Achieving Productive Work and Life Through the Take Back Your Life Program®
Productivity is something that we are always talking about but sometimes find difficulty in achieving both in work and life. The question we should be asking ourselves is what productivity means to us. I think that is where it all starts. If we define productivity as accomplishing all the tasks we have in front of us, we will be forever completing our tasks. However, would that mean we are moving towards our goals and objectives at the same time? If not, then we have a serious misalignment of what productivity means. We also look for tools and processes to help us be more productive but really if the mindsets and habits we have do not change, then the tools and processes will not help us become more productive. I do think many of us feel that we may not be productive enough and are always looking for ways to be more efficient and effective.
In my corporate life, one such program came along which I attended. Through it, I learned that productivity is not about getting everything done but rather, it is about getting the right things done. That was a big change in the way I started to think. This program was McGhee Productivity Solutions Take Back Your Life Program® that not just focused on tools and processes but also on changing mindsets and beliefs. It was certainly something that was new for me then but implementing some of the learnings there resulted in significant changes.
Fast forward to 2013, where I had left my corporate life and started doing facilitation, consulting and coaching work. I was approached by McGhee Productivity Solutions through a common acquaintance to become a certified facilitator in their signature program Take Back Your Life® (TBYL). They were looking for someone in this region to help them deliver programs – face to face and virtually as well – as the time zones made it difficult to service their clients from the US. And I jumped at the opportunity to do so and went through their certification process. Since 2014, I have been delivering the TBYL program in this region and beyond to EMEA, as long as the time zone was favourable to me in Singapore.
Why does this program work? I believe it is because it addresses our mindsets. We have beliefs that may not be helping us and that is what thwarts us regardless of the tools we have in place. We believe that we have to get everything done when in fact we should focus and get the right things done that furthers our goals and objectives. We can’t seem to say no to other people when in fact it is ok to say to no to ensure we are achieving the things that we need to be achieving.
Habits play a big part as well. We don’t shut off notifications from our devices that distract us from the work that we should be doing. We are constantly being run by the emails that pop into our inbox instead of focusing on the tasks we have planned for the day.
Take Back Your Life® is integrated with Microsoft Outlook, a place where all work and life tasks are managed through email, task lists and appointments. Its processes and methodologies are replicated in the tool to provide a one stop solution and an easy way for each person to manage their work and life without relying on too many other tools and devices. You will learn how to manage distractions, how to have specific collecting points for capturing all that you may have to do, how to process and organize what you have captured to make it easy to search and manage, and then prioritize and plan it on your daily task list and calendar and use that to drive your day.
We are pleased to let you know that ENiBLE is now partnering McGhee Productivity Solutions to bring their productivity solutions to our clients in this region, in particular, the Take Back Your Life® program which can be run well even in the virtual format.
If you are using Microsoft Outlook at work and/or at home, come and chat with us on how the Take Back Your Life® program can help you to literally, “Take Back Your Life” by having a system in place that allows you to manage both your work and life in an integrated fashion to ensure that we are not compromising one or the other. While it is an individual productivity system, it can be rolled out to teams and organizations to help them collaborate better by building a culture of productivity through having everyone having the same language of productivity applied throughout the organization.
– Sanjay Mehta, Director, ENiBLE and Consultant for McGhee Productivity Solutions
