Are You Busy, or Just Constantly Occupied?
There is a question I sometimes ask people towards the end of a coaching session, "What has made the biggest difference this week?". It often creates a thoughtful pause. People usually have no difficulty describing how full their week has been. They can tell me about the meetings they attended, the emails they dealt with and the number of different issues that demanded their attention. What is often much harder is identifying the things that genuinely moved something forward. That isn't because they haven't worked hard (and it’s usually the opposite). Most of the people I work with care deeply about doing a good job. They are thoughtful, conscientious and committed, so they naturally respond to whatever needs their attention. However, responding to work and progressing work are not always the same thing, even though they can feel very similar at the time.
I have certainly found myself reaching the end of a day wondering where it has gone. It has been full from beginning to end, yet the piece of work I had hoped to make progress on is still sitting exactly where it was that morning. The day has been spent dealing with what arrived rather than what mattered most. Perhaps that feels familiar.
An email prompts a conversation, one meeting creates three new actions and a quick request turns into half an hour. None of those things are necessarily unimportant and many genuinely need attention. But they can quietly shape the day before we have given much thought to how we wanted to spend it in the first place. That is one reason I have become rather cautious about describing a week simply as "busy". It tells me how full it felt, but it tells me very little about what was actually achieved.
A more useful question, at least for me, is to ask what made the biggest difference. Sometimes the answer is obvious. More often, it isn't the task that occupied the most time. It is the conversation that brought clarity to a difficult situation, the decision that removed uncertainty or the hour spent thinking through an issue that had been circling around for weeks. Those moments often have far more influence than they appear to at the time.
Looking back over a week in this way can also reveal something else. It becomes easier to notice the difference between work that simply kept us occupied and work that genuinely created movement. Both have their place, but they are not interchangeable. I've found that making this distinction changes the way I look at the following week. Rather than trying to fit more into the diary, I begin thinking about where my attention is likely to have the greatest effect. It doesn't mean the unexpected stops happening, because it never does. It simply means I am a little more conscious of what I don't want to lose sight of when it does. Perhaps that is a more helpful way of thinking about productivity, as a reflection of whether our time and attention found their way to the things that mattered most (rather than how much we managed to squeeze into the week).
Questions to Consider
Looking back over the past week, what made the biggest difference?
Which activities created genuine progress and which simply kept you occupied?
Where did your attention go that you hadn't intended?
What deserves a little more of your time next week?
Try This This Week
Before you begin planning next week, spend ten quiet minutes looking back at the one that has just finished. Rather than counting everything you completed, identify the two or three moments that had the greatest impact. You may find they have less to do with how busy you were than with where you chose to focus your attention.
Looking for more practical ideas?
If you're interested in creating more thinking space, improving your effectiveness or making better use of your time, you might be interested in our free 15 minute video Making Time to Think. And if you found this post useful you can sign up to stay informed with curated strategies on managing change. Delivered straight to your inbox. Unsubscribe at any time. Send me updates