(April 16th, 2024 Lift Up Email) Get the Lift Up delivered to your inbox here.
Ever find yourself stuck on repeat, playing out the same frustrating scenarios week after week?
That’s what was happening for my client.
Early in our coaching relationship he said, “I feel like a fire fighter in a suit. 🔥 My days are spent putting out everyone else’s fires. I have no time or energy left to do my own work, let alone spend time with my family at night.”
(Read the story in the image below for a chuckle.)
It’s a leader’s dilemma.
How do you split your time between:
*Solving immediate problems that ignite.
*Supporting your team.
*Completing your priorities.
*Having a fulfilling personal life.
*Taking care of yourself.
If the answer is pushing today’s priorities until some magical time in the future when…
*this project is done.
*we hire another team member.
*a big deal closes.
*the economy gets better.
*or any other variable that is unlikely to be the elixir for an overloaded, misaligned schedule…
…then chances are, nothing is going to change.
After going through my own burnout experience and having the privilege of witnessing my clients’ frustrations and transformations, I know it is possible to design a life that intersects at the sweet spot of performance, productivity, profitability, AND personal fulfillment.
but there’s a catch…
Feeling less stressed only happens AFTER a person has made the commitment to be strategic about how they allocate their precious resources.
That often means they need to:
*shut down drama in the workplace
*employ more strategic problem solving
*be compassionately curious (rather than judgmental) about their own patterns, and
*open themselves to new solutions and possibilities.
These were the concepts that my client – the ‘fire-fighting executive’ – and I explored.
Over the course of six months, he changed his working habits and schedule and doused his micro-managing tendencies.
Most important of all, he empowered better problem solving across his entire team. Everyone on his team was equipped with their own fire hose so he was no longer the bottleneck for swift problem solving.
Only the most intense issues were offloaded to him – and because he had taken control of his schedule, he had time to deal with unexpected obstacles.
When we finished working together he said, “Allison, it’s not that I took back my time, I took back my LIFE!”
What about you? What patterns are stuck on repeat? When is enough enough?
Allison “Time to Put Down the Fire Hose” Graham
P.S. Here’s a funny (yet, serious so it’s really not funny) script from a video I posted on LinkedIn yesterday
Powerful Course to Deal Discover How to Be Less Stressed When You’re Under Pressure – FAST!!
Discover the Rapid-Fire Resilience Rundown to deescalate stress
Take Control of Your Time and an Overloaded To Do List!
If you don’t believe you are on top of your workload enough to take a four-day work week and to stop feeling so irritated and annoyed by your workload – you likely need my Task Circle System. It is a proven way to Take Back Your Time – and your life! Learn all about it in my Optimize Your Workweek online course.
Then check out my Optimize Your Workweek online course to discover my proven system for taking control of your time.
