Parkinson’s Law | Essential Time Management Toolkit – Part 5

I came across Parkinson’s Law fairly recently as I was diving into how to manage my own time on bigger picture passion projects for myself. I was finding myself continually putting off things that I was super passionate about. As I was exploring what might be happening or how I might be unintentionally sabotaging myself, I came across Parkinson’s Law from a video by Ali Abdaal, his channel is (https://www.youtube.com/@aliabdaal) .

The Core Philosophy of Parkinson’s Law is that time will expand to fill the time allotted for it’s completion. In other words, people’s pace will adjust to the time they have given themselves or been given to complete it. Some of the ways to overcome Parkinson’s Law are to plan your work strategically, set self-imposed deadlines, track your time or challenge yourself.

The quote “People tend to overestimate what they can get done in a day, but drastically underestimate what they can get done in a year” was stuck in my head, so I really latched onto the “challenge yourself” method to overcoming. I think this is the best, lowest touch method of all of them, but that is just me. The downside to this is, I tend to be HIGHLY unrealistic or optimistic at times, which put me in situations where I was never going to win.

In a healthy environment, that is ok most of the time, but in an unhealthy environment, like the one I had created for myself, it weighed me down instead of lifting me up and feeling like a challenge. It’s tough to find the balance, but if you can, this method can be very beneficial and really test the beliefs you have about what can be accomplished.

I still use this on a regular basis, but I use it more as a thought exercise about work I am doing and if I am being too cautious with timelines. I would love to hear how this works for you! Let me know!

I hope this was helpful! Thanks for being here! Take care!

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