Five Meaningful Changes You Can Make in Spite of Doubt - Steve Parker, Jr.

This time of year is generally reserved for reflection of time passed experiences had people who have come into our lives and those whom have passed through It is also a great time to celebrate what the future holds But the future however exciting can be filled with angst That said many times in life we don39t make decisions because of doubt it simply paralyzes us The reality is that if you have a willingness to move forward in spite of doubt you often should amp8211 and it is likely to reap great rewards for youOftentimes I find myself struggling with the quotwhat to changequot so I can quotbe betterquot dilemma essentially the dreaded resolutions or reflection reality check Over the last month most of my thought has been focused on minimizing amp8211 basically getting rid of waste in my time and life andor creating more with less The result I hope would be more clarity and timeGiven this topic has been heavy on my mind I have been reading a lot on the subject One article I read in Harvard Business Review quotFive Things you Should Stop Doing in 2012quot by Dorie Clark provided some tremendous advice and therefore I decided to share it and add my own thoughts as well1 Email HellIf you are experiencing this you know exactly what I mean I have literally received 278 emails as of 230pm today work related only It39s become a skill in itself to manage the deluge of email In Dorie39s article she calls it quotResponding like a Trained Monkeyquot and I do feel that way some days Dorie mentions that email management studies prove email has become addictive and in many ways like a slot machine for the brain further explaining that checking email only periodically every 90 minutes or only once a day is not only beneficial for our wellbeing but further allows you to actually accomplish something substantialIn this day and age I know we all feel we need to respond to every email as soon as it arrives but the truth is we don39t and we shouldn39t I recently spent time at the Ernst ampamp Young Entrepreneur of the Year Awards with Greg Koch CEO of Stone Brewing Co and he certainly has a focus on managing email In fact his autoreply states the following quotThank you for your email In order to better respond to business demands I will be responding to emails twice dailyamp8232If your email is Urgent in nature and cannot wait up to 68 hours for a response please contactamp8230thanks for your understandingquot Moral of the story Manage email amp8211 don39t let it manage you2 Small DistractionsAll day long one distraction leads to another which eventually adds up We inevitably become stressed frustrated and finally overwhelmed I39d estimate this happens to me at least 2 amp8211 3 times a week Dorie39s concept is called quotMindless Traditionsquot The example given is essentially passing on one opportunity because of feeling the need to fulfill another traditional quotobligationquot amp8211 such as sending holiday cards amp8211 because if you don39t you may feel guilty Meanwhile your card gets buried in the many others people receive around the holidaysThe opportunity here is to reach out and touch someone in a different time perhaps a time they wouldn39t expect it How about sending a card in July amp8211 Happy Summer Card Or better yet amp8211 just call them Handwritten notes throughout the year are nice when not expected In fact I keep a stack of thank you cards and envelopes on my desk and every time I get back from a conference or a meeting the first thing I do is write a quick note to those I met and thank them for their time Recently I received a nice wallet in return just because I had sent a handwritten note Focus on what is important through prioritization and delegate the rest3 Information ParalysisIt is really easy to get caught up in feeling as though we have to know everything going on in the world Heaven forbid we are the last to find out the latest business merger political policy or worse yet Kardashian breakup In Dorie39s article she mentions that she has nearly a dozen newspaper and magazine subscriptions all driving her compulsion to be included on crucial information I39d say that is about par for the course I bet we all have amp8211 at minimum amp8211 twodozen physical subscriptions email newsletters and online accounts we feel we must read Dorie took a month off from all the physical sources to detox and afterward realized she was able to reflect on those that matter For her that was The New Yorker the rest were out the doorI39d like to broaden this to all compulsive sources of information overload Which of them don39t truly provide value or save you time For me it means no more magazines DVR for every show cutting my newsletter subscriptions in half I don39t need that special Groupon deal and an aggregate RSS news feed that organizes my news Streamline your information sources to essentials and gain more control over your life You39ll probably get smarter as a result4 All Work is Not Created EqualDorie calls this quotWork That39s Not Worth Itquot and for this section I39ll skip her examples I am very passionate about this topic In fact at advertising and marketing industry events I often talk about it Businesses especially ad agencies have gotten so caught up in the herd they feel compelled to do something cheap or free to keep a client happy or compete with everyone else amp8211 why quotBecause everyone else is doing itquot Let me ask you how39s that process worked out for you thus far If you do something cheaper than you should or for free because everyone else is you do three major things1 You devalue your work2 You become frustrated because you made a bad decision and it is painful to work on that project every day3 You actually harm the client longterm because the quality suffersThat39s right if you can39t do it at a fair price for both the client and your business you should not do it Say no Free often leads to low quality and you will end up in an unhappy place Respect your business and your clients the results will not only improve you will be happier and your client will be too5 Idea ComplicationsWe all have a lot of ideas However may times we overcomplicate them We either don39t have a great approach or vision lack execution or haven39t tested the waters to know whether people even want or desire what we think is great I once heard that Google has an internal pitch process for ideas If you can39t get the point or value across in as few as three slides your idea is toast I like that Ideas should be simple and easy to communicate The moving parts can be figured out after the value proposition Dorie39s example was in regard to a friend39s idea of a professional development series but the friend wanted to do biweekly calls over a twomonth period to filter through the idea When Dorie asked a series of questions that resulted in silence she quickly knew she had saved herself a lot of time and effort on moving forward with a bad idea Create a value proposition and decide what to test even a little before putting too much time and effort into itI suggest reading Dorie Clark39s full article on HBR and appreciate her inspiring words that led to this postSteve Parker Jr is a CoFounder and Managing Partner of Levelwing a digital advertising agency that provides datadriven marketing solutions Steve can be reached at sparkerlevelwingcom Follow me on Twitter at sparkerjrRead all Steve39s MediaBizBloggers commentaries at AskingSmarterQuestionscomCheck us out on Facebook at MediaBizBloggerscomFollow our Twitter updates MediaBizBloggerThe opinions and points of view expressed in this commentary are exclusively the views of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaBizBloggerscom management or associated bloggers MediaBizBloggers is an open thought leadership platform and readers may share their comments and opinions in response to all commentaries

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