part of one of their always awesome contests.  It is a really good question and one I should answer, even if a free wireless printer and logo were not at stake and even if I did not have a world of respect for the gang at Sparkplugging

Marketing and Personal Productivity?

At first, the topics of marketing and personal productivity may not seem to be related.  If I had any advice about marketing a Fortune 500 company, it might not be.  But my experience in entrepreneurship has been promoting Hi Fidelity IT, Inc., some thoughts about Fireadi, and several of my own ventures, all of which are small companies, and all of which required that I market myself.

The Greatest Marketing Advice Ever

Which leads me back to the greatest advice on marketing I ever got:

“YOU are a brand.  Make sure your brand is order before you do anything else.”

There is nothing mystical about this advice.  It is basically the same thing as saying “Be the friend you want to be.”  If you want others to do business with you, you need to be someone you would want to do business with.  There’s also a lot of the Golden Rule in this bit of advice (You know: “Do unto others as you’d have done to you.”  If you want customers to keep doing business with you, be someone they want to keep doing business with.

Getting Yourself In Order

It’s hard to say what getting yourself in order means because we all have our strengths and weaknesses.  For instance, I am very analytical, but sometimes I do not see the forest for the trees.  Other people are so good at generating ideas, they forget someone has to execute them.  Some people are hot headed, while others are not emotional enough.

But ultimately, no matter the journey, overall, the road towards being a good brand is pretty much the same.  And you probably learned it in kindergarten.

• Be trustworthy
• Be honest
• Be professional
• Be courteous

However, the devil is in the details.  I know what is professional in computer software and what is professional in writing for women’s magazines are not the same.  (In one of those disciplines, having a thick beard is considered an advantage, guess which one?)

Still, the secret to success lies in those four precepts.  Master their subtleties and you will master self-branding.  Master self-branding and then you can master business.

Sadly, I cannot blaze the trail for you, not in this blog anyway.  However, you can contact me if you would like and we can start laying down a plan together.

Branding and Personal Productivity

Oh, and since this is a personal productivity blog, I would be remiss in not at least mentioning how branding and personality productivity mix.

Of the four precepts above, being professional and trustworthy are the two most directly linked to good personal productivity.  Professionals accomplish tasks assigned to them and those for which they volunteer.  Those who are trustworthy do what they say, when they say.  Which means not forgetting To Dos when things get hectic.  (Which are areas that the PAR System can address directly.)

In terms of being honest and courteous, these are two areas when the PAR System is less directly applicable.  Still, there is something to be said for writing down on your To Do list or having a DUMB goal that you want to control your temper or that you always want to be upfront when dealing with others.  Writing something down like that every day and prioritizing it certainly cannot hurt.

Ultimately, make self-branding a goal and you can acheive it.  Writing down the steps you will take to meet your goals and keep them prioritized and you will become the brand you want.  Then marketing, sales, and being a busines will all fall into line.

I was having an interesting discussion with my mentor the other day in which we got on the subject of organization.  This was the same mentor who taught me the necessity of having a good way to keep track of my to do list.  This was in no small part due to the fact that I reported directly to him at the time and he was an amazing delegator…

That being said, we were talking about keeping ourselves organized and he told me that he spends 30 minutes every night before he goes to bed organizing himself for the next day.  These 30 minutes had become so ingrained into his routine that if did not spend the time to organize, he would not sleep well.  I found this to be interesting and quite different than my approach of taking 15 minutes at the start of everyday to rewrite my task list and prioritize my to dos.

Perhaps I am simply too set in my ways or perhaps he and I just attack our work differently, but I do not see myself switching anytime soon.  However, I do see that his method offers several distinct advantages.

1. The value of the time spent.  Normally, the 15-30 minutes before I go to bed are not billable, whereas the 15 minutes at the start of my work day could be (since I always do my organization at my desk where I am in the work mode.)
2. The urgency of the workday.  There are many days when the first thing that greets me in the morning is some fire I have to put out or some client call I need to take or an email I have to answer.  This can delay my organization time by a few minutes or a few hours.  During that time, I always feel less in control of my day because I am being reactive instead proactive.   Managing my day by addressing whoever is screaming the loudest is a poor way to be ultimately successful.

Still, spending my 15 minutes organizing in the morning (or as close to it as I can) works for me.  But I would like to know, what works for you?

Sometimes productivity hints strike when you least expect them.

I was listening to a sermon today in which the preacher recounted one of the other parishoners talking about he remembered to do things.  The parishoner in question said that when he needed to do something, he wrote a note down on a piece of paper, folded it up, and put it in his left pocket with his change.  That way whenever he went to pay for something, he would have to first pull out the notes before getting to his money.  The sheer annoyance would of having to pull out those pieces of paper would mean that sooner rather than later, the gentleman in question would do whatever needed to be done.

I looked at this as a validation of the PAR System.  Instead of notes in my left pocket (which isn’t a bad idea except that I tend to pay for everything with a check card), I use my to do list which I recopy every morning.  This keeps what I need to do always top of mind and the sheer annoyance of not accomplishing things…well…it keeps me motivated.

So, how do you keep notes in your left pocket?

So as you can see I’ve been a bit lax on posting here recently.

And there’s a good reason for that…I’ve been busy.  Really busy.

Now, I know that seems like an odd statement for someone writing a productivity blog.  Don’t I have the PAR System to help me manage things?  Sure.  Aren’t I trying to advocate higher levels of productivity?  Of course.

Frankly, I’ve looked at the last three months as research.

First, in the past three months, my planner was stolen so I went to using a spiral notebook, just like I advocate in my guidebook.  So now I can say I officially eat my own dog food.

Secondly, in that time, I also accomplished the following:

1. Established a vegan blog
2. Wrote a book
3. Edited another book
4. Created a large web app for a client
5. Released at least 7 episodes of my two podcasts
6. Put together the media blitz for both the game I wrote and the game I edited
7. Gained a new SEO client
8. Wrote 7 articles

So you get the picture. 

What fell by the way side are this blog, Blog Well Done, and my personal exercise regimine.  (I am not happy about that last part.)  Fortunately, family obligations were largely met.  I have a tendency to ignore the fam when I get busy.  This is not a Good Thing.

Anyway, what the past three months have proven to me is that productivity is a choice.  Over the past three months, I did what was important to me.  I did not do what was truly not important to me.  (I am still chapped that my personal health turned out to be unimportant.)

But it also showed me why prioritization is so important in the PAR System.  For most of my life, I have planned what I am going to do for the day.  I never just made lists.  I thought about the tasks on the list and figured out the order in which I was going to do them. Now I understand why.  I was doing what was important and taking note so that I would not forget what was not.

Of course, there is a lingering issue that I need to deal with personally…getting my judgement of what is important inline with what I want to be important.  That’s another post.

A TRIP TO THE BOOKSTORE

I was walking through the bookstore tonight when I ran across this: The Really Inconvenient Truths: Seven Environmental Catastrophes Liberals Don’t Want You to Know About–Because They Helped Cause Them (Hardcover)

Now, I am not going to muddy The PAR System with politics.  I have other places for that.  Still, I was struck by the masterwork in the title.  It was taking a political issue that liberals have traditionally championed and that has recently become front of mind for many Americans and tries to derail the debate.  Instead of dealing with the issue, it points fingers.  It politicizes and stratifies the issue along party lines.

And you know what is going to suffer?  The environment.  There’s no way to affect positive change while bickering.

WORKPLACE PARALLELS

Unfortunately, I see too many parrallels in the modern workplace.  How many coworkers have you had whose reaction to a crisis is:

1. Spend 30 minutes finding who to blame.
2. Spend 10 minutes ensuring EVERYONE knows it’s not their fault (or 30 minutes when it just might be.)
3. Spend 2 minutes trying to fix the problem.
4. Spend 30 more minutes ensuring everyone knows it’s not their fault.
5. Call a meeting to “discuss the problem”
6. Go to lunch
7. Spend 2 minutes trying to fix the problem
8. Send out an email, CCing the President, Vice President, and Board of Directors about just how much it’s not their fault.

And so on…

What’s worse, how many managers have you seen ask the question: “Who screwed up this time?” or “Whose fault is this?” the minute they catch wind there is a problem?

IT DOESN’T MATTER

I cannot stress this enough.  Until the problem has been resolved, knowing who caused it, or worse looking for a scapegoat is irrelevant.  Companies that want to have excellent customer service, be a people-first organization, have empowered employees, or just generally run a good business should shelve the finger pointing until well after the problem is fixed.

Then look at mistakes as (get ready to groan) a teachable moment.  Good managers foster trust by honestly and openly reviewing mistakes and getting their people to understand why things went wrong and how to avoid them in the future.  However, this is a two way street.  Recipients of such teaching should be open to honest coaching IF it is given in an environment of respect.

WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH PERSONAL PRODUCTIVITY?

Good question.

1. If your first reaction to a problem is to point fingers, you are not being productive.  Check the ego at the door and get the problem resolved.  That is being productive.  In a healthy organization, you garner more respect for fixing your mistakes than for avoid taking responsibility.
2. If you work for an organization that is more interested in finger pointing than fixing the problem, you are not in a healthy organization and you are not going to be at your most productive since you’ll be too busy looking over your shoulder.  Thinking about finding a place at work that truly empowers you to be productive.

If you want to know more about being productive, download the FREE PAR System Guidebook today!