2 Warning Indicators
Each week I learn more and more how important it is to take care of myself. To be a good leader, to be a good mother or a wife I need to feel good. When I am sick or down I tend to be crabby and at times difficult to deal with. Therefore, the quality of my well being is crucial element for quality of my outputs. So to start of I created 2 very simple and easily recognizable dashboards. The two areas needed measuring are for energy earned and energy burned.
The first dashboard measures inputs that I put into my energy chamber to keep it full and maintain a running level of energy at all times. To do so I need to make sure I get enough sleep, I eat healthy. I can’t skip meals or eat junk food even when it seems like a good idea. It also means that I have to know where to start and when to stop working on a project so I don’t push myself over the brink of what is reasonable. It is easy for me to get caught up in the moment and try to outdo myself, try to finish just one more thing or start on the other one. However, I am learning that I have to consider myself as a finite resource that has limited capacity. My energy levels can be recharged but I can only produce so much impact with so x amount of effort. When my energy is low the effort needed is increased, however the quality of work I produce is decreases.
The dash board reads from left to right, low being on the left and high on the right. Just like with a fuel gauge there is an indicator that always shows where my energy level is. The resources i need to maintain at least medium level can vary, meaning sometimes I need more sleep. At other times I may need exercise to turn bad energy into good and keep a balance.
Just as I am becoming more cognizant of what I put into my body and how I take care of my body in order to be productive. I am understanding that productivity and is all about quality and not so much about quantity. I am learning that when I put my best foot forward there are rewards and next levels I can reach. Whether that means I get a good grade or praise, quality of my results dictates my future progress.
Sometimes it is hard to do your best, and best we can do means just getting done and over with whatever it is that we are working on. When I am too tired I regretfully ask my kids how does pizza for dinner sound knowing they will beam with delight and say yippee!!!! The effort and outcome are predictable and I know I can check diner of my to do list. Those moments make me feel like a bad mom, but at times that’s all I can muster.
There are many examples I can list in personal or work life. Maybe I won’t go out with friends because I feel too tired, but if I do I know I’d have lots of fun and would be able to relax and enjoy the moment. Except I know I would be exhausted. At work, there are times when I know a projects is half baked, we need more input maybe from a leader who is not in the office, but “completing” it as such gets me by. Quantity is always there, but not quality. I am committing myself to changing the ratio. I would rather produce higher quality at a lower output rate than have mediocre results.
The second dashboard looks exactly the same as the first one, except it measures the energy burned or used to produce quality work. As I look at both gauges side by side it is easy to see how one affects the other. Low energy levels mean lower quality of my outputs. On the other hand when I have a lot of energy, with little effort i can produce some quality results. 