Even in the hardest times though, there are certain industries that thrive. In this current environment, businesses who specialize in technology-based solutions, especially Cloud based solutions, have seen a massive acceleration in demand.
How do I know this? Because that was the case for SoJI in 2020.
As much as there are business owners who are taking strain from a lack of business, there are also business owners who are overwhelmed and struggling to keep up with the opportunities coming their way.
I hope that this article provides encouragement for BOTH of those groups.
I read a question, posted recently on Social media that asked – “Is it just me or does this year keep getting harder?”
It got me thinking – “Why is that the case?” Sure, there were, and are still, obvious factors such as continued lockdowns, restrictions on social gathering sizes and, all the other limitations so many of us are facing. Still, I felt that, there must be a bigger reason.
So, I looked at my own business and areas where I was personally challenged last year. One of those was in trying to maintain a full working day – I would often find that by two or three in the afternoon, I had nothing left and yet, there was still so much to do.
And so, I thought of the following acronym that has helped me to remain productive, whatever the number of hours is that I have capacity for.
F – Focus
I read an interesting comment that said – “Writing something down once is equivalent to reading it seven times”. Note that is says writing and not typing.
While I appreciate the age of digital task lists and applications, there is something incredibly satisfying in crossing items off my written task list.
Once I have my focus points in place, what I need to do, I can move on to the second letter. (Check out Do what you need to do, so that you can do what you want to do. | LinkedIn for more thoughts on this)
A – Attention to detail
It stands to reason and yet, I have seen this missed many times that, if I don’t know WHAT I need to do, I am really going to struggle to know HOW to do it.
Once we have established the “What?”, we can focus on the “How?”. This is where I go to my whiteboard and start mapping out the process that I need to follow in order to complete the task.
R – Respect (Your Job, Your Boss, Your Staff, Yourself)
I have a saying in my business – “Doing what you love is good but loving where, what you are doing is taking you, is better.” We may not all be “in love” with our jobs and, some of us might not have jobs right now at least, jobs as we used to understand them anyway.
That does not mean that our circumstances should change our behavior.
It’s hard to be “happy” when we have just been called into another Zoom meeting at eight on a Thursday evening. I have tried to remind myself of this each time though- My boss/client is expecting something from me because their boss/client is expecting something from them.
I also want to encourage those of you, who are employees, to communicate openly with your managers about your capacity. We usually talk about managers managing their staff and yet if staff managed their managers as well, the chances of them meeting the managers’ expectations would increase exponentially.
Remember; a broken “honey badger” is no help to anyone but, a healthy one will take on a lion.
T – Take a breath and be Thankful
This was the most important letter for me, last year. I remember recently thinking to myself at about ten ‘o clock in the morning “WOW my fuse is short today!” Stopping for a moment, taking a breath and then, making a step forward has helped me avoid several possible banana skins last year that could have turned out very differently had I responded in the moment.
Try this approach the next time you are ready to commit “murder by email”. Write the email, save it, sleep on it, re-word it the next morning and then, send it.
The second “T” is very useful for reminding ourselves that, as bad or crazy as things might seem right now, if we take our head out of our bubble for a moment, we will find something to be grateful for. (Check out Living Outside Your Bubble | LinkedIn for a few practical tips).
This is not always an easy exercise but, I can tell you that, the more you search for opportunities to be thankful, the easier it will be to find them.
You may have noticed the acronym does indeed spell F.A.R.T. I have been using F.A.R.T. for the past couple of months and I can honestly say that, while my capacity is different to what it has been before, my productivity has increased due to applying these principles.
So, I encourage you to F.A.R.T. in 2021. Try these principles out and tell me in the comments how they work for you.
Finally, when you talk to a colleague who is tired of people farting around, tell them that you know the acronym to change that smell.
