My greatest challenges come from the sheer quantity of work that I have. I generally have at least 5-7 design projects happening that I personally work on at one time. Since I am the project coordinator for our company, I also oversee all projects whether I am involved in the actual programming or not. Therefore, I must also coordinate whatever staff I have working on other projects. I also run The Fundraising Network and constantly expand it (will launch 2 new sites this month). Of course, that doesn't take into account all the site updates and customer service calls that I handle every day.
How do I handle it all? There are several things that I do.
1. The first and most important factor is peace. I am a Christian and while people say not to mix religion with business, I find that my relationship with Jesus keeps my business running. If I had no relationship with Him, I would be completely stressed out and would have quit a long time ago.
2. Prioritizing. I keep a task list (see #3 below) and the most important tasks go at the beginning. The important ones get done first.
3. Microsoft Outlook schedules my life for me. I use its email to handle approximately 15 different accounts. I use the calendar to schedule everything -- literally! The task list has everything that needs to be done. One of the nice features is that I can drag an email directly to tasks and it creates the task entry for me. At any time, I can go to Outlook and know what has to be handled in the order it should be handled. (I also have a PocketPC from Dell that syncs with Outlook so I can take all this info with me if I have to leave.)
4. I take at least 2 hours to play each day. This is probably the hardest part for some people. Playtime can be many different things for many different people. For parents, it may be quality time they spend with their children. For married people without children, it is quality time spent with a spouse. For me, I play in Team Fortress League (online gaming league) or watch movies with friends. The point is, it is my time and I am not allowed to work or worry about work.
5. Finally, I respect myself. It took me forever (or at least it seemed like forever) to realize that somebody or somthing will always want my time. Whether it is general life, friends, clients, interuptions or even terrible things that happen, it never stops. They don't care if I feel good or bad, am healty or sick, am rich or poor, everyone wants something -- whether it be time, money, or whatever. (That's not to say that it's all bad. It's good to spend time with friends.)
I realized that I can't please everybody all the time, and sometimes I can't please anybody any of the time. Therefore, all I have to do is my best. After that, tough noogies to anyone who isn't pleased! It may sound a bit callous, but I think of it this way. If I work too long without proper nutrition, rest, exercise, and a little playtime, I eventually wear out from an imbalanced life. Then I can't do anything for anybody.
Part of my responsibility to my clients is to take care of myself, and that means at the end of the day, I walk away from work. (It's sometimes hard since my office is in my house, and I tend to work too much.) There are times that are exceptions such as 2 weeks ago when I worked 126 hours in 8 days to meet a project deadline, but that's not the norm.
SUMMARY
So that's how I deal with life. When something happens that interupts my schedule, I simply schedule it in. Sometimes its a tight fit, but it all works out in the end.
MrGrammar
P.S. By the way, I hope "tough noogies" above doesn't come across as me being a mean-hearted jerk. It's my attitude toward the stress that tries to get me, not toward people. People are very important to me, and I like to help when I can. I just have to know when it's time to stop and take a break. That's when I say, "Tough noogies! You'll have to wait!"
