Deadlines, Do They Really Work?

Work Your Deadlines Properly!

One of my most memorable business mentors, Jack, was a stickler for being on time.  He would make an appointment and set the time with a strange setting.  He would use an uncommon number.  He might say, "Let's get together tomorrow at 4:67 P.M. in the lobby at the Marriott."  He would not select the time to be an even number like 4 or 5.  He would not say, "Let's get together at 4 o'clock tomorrow."  He would select something like 4:67.  When a meeting appointment is set at a strange time like that, it gets your attention.  Why meet at exactly 4:67?  It sounds weird.  It captures your attention when it is set at 3:46.

Jack's time selection could be considered a clue for how specific he might be.  You see, if the time is selected so specifically it now seems to be a slightly more exact thing.  That was a clue.  Any sharp thinker could recognize and interpret that this kind of specific time setting could be a clue that you better be on time.  What's more, anyone that did not show up on time, at exactly the moment he arranged for them to meet, he walked away.  Jack waited for nobody.  If you were going to be fashionably late, you better make a phone call to explain or your scheduled meeting with Jack did not happen.  It was very simple.  There were no exceptions and no confusion about how he arranged to meet.  If it was set at 7:19 P.M., that was when he expected you to be sitting in front of him ready to go.  If you were walking across the lobby at 7:19 P.M., you were late and he would excuse himself from that particular meeting.  Jack loved respect and absolutes.  Anything less, was considered, less.  Jack strongly believed in maximums, not minimums and average work. Jack did not intend to work with minimums.

In fact, when he set a meeting time he would commonly ask the other associate to check his watch.  He would synchronize it with those who scheduled a meeting with him.  He wanted to avoid a silly excuse for being late.  This was another clue.  If someone was not sharp enough to recognize these clues, they did not deserve to sit down with him and get some valuable business lessons.  Jack loved discipline.  Jack loved deadlines.  Jack was successful in the business landscape.  He earned an annual income that landed him in the top 1% income bracket for 25 years straight.  His time was extremely valuable and he was not accustomed to wasting it.  Jack operated on strict time lines.  Deadlines became a large part of his working environment.  Deadlines determined if your effort to meet with Jack lived or died.  Jack placed deadlines on his business trail.  Jack made no secrets about his deadlines.  They were lines clearly drawn in the sand.  Jack's business success came from meeting the most deadlines with the proper results.  In his business world, deadlines worked.

If you are the type of business leader who sets goals in place but never attaches a time line to complete them, you might be a business leader who does not accomplish very much.  Deadlines help our goals get to their end.  What's more, all of us needs some alligators to help push us harder.  Deadlines help provide some of the alligators we need.  I still cuss in my language a little bit.  I use some cuss words once in awhile.  My wife dislikes them.  She has asked me to clean it up a little bit.  Unfortunately, that is exactly what I have done...I have cleaned it up a little bit.  There is a difference between cleaning it up a little bit and stopping it altogether.  The reason why I still cuss once in awhile is because I have not made the decision to stop it altogether.  When I make the decision to stop it altogether, I will stop it.  It is a decision.  It is not a wish, a whim or some hopeful maybe.  It becomes a decision.  I stopped my lazy eating habits when my doctor told me I had stage two diabetes.  That day in his office I made the decision to get rid of that challenge.  I asked him how that could be done and he described the type of diet and exercise I needed to adhere to.  That was it.  I made the decision, right there, to do what it took.  I changed what I eat and how I exercise.  It was not easy.  I made the decision.

Since that decision I have lost 59 pounds, held my weight and I successfully work on keeping myself physically fit.  I also understand how alligators work.  I do not try to kid myself into believing I can make these kinds of serious changes all by my little lonesome.  I am a human.  I need some alligators to help motivate me.  Serious changes in a diet need the help from some alligators to ensure that those changes happen and stay happening.  I made a daily recording chart that I turn in to my doctor once a month.  It records my daily numbers.  That daily chart shows my calories, my foods, my blood pressure, my sugar count, the amount of water I drink and the exercise I do.  I record it for his office to review.  I make sure someone holds me accountable.  I use deadlines on my efforts.  I use final measurements with specific targets to record and keep me in line.  I do not try to make it happen and hope for the best.  I make certain I know where my numbers are, what affects them and I make sure my doctor sees how well I manage them.  Guess what?  My blood sugars, weight and blood pressure have all arrived to stellar levels.  The doctor is surprised.  I have turned my diabetes around and my numbers are excellent.

Make the decision to use deadlines.  Make the decision to become effective.  I remember how much he and his office staff laughed when I turned the first report in.  I remember each of them asking me what it is.  I remember how each of them asked me to describe what I was charting.  I know they think it is over the top.  I also know they do not understand how to place real alligators and deadlines onto their own path of serious decisions to make serious changes.  They are just as human as I am.  However they think, now they can read the results I post in the spreadsheets I deliver.  They anticipate the monthly report, read it, file it in my charts and I know they share with other patients how I have succeeded using this method for managing my diabetes control.  I made the decision to fix it.  I added deadlines to make it happen.  Those deadlines included placing an alligator next to the gate that measures how I am doing.  I have them now watching me perform my control.  All of them will know when I slide off the work to succeed.  They have become my quiet alligators and they did not catch it.  They help me force myself to do it correctly.  I painted myself into that corner.  I do my deadlines every single day now.  Most leaders never understand the value of this simple step.  Decide, change, create specific deadlines and find your alligators.  That is where success lives.  Most miss it.  I don't care about who gets it or who does not get it.  I care about having good diabetes numbers.

Furthermore, I have not made that same decision with cussing!  There is a difference, here.  That is why I still remain to cuss once in awhile.  I have not made the decision to stop it altogether.  I have not included any serious deadlines.  Deadlines work.  Alligators on those deadline paths help to keep the efforts in line.

Even so, the question still remains...do deadlines really work?  Let's examine how they can hurt us, too.

Learn How To Become Flexible, Properly!

Most business leaders have a tendency to take on too many tasks and projects, all at once.  As a result, they begin a lot of projects and tasks that eventually do not get completed.  Did you know that this kind of work is not productive work?  Did you know this kind of work produces marginal results?  Most business leaders are great starters but terrible finishers.  Some business leaders get something started and as they work longer on doing it they lose interest in it.  Then they get distracted away from it for some reason which causes them to never get back to finishing what they started.  This is exactly one of the key ways a business model struggles with success.  It is how a business leader works so hard on operating their business model and never really produces healthy and consistent financial success.  This is how a lot of business leaders waste a lot of valuable time.  This is how some business leaders work so hard on doing their work yet never quite reaching the rewards they want to produce.  It is a common pattern.

Deadlines can help us stay on task when this pattern keeps happening.  In order to produce deadlines we recognize we have goals.  The tasks we perform are directly related to the goals we want to achieve.  Placing deadlines on those goals helps us to stick to the work that we need to do to reach those goals.  Deadlines help us to stick to the grind stone and get done what we need to do that is so hard to stay focused on doing.  If we tend to struggle with trying to finish what we started, setting deadlines will help us stay on task more often.  That is one of the main reasons why every goal needs a time line.  Deadlines help to keep us on task.  If we set deadlines, reasonable ones, we set in place a proper check and balance to help us stay on course for the things we need to do to.  Deadlines help keep us doing what needs to be truthfully done.

However, deadlines can be damaging, as well.  In addition, finding the damage they can produce does not exclude anyone from doing them.  We need to include deadlines in all of our planning.  Deadlines are a must.      However, deadlines can lead us to failure if we do not manage them correctly.  Setting deadlines is an art.  It is not just something we do fundamentally.  We must artistically set deadlines like we are establishing a dynamic pattern of working procedures.  We must initiate deadlines like we are building a pattern of success.  Although it is crucial to set deadlines that matter...that have teeth, absolutes and substance...it is also as important to know when to move those deadlines appropriately.  Treat deadlines firmly but with a dynamic sense of proper mind.  Sometimes the timeline we set to a deadline is not an appropriate or realistic timeline.  Sometimes we discover this truth when we get near the end of the deadline goal.  If we do not make the proper adjustments to the timeline we originally set, we cannot demonstrate healthy flexibility.  If we stick too firmly to the deadlines we set and we notice it cannot be properly met, we may compromise the quality of work we do to hurry up and get it done on time.  I have witnessed many good business leaders do exactly that!  They compromise good work to meet a "set-in-stone" deadline.

Deadlines work when the proper flexibility is blended in well.  Deadlines fail if the quality of the work is compromised to meet the date set in stone.  Great business leaders understand this process well.  Great business leaders set deadlines.  They press on to complete what needs to be done to finish the work on time.  However, if the deadlines are recognized to be off the reality chart as they draw near, great managers make the proper adjustments.  Great managers do not 'force' the work to meet the deadlines set in stone.  Great business managers find healthy methods for adjusting their deadlines that are set incorrectly.  They recognize how much their deadline is set inappropriately.  They are flexible enough to make the proper time adjustments.  Great business leaders do not allow the quality of work to become compromised to meet a deadline.  They want the deadlines to work.  However, they prefer quality work over completed work.  There is a difference.  Successful business models know and protect that difference.

Deadlines, do they really work?  They do if the quality of work does not become compromised in the process.  Learn how to protect the quality of the work your business performs.  Make sure you do not set deadlines too tightly.  Work to complete your tasks and projects, but remain flexible when the need surfaces.  Stuff happens and time can easily get away from us.  Stay on task but move the deadlines if the proper circumstances suggest they need moved.  Above all, remain adamant about performing quality work.  Do not become impatient.  It is one of the killers to success.

Until next time...