The subject line screamed from my in box: ‘URGENT Please respond this morning.’ I read this in the 5 minutes I had in between clients meetings. I opened the email (from a contact I know well) and realized immediately that the urgency was steaming from his needs, yet there was significantly less urgency from my end. I resented the ALL CAPS subject. I will decide what’s urgent!
How do you react and respond to other’s ‘urgencies’? When we are running 1000 mph it is imperative that we are in the driver’s seat, not someone else. Here are a few tips for you to remain in control:
1 – Start each day with setting your priorities.
2 – Be honest with yourself where you could be potentially holding people up. What can you delegate?
3 – Be decisive about where your colleagues, team, vendors need to check in with you and where they can move forward without you.
4 – Respond in a timely manner. Your definition of timely. I have heard many of my clients tell me they respond to their clients within 24 hours. This includes responding to an URGENT email with a short response: I am in meetings until this afternoon. I will get back to you when I get back to my office. (Yes, this is how I responded to the email I received.)
5 – Be confident about your strategies. Hold your ground on what works for you.
6 – DO NOT BE A SLAVE TO YOUR INBOX! The original intention of email was not to serve as a to-do list. (Although I have learned to manage it and have found it to be a useful to-do list!) Again, you can be in charge of your time – most of the time!
As a side note, these are acceptable urgencies in my perspective:
My dream client (the Red Sox) is ready to hire me to work with their retiring players about the next phase of their careers (i.e., David Ortiz)- Sidney Crosby is coming to meet the family
- The Mesa behind my house is burning
- Dixie Bauer, the family dog, has eaten all the flip flops in the house and is roaming the streets looking for more.
LESSON LEARNED: I noticed my resentment to this email and realized that I was reacting to someone trying to push me out of the driver’s seat for the day. I started my own business so I could be in control of my time. That is not always the case, however, I guard my calendar and my time like it’s a pot of gold. There are times I respond to clients’ last-minute requests for my time, but that is not a daily occurrence. What do you protect in your day like a pot of gold? What strategies will you put in place to respond to other’s urgencies?