Priorities

Just how do you work out what to do next ?

Thinking about work here and how we get through all that work that we need to get done. I work in a post with a work profile that can be best described as having a baseline of work that we need to get done so the project moves forward. On top of that, we get questions coming in that are usually on a very tight timescale and require some techie/engineering braincells to figure out :

Where to look to get the information
What information is needed
When info is "Too Much" and clouds the issue
Figuring out what the question actually means ...

People can ask one question but they're really meaning to ask a different one. However, they can't ask the question they're really intending to because they will either dictate the answer or it will be an answer that no one wants to hear. Or they're not really sure what the question should have been in the first place.

Anyway, back to the original thought. Priorities. With a heavy workload, what do we decide to crack on with first ?

I dunno how I look from the outside but my inner scheduling tends to reflect my thought processes. That would be thought processes that rebound between utter chaos and absolute order. I'm capable of thinking in the absolutes of computer logic but can also come out with the off the wall longitudinal thinking (longitudinal thinking = even more obscure than lateral) directions that no one in their right mind would go to, usually because the radical thought has been trained out of them.

(I just wish the chaos could be a bit more controlled and spontaneous, I'll often think the inspiration thought quite some time after the moment has gone)

What kind of jobs do we tend to do ?
Baseline repetitive tasks we can do without thinking
Deep Thought investigations
Quick 5 minute jobs
Jobs that if we sit and stare at them, they will never get done
Things that need an Idea Foundation before you can start

There's more to it than that but you get the basic idea. Those 5 minute jobs are usually things where people say "no need to do it now". I like to get these out of the way asap. If I don't, in 5 minutes I'll have gonSQUIRREL (name that film) when the pretty blonde lady* walks past and completely forgotten what they'd asked me to do. And in an hour or so, the fella who's asked for the 5 minute job gets as embarassed about reminding you as you do about forgetting.
*(we are blessed with pretty dark haired ladies who work for us too)

Yep - get 'em out the way quick.

The difference between the Deep Thought stuff and the baseline stuff is curious. I enjoy the Deep Thought stuff as it lets me harness my brain some more. It's new and interesting and tends to be open ended. Your result depends on how smart you are at digging out information. And I get a kick out of finding stuff out. But the baseline stuff still needs to get done or we miss dates and people give our bosses a hard time (which then gets passed on). It's much easier to say "Yep, all done on my end" than "Ummm, will get to that soon".

That last one is a thorny one. It's those tasks where a lot of inspiration is needed to get something made. Inspiration isn't something you can force, it has to come naturally. I used to produce certificates for people who leave the project and I'm doing one again as a bit of an emergency job. They're custom made for the leavers and pick up highlights and lowlights of their stay with us. If you sit and stare at them, the inspiration to fill the template doesn't happen. But if it's sitting minimised behind the word document you're reviewing, those random thoughts have a habit of tapping you on the shoulder.

That job's almost done now after just a day of incidental thought on it. And it's got some things in there that are sure to provoke the guffaws. Muahahaha.

Everyone will have their own way of prioritising their workload. I think mine works reasonably well as a fit for how my brain works. I fall back on the baseline load when there's no fastball investigations to do, or when baseline starts to pile up. I get the quick & easy tasks out of the way before my Goldfish memory makes me forget. The inspiration tasks benefit from the chaotic part of my brain ticking away in the background.

I also like to get the preparations out of the way the evening before. I'm not a quick starter in the morning, so doing that prep the day before allows it all to get done efficiently. Doing it in the morning only leads to PANIC and huge potential for distractions (like Pretty Lady with task only You can help with - yes, I'm a sucker for that) meaning your prep is rushed and flawed.

I've not mentioned training yet. We have to do a certain amount of training each year. It's a necessary evil that helps us be more efficient. And with a flexible working hours system, less hours needed for a task means more chance to disappear on the Friday afternoon. Why spend hours doing something the hard way if a training thing would have shown you the quick and easy way ?

Being more efficient doesn't make training interesting though ...

Right - time to wrap up and see what the Next Game will be after finishing the Mass Effect series again. Tomorrow (after Teacake Raid!) will be more baseline task, this time with a difference as I'm checking the evidence behind what we're accepting, which means learning how to interpret that evidence. I can do that because today I got the fast task done which was promised complete by the end of the week.

LOOK ! SQUIRREL !