Any good leader wants to help their team feel productive and successful. One common enemy that holds people back from growing in tandem with company vision is the dreaded “Overwhelmia.”
When people feel overwhelmed, they begin to shut down. They live under the constant fear of deadlines and to-do lists. They carve out more and more of their personal time to make up for bandwidth-busting deliverables.
Consider the poor multimedia specialist at an association: the sales team keeps selling webinars and podcasts and the overworked in-house party of two can’t keep up without working nights and weekends, sacrificing sleep and well-being.
There has got to be a better way.
Instead of directing your people to delegate, ask them to share their to-do list with you. What you find there might surprise both of you.
Now, put on your progressive leadership pants and help them edit it to a manageable and sustainable workload, one that makes them feel capable and energized.
How to edit a to-do list as an antidote to overwhelm.
- Identify what work needs to be done and what work doesn’t need to be done.
- Identify what work on the list really belongs to someone else and help repatriate it to the right person.
- Identify what work has the largest impact on the business.
- Identify their most productive hours of the day.
- Align the most impactful work with the most effective hours of the day and voila!
Teach your team to prioritize their to-do list through impact and increase awareness about aligning those tasks with the best time of day. Now, they will focus on what’s important and do that work when they are at their best.
As for the rest of that to-do list? Use it to fill-in around priorities or send it “home” to the right person on the team.
Progressive leadership thinks about work in new ways. Lower overwhelm and increase feelings of success by helping those suffering under the weight of “Overwhelmia” by looking at their list, helping them get focused on the right work, and teaching them what is most important.
When people learn how to do their most productive work when they are the most successful, they are more immune to burnout, apathy, and avoidable mistakes. Help them get there by editing to-do lists for maximum fulfillment.
How has a to-do list aligned with impact and personal bandwidth improved your feelings of being productive and successful? Connect with us and let us know. We’d love to hear how you said “Adios and Good Riddance!” to Overwhelmia for you and your team.
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