I have a party at my place tomorrow evening. I have to arrange for music, food, drinks, seating arrangements... so many things. On top of it, my friends want me to cook some of my specialities for the party. I have no idea how I'm going to do so many things by tomorrow evening.
The very thought of so much work makes me shudder.
Now, I can either be caught in this thinking process, or I can start working on it.
I break down the entire activity into smaller manageable bits.
First of all, I go to the neighbours and request if I could borrow their chairs for the next evening. There, one job done.
Then I call up my sister and ask for her music collection and player.
I sit down for 5 minutes and list the food I'll cook and all the required ingredients.
I run down to the neighbourhood shop and pick up the ingredients, place an order for drinks for the next evening. (I ask delivery in the morning itself so that it gives me enough buffer time)
On the way back from the shop, I pick up the music collection and player from my sister's place.
Its already evening by the time I reach home, I quickly test the music and the player I borrowed. Thankfully it works. If it hadn't, I would have copied the whole thing to my Iphone and played it through the docking station.
Too lazy to do any more serious work, I want to watch that 7 pm movie, so I just take all the vegetables and ingredients and start cutting and arranging them as I watch the TV. (Cutting veggies while watching TV can seriously reduce the cutting speed)
Before I know, its 10 and time to sleep. (after keeping the ingredients in fridge)
Next day (Party day), I get up by 7.30 and make a quick round of trips to neighbours collecting the chairs. The drinks haven't come yet.
I get into the kitchen and start cooking. Thankfully, the cutting I did last night helped save some time.
Its 12.30 noon and I'm already done with the cooking. Now I have to just put things in the oven 10 minutes before the party starts.
Drinks still haven't come.
I run down to the shop and he has got only 75% of the stock I ordered.
I pick it up and pick another dozen bottles of squash and some soda (for some instant Gulshan style inventions)
And at 3.30 pm, here I am ready for action without any stress inspite of some issues with the drinks.
Something that looked so frightening yesterday morning is already in good shape and before time just because I was able to handle one bit at a time.
The party is just an example. So many times we come across issues in office and at work which look simply huge in the beginning, but by breaking them down in smaller activities and delegating some of them, monitoring them regularly, keeping track of time we can make life much less stressful.
Whether its planning a trip, cooking a meal or planning a multi million dollar client project, the steps are pretty much the same.
Break it down, spread it into smaller time bound milestones, delegate what you can, periodically monitor, target to be ready with atleast 20% time to spare. This gives you a project level buffer.
Read the above story again and you will see that I have done each of these activities.
A lot of people think that I'm over simplifying things, but it has always worked for me.
All I need to do is to Break It Down...
The very thought of so much work makes me shudder.
Now, I can either be caught in this thinking process, or I can start working on it.
I break down the entire activity into smaller manageable bits.
First of all, I go to the neighbours and request if I could borrow their chairs for the next evening. There, one job done.
Then I call up my sister and ask for her music collection and player.
I sit down for 5 minutes and list the food I'll cook and all the required ingredients.
I run down to the neighbourhood shop and pick up the ingredients, place an order for drinks for the next evening. (I ask delivery in the morning itself so that it gives me enough buffer time)
On the way back from the shop, I pick up the music collection and player from my sister's place.
Its already evening by the time I reach home, I quickly test the music and the player I borrowed. Thankfully it works. If it hadn't, I would have copied the whole thing to my Iphone and played it through the docking station.
Too lazy to do any more serious work, I want to watch that 7 pm movie, so I just take all the vegetables and ingredients and start cutting and arranging them as I watch the TV. (Cutting veggies while watching TV can seriously reduce the cutting speed)
Before I know, its 10 and time to sleep. (after keeping the ingredients in fridge)
Next day (Party day), I get up by 7.30 and make a quick round of trips to neighbours collecting the chairs. The drinks haven't come yet.
I get into the kitchen and start cooking. Thankfully, the cutting I did last night helped save some time.
Its 12.30 noon and I'm already done with the cooking. Now I have to just put things in the oven 10 minutes before the party starts.
Drinks still haven't come.
I run down to the shop and he has got only 75% of the stock I ordered.
I pick it up and pick another dozen bottles of squash and some soda (for some instant Gulshan style inventions)
And at 3.30 pm, here I am ready for action without any stress inspite of some issues with the drinks.
Something that looked so frightening yesterday morning is already in good shape and before time just because I was able to handle one bit at a time.
The party is just an example. So many times we come across issues in office and at work which look simply huge in the beginning, but by breaking them down in smaller activities and delegating some of them, monitoring them regularly, keeping track of time we can make life much less stressful.
Whether its planning a trip, cooking a meal or planning a multi million dollar client project, the steps are pretty much the same.
Break it down, spread it into smaller time bound milestones, delegate what you can, periodically monitor, target to be ready with atleast 20% time to spare. This gives you a project level buffer.
Read the above story again and you will see that I have done each of these activities.
A lot of people think that I'm over simplifying things, but it has always worked for me.
All I need to do is to Break It Down...
No comments:
Post a Comment