A day of days - 5 things to do in a workload peak

The advent of home working has meant significantly less time between meetings. For those of us who spent time with customers this was often time in the car or train, for all of us, we have found ourselves fitting in 'comfort breaks' in the 2 mins gap between calls.

'Back to back' has long been a dangerous situation to find yourself in with meetings but, let's be honest, some days just fall that way. I had a day such as this recently and I call it 'a day of days' (DoD). Simply, it was a day where I seemed to have a few days of activity all at once.

It led me to think about what to do in such circumstances. I finished that day tired and less energised than I could have been so knew I had room for reflection and improvement. Here are the five things I concluded for myself, I hope you can find some value in them:

Look at the day before and the day after: What was the reason for my 'day of days'? Bad planning? Coincidence? Was it a day before or after a holiday or full day meeting? This helped me understand why it happened. For me it was bad planning but that's not always the case. Whatever it is, be kind to yourself, it's done.

Make a list: Those of you who have read my posts know that I like a list. I did this for the 'DoD' and, without it, I would have been crushed. I knew what I was doing, when it was happening, in what format (call/Teams/Zoom etc) and my role. I also knew which were part of my priorities and which were not (there was a mix, see above, bad planning).

Plan your opinion and your input: This one is important. For each meeting, it was critical that, not only did I know my role in the meeting (was I the lead, a contributor, a decision maker?) but I also knew where in the meeting I had an opinion and input. For example, there were parts where I was learning and note-taking. There were others where I was 121 and in the lead. I knew, in advance, what I wanted to add to the meeting and also what I was curious about. This helped each meeting have clear outcome objectives (for me and others)

Be as present as you can: We all find ourselves drifting. Especially if we opt for no video, if the meeting is a regular one and the agenda is very familiar (conscious competence can be a red light!) I was happy with how I did this but reflected that it was important to reinforce - why waste everyone's time by not being present? I'm not a fan of passengers in meetings - take part!

Plan some breaks: Surely you're all good at this by now? No? I didn't think so. I don't mean the toilet breaks, I mean the time away from your desk, time looking further than your screen. Time to breathe, walk, have tea...my strongest advice is to schedule them in, the same way you would if you were meeting your boss.

So that's me. I am sure there are fantastic hacks out there on how to have great back to back days - we all need them.

As always, thank you for taking time to read, I appreciate it.