Are you one of those guys who are overwhelmed by the thought of completing large projects? You know who I am talking about, right? These are the folks who look at the amount of work needed to complete the project and can’t decide how or where to begin. Their mind is occupied by the thought number of tasks that need to be finished – all interconnected and interdependent; but are unable to take any action to move them forward. Finally, they throw up their hands in frustration and end up not accomplishing anything.
There is a better way to manage these large projects. It’s called – Divide and Conquer. The way it works it you start at the top and start dividing the project in smaller chunks; further refining those chunks into even smaller, easily manageable tasks and so on. Those who are trained in formal project management techniques can relate to this. Unfortunately, not all small business owners are trained to think this way.
So, how does divide and conquer work? Here are some of the techniques.
- Divide large project in smaller tasks listing dependencies and deadline. Keep dividing them further till you reach a task that can be accomplished in a single time block of say 30 minutes. Some of the examples of these tasks are – write a proposal to the client, call headquarters, prepare financial report, etc.
- Review the tasks and make a plan for when and how you will finish it. You will need to look at the dependencies, time needed and other information to come up with this plan.
- Review this list whenever you have a small time window available to see what can be completed. Have a 30 minute drive to get to a meeting? Get the phone numbers of the clients and complete those phone calls from the road.
- Delegate all the tasks that can be completed by others. Remember, you don’t have to do everything yourself. After all, there is more than enough work for you to work on any given day.
It’s amazing how effective these techniques can be in helping you finish the large projects without getting overwhelmed. There are several reasons why they work.
- Dividing the project into smaller tasks and putting them on paper (or computer) gives you a good overview of everything that needs to be completed. Your mind becomes free to think about other things after you clear it out of all the unnecessary thoughts occupying it all the time.
- Thinking about all tasks and putting them on paper gives you an opportunity to delegate. If you have not thought through the tasks you can’t tell if someone else can help you finish them.
- It allows you to utilize your time more effectively. You are not wasting 15 minute window you may have between tasks. You can review the list and find out what phone calls you can make in those 15 minutes.
- The act of checking off tasks from the list gives you a sense of accomplishment and provides you boost to keep making progress. You know how frustrating it can be when you are not able to see any progress on a large project.
This technique of divide and conquer can be applied to your daily routine as well. If you plan your day in terms of small time slots of 30 minute each and allocate tasks in those slots you can be much more productive throughout the day as opposed to if you look at the day as one 12 hour block. As we showed earlier a to-do list can be useful tool to plan your day.
What techniques have you utilized to finish large projects?
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