Managing Expectations
“Managing Expectations”
Life can be completely characterized by this one concept, about this one piece of advice. But how can these 2 words above, possibly help you daily? How would you go about tackling this one phrase day after day after day? I will try and explain what I am getting at as you read further.
What I mean by this is that we need to manage many things in our lives; we are constantly juggling 10 or more tasks from day to day. On top of these daily tasks we are dealing with monthly goals and career or long term choices and decisions as well. These choices and decisions that we need to manage seem to never end and continually pile up. And this frustrates us at times, but we can’t turn face and let them be, we need to go at them head first and trudge through them. Or if you are good at managing expectations you seemingly glide over them. But, here comes the question, how do you do that?
How do you manage your expectations?
How do you get the tasks, work and goals in your life completed? And not just completed but in a relatively quick time period and done well and professionally?
Example: You are expected to get this big presentation done by the end of the week, and you know it will take a lot of time and effort to get it done, but you are not sure how much time you will be able to spend on it, as you are already spread pretty thin as it is with current projects. So what do you do?
Simple, you manage your expectations. You get done with your most important projects first and you go from there. You start with that presentation as it seems to be the hardest thing on your plate and the one project that has a specific deadline and has the biggest weight behind it. Then work your way down, and by doing so this will accomplish a few things for yourself in the process. First: You will get the most complex and mentally trying task out of the way first and ensure that it gets finished before the deadline. Secondly: you will guarantee that all the tasks that you do therein after will be easier and go by more quickly than the first as it was the biggest and hardest for you. And third: you will be happier as it always feels good to get the hardest things done first. It is always better to “eat your toads” first. (Toad = hardest task from every day on your to-do list) Think of the flip-side, if you start with the easy things then work to the hard ones, you will be dreading the end of your day everyday, which doesn't sound like much fun does it?
So don't do it that way.
Juas a couple of quick notes: Manage what is expected from you. Manage your projects and prioritize them accordingly from high to low. Always meet your expectations and when time and space permit it, exceed those expectations. Especially as you get more practice with this, because you will eventually get extremely good at it and be able to take on more and more with less and less stress. Trust me.
Till later, Caio-
Posted in: decision, improvements, random thought, rant, thinking on Wednesday, June 10, 2009 at at 10:13 AM
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I agree.. I always try to get done what I know people will be looking for first.
If life can be completely characterized by "managing expectations", than one would be left to assume you have a rather dull life.
"Eat your toads"? Nice...
Your advice here is generally fine, but I'd recommend reading what Stephen Covey has to say about managing expectations and time, and rather than a simple "important-to-least-important" he has a matrix which can be used to manage expectations and time.
it works better for me to start with the things that i like doing first. so i disagree.
LOL, nice comments.
@ Gust: Dude you are wrong, just because you manage expectations doesn't consitute a dull life, it just means you never dissapoint. You always come through in the clutch.. etc.
Gotta love the toads. :P
@ xxxray: Cool, everyone is different so do it your own personal way, but I am willing to bet you hate the end of your days..?
I am so NOT wrong, and here is why.
If I perform a task or errand, I'm not doing it to be thought better of, or solely to make someone happy. Managing expectations reminds me of something you write down - specific, individual goals. I don't have many of those, and the main ones I have are for myself.
As a Christian, I try to live in the grace of Jesus Christ. What are his expectations? To boil it all down: love one another. So how do you manage love? Is something like "love" even an expectation? Something that needs to be managed? I submit that it's not.
I don't want to go through life managing expectations. I want to go through life enjoying it. Yes, there's a certain amount of managing expectations we need to do, but to say that life can be COMPLETELY CHARACTERIZED by this one concept seems to be extreme, and inaccurate.
If someone asked me to completely characterize my life, I know I wouldn't say that it's about managing expectations. Is that what you would honestly say characterized your life? Is that how you would want to be remembered? Is that all you want to do?
I hope not.
Not being mean or rude here... but that particular sentence doesn't strike a chord with me.
I agree with Gust. Love is what life is about. When we're talking about what will charaterise your life, it's not the tasks you completed, or the order you completed them in. It is how well you loved and were loved...
When you're older, you won't look back and think of how well you ticked off the tasks on your 'to do' list - but you will remember the love.
Of course you make a point about getting to those tasks that are necessary, but I fear that that is not the way you should characterise your life. Maybe we are just talking semantics now, and this is outside the point? But think about it... At the end of the day, those are just 'things' you have (or want)to do. They aren't the most important thing.
That's what I believe.
@ Bamer : LOL no because my days went exactly the way i wanted them to go , i end my days with grace... and a very strong mixed drink :)
@ xxxray: nice... whats the drink of choice?
chocolate martini