To Finity. Then Beyond.

Here is a journal entry from the end of March. It's a time when most educators are really feeling the strain of the season. Spring Break may be a week or two away, and many of us are pushing back against fatigue in order to grind our way through. Perhaps other industries feel this way, too. The stretch between President's Weekend and Memorial Day is really long, and I've always felt like we need a break about every six weeks. So I'm always mindful of when things like social events or happy hours occur. I also try to moderate staff meeting content during these harder parts of the year - keeping agendas light, mixing in short bits of entertainment, and minimizing the number of meetings whenever I can in this stretch.

So on this morning - March 29, one of several cloudy and rainy days in the early Spring - I was synthesizing lots of different lessons and reflections across this six-week slog:

To Finity. Then Beyond.

Time and energy are finite, so the goals we set need to honor those limits. We must ensure that our most deeply held values inform our prioritization, then we need to acknowledge how far we can go within the time, energy, and resource constraints we have. Short-term benchmarks can maintain, not just practical progress, but emotional investment if you celebrate a variety of milestones - especially smaller ones that are not openly visible to those outside the working team. 

But if you are like me, and you don't have an eagle eye that can accurately measure or predict how long certain tasks might take, scheduling these benchmarks can be a tough puzzle. This is especially true if you are working on something innovative; there may be little or no prior experience to draw on. So let's openly acknowledge another finite resource: our fortune-telling capabilities. 

Stick to a Schedule Without Getting Sticky

The project timeline is always a guess, but it's still a vital tool that anchors and guides everyone's efforts. Here are some hacks I am trying to be a better long-range planner:

1) Check your current calendar. Objectively, a project may take ten person-hours in terms of pure labor, but when can you dedicate those hours? How long will it take to "bank" that time? If you looked at your current calendar for the next two weeks, how many hours are currently unaccounted for? How much further into your calendar would you need to look in order to carve out the full set of ten? 

2) Stay flexible. As you just experienced in that little exercise, managers will need to be creative in how they clear time and space for these priorities. (Remember, I'm talking about projects that deserve your focus and energy because they are closely aligned to your and your group's deeply held values.) Agree to let some other tasks go -- or at least allow a later completion. Reciprocally, look for opportunities to marshall additional resources to help the team move more quickly or help them to clear their plates in order to focus on this project. (Chances are, their calendars are looking just as packed as yours.)

3) Build time into the timeline. This can look like check-in times at key points that can become natural  breaks -- remember my six-week cycle from earlier. In fact, we should never stigmatize rest. Consider that this 'extra' time could be for team fun: happy hour, bowling night. I don't think this is an 'extra' at all; it's a crucial release valve for the stress of a very important project. It's also a simple way to prioritize the mental and emotional health and fitness of your people, which should be at the core of how we lead. 

I firmly believe that the social and emotional life and health of an organization is crucial to its long-term success. As a leader, personally, I prioritize this beyond the standard relationship-building that many management advisors emphasize. I'm talking more about maintaining relationship and connection by making sure that the folks I lead can stay mentally and emotionally fit as they navigate this project alongside the myriad other stressors in their lives. 

Play Stops and Rest Stops

Humor and play are both integral parts of my daily management. It's a key way that I try to elevate humanity in the work environment. Building rest stops and play stops into a long-term project timeline can help everyone persist through the arduous journey. It also communicates, right from the start, that you will care for them during the hard parts. Like the dog days of Spring when the next holiday is still a couple weeks away.

At least we can look forward to Team Karaoke next week.