How to Control Your Inbox – Use Rules
12 November 2015As I work with people around the world on their productivity issues, everyone shares one common challenge – too much time spent on email. One really simple strategy can make a huge difference, and yet hardly anyone uses it. When correctly set up, Rules save you filing time, make it far easier to keep your […]
Are You Too Available?
11 November 2015‘Simon, what’s your biggest challenge?’ I asked. He was having a follow-up coaching session after a half-day’s training. ‘I think I’d call it delegation,’ he replied. ‘I seem to be interrupted all day long with team members wanting help. I don’t want to send them away – I know we have to be available for […]
How To Get Engagement From Your Staff
16 September 2015Are you interested in getting full and involved participation from your people? Instead of telling someone to do a task, ask them how they think it should be done. I first read the following story in Les Giblin’s excellent book ‘How to have confidence and power in dealing with people’. He gives credit to […]
Have You Noticed How Attitude Affects Everything?
27 May 2014The other day as I was driving to an appointment I heard Kim Hill, long-running National Radio New Zealand personality, interview 88 year old Sheila Natusch – artist, historian, natural science researcher and writer of over 30 books including ‘Animals of New Zealand’. http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/player/2597151 I was glad my trip was long enough to hear the […]
Working At A Stand-Up Desk Will Get Your Better and Faster Results
20 May 2014As I walked around the offices of one of my long-standing legal clients a few weeks ago I noticed some of the senior associates and partners had stand-up desks for a portion of their work, including computer work in some cases. Then last week, when I interviewed my friend and professional organiser Mary Pankiewicz of […]
How do we learn to not sweat the small stuff?
14 May 2014Some people know it naturally, some never get it, and the rest of us have the best teachers in the world – small children! I spent the first week of our recent school holidays around a lot of small children and their parents, with a brilliant opportunity to observe in a real world ‘laboratory’. Although […]
Teach Good Habits Young and We Grow Self-Sufficient Adults
14 April 2014Last weekend I had the joy of looking after 3 grandsons whilst their parents were off at an agricultural conference. On Saturday morning I was chatting to a mother on the side line of 7 year old Matt’s first rugby game for the season. ‘My son struggles to keep up,’ she said, pointing to the […]
How To Separate Work And Home When Working From Home
8 April 2014These days more and more folks, even corporate people, work at home some or part of the time. Two key issues need to be handled if we work without the immediate physical support of an office and the external motivation of ‘going’ to work. Mastery of them will dramatically increase your home-based productivity. They are: […]
Consistency: The Key To Better Time Management
30 October 2013When I ask people about what they struggle with the most when it comes to time management, consistency is a reoccurring answer. This makes sense, because creating a new timetable or “to-do” list isn’t the difficult part of managing your time. Applying the new schedule in your life is. This step is always overlooked. A […]
A NASA engineer says: ‘Know what to ignore’
17 September 2013A couple of weeks ago I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr James Brown from Florida. (You can hear it here ) James was a NASA engineer and project manager for 16 years, including many years working on the space shuttle programme, has received several awards for his work, and these days lectures around the […]