What to Do When You Have To Much Work

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We all have times in our lives where we feel like we need more hours in the day. Those are the times when we have so much work on our plates that we don't know how we will get it all done. Being overworked has numerous downsides. The obvious, of course, is that you run late on getting everything you need to be done, but you may also find yourself...

• Working long or excessive hours
• Feeling exhausted physically
• Stressed out mentally
• Making little mistakes
• Missing important things at home
• Withdrawing from personal life and obligations
• Depression

It's important to manage the right balance between work and personal life. Anytime you can adjust your work life to have the right balance you should do so. I've written about how to do that before and there are several different methods you can take. 

Just Say No

You can't do it all and you shouldn't pretend that you can. Sometimes, especially when you're new to a role, you may find yourself saying yes to everything. This is a trap that many new people and unfortunately many experienced people fall into. Their desire to be of value and prove their worth leads to them taking on project after project, task after task even if those projects and tasks are not part of their responsibilities. While this is manageable at first it quickly becomes overwhelming. In fact, you do more by doing less. You have to learn to say no at work. 

Remember that you will do your best work when you are focused on your responsibilities and your strengths. You don't help others get better by enabling them to not do their job by doing it for them. When you get a request for a task that's outside your area of responsibility, just say no. Be straightforward and honest when saying no. Do not make up elaborate stories about why you can't do it. Do not give excuses at all because this invites the requester to find a way to overcome your excuse.  Simply saying "I'm sorry, but I can't help with that." is a great way to respectfully decline. If they persist, recommend someone else or another resource they can engage to get what they need. 

Prioritize

Understanding what is most important on your list of requests can help you eliminate the things that you don't really need to worry about. You want to identify the tasks that play to your strengths and that you enjoy first. Those go right onto your to-do list. Next, ask yourself how critical it is to the business. Does this push your work and goals forward? If it does, do you have to do it or is it really best for someone else to do it? If you must, put it on your list, if someone else would be better, route the work there. Lastly, is the request really needed? If you aren't obligated to do it, or it just isn't valuable, pass. If the requester still wants it done use the Just Say No steps to decline the request.

These steps come from a book called the 4 Hour Work Week by Tim Ferris. In that book, he laid out this strategy for prioritizing work and included a handy flowchart. Here's a recreation of that flow chart. Check out more about the 4-Hour Work Week and all that Tim Ferris has to offer at his website FourHourWorkWeek.com.

Focus On Strengths

It's so important to lean into your strengths. Everyone has things that they are innately good at and things that they are just not good at. You should work to identify the things that you're good at and the things that you are not good at. Once you've identified those things, arrange your work around the things that you have strengths in. There are multiple advantages to this. First, when you work to your strengths you will work more quickly and effectively. You'll be able to get more done with the same effort. You also tend to enjoy doing the things you're good at. So when you are working not eh things you are naturally good at, you get more done and have fun doing it.

Avoid working on things you are not good at. Be honest with yourself and when you identify something you are not skilled at. If there is a way to use your strengths to get something done instead use that alternate method. If it's not, never be afraid to ask for help and get someone good at it, to step up and knock it out of the park. 

Ask For Help

It can be a little scary to ask for help. You might be worried it will make you look weak, unprepared, or unfit for the job. Don't worry about any of that. The reality is that failing to complete work on time or correctly is far worse than asking for help when you need it. If you find yourself with more on your plate than you can handle, seek the help of a peer or go to your boss. Ask them for help in identifying the right priorities and resources to get your work done. If something needs to be shifted, you can work with them to identify where a project should go. 

Don't let pride or fear of how you will look stop you from getting the right work done effectively. It's much more impressive to consistently turn in high-quality work on time than to consistently turn in a lot of work late and done to only mediocre quality. When you find yourself overloaded, do not hesitate to ask a peer or even your boss for advice on what to do next. 

Move On

Sometimes you will find yourself in a situation where you will always have more on your plate than you can handle. Often times this is because your boss or organization has an unrealistic expectation of how much work they want a position to do. To save money, they may be attempting to assign the work of 1 or more people to a single individual. If you find yourself in this kind of situation you should first try the strategies above to overcome having too much on your plate. If you find that no matter what you do you will continue to have too much on your plate it may be time to move on.

It's OK to quit. When you find that you have too much, you have two strategies.  You can either look for another position internally or leave your organization altogether. Either way, it's important that once you've made this decision you move quickly. The longer you stay in your role with more than you can get done, the longer you expose yourself to failing, poor reviews, or risk performance management. If you're leaving the organization, don't say anything until you've found your next role, but once you have give two weeks. After all, you want to have a good reputation in case you ever work with this organization or some of your coworkers gain in the future.

I have found myself overwhelmed with work in the past, working long nights, and missing things at home. I had to learn through trial and error, how to manage my work and home life effectively. Have you had to learn through trial and error, did you learn from someone else or are you still struggling with balancing your workload? I want to hear your story! Post below or contact me!