Getting over overwhelm with Personal Kanban
Meadhbh Hand
Human2Human copywriter for B2B, Content Writer, Content Designer, Writer. White papers, long form articles, web content.
Ever have those days or weeks where it just feels like there are way too many things being added to your to do list and not enough being removed? Because I’ve been dealing with that a lot lately. I’ve recently taken on a new voluntary role, I’m getting ready to go offline and off grid for a week and I have to keep things going in the business at the same time. I’ve written before about how I find it challenging to switch gears from quieter periods to busier ones and back again. Last week things were feeling more towards the frantic end of the scale and I was dealing with an unhealthy dose of overwhelm.
Aside from meditating which has always been one of the greatest supports to me when I’m stressed, I struggled to think of a way to manage the spinning plates. I came across this Guardian article. Clearly I was dealing with my situation by ignoring it and reading it instead of dealing with my to do lists.
The Personal Kanban method is a stupidly simple but amazingly effective way to manage your productivity in busy times. All you need is a white board (or wall space) and a bunch of post-it notes.
There are two principles:
1. Visualise your work
2. Limit your work in progress
For the first part write down each task on a separate post-it note. Then, on your whiteboard draw three columns with the headings Options, Doing and Done. Now put the post it notes in the options section, then pick up to three and put them in the doing section. Simply changing the title from “to do” to “options” helps change your mindset from feeling that you have to do things, to feeling that you have a choice about what you do. You are only allowed to have 3 items in the doing section at any one time. Limiting work in progress in this way really helped me to focus rather than jumping from one thing to another. And then you have the very satisfying experience of moving things from doing to done. It’s like a very slow analogue arcade game. There’s a video here which demonstrates how it works if you’re a visual person and my explanation is unclear.
Give it a go and let me know what you think.
Thoughtful messaging & comms for expert-led businesses | Messaging strategy | Client-facing communications | Marketing & communications support
5 年I really like this method, it's a great head-clearer. It also works well using Trello if you want to make your Post Its digital :)? Best of luck with your off the grid adventures!?
Coach, Facilitator & Trainer | Networking | Career Transition | Team Coaching | Career Returners Associate Coach
5 年Very helpful Meadhbh. Do you think if I crest that board today the ‘work elves’ will have them all in the ‘Done’ column by the time we get back from ‘off the grid’ ????