New Year Res: Fight Procrastination!

Welcome to a new year! January is always a great time to get our outreach marketing campaigns--for ourselves or our clients--as on schedule as possible. And that's why you (and/or your team) needs to fight procrastination. Trust me, I know what procrastination is. And no I didn’t have to become a writer on aging America's health topics to learn the word.

But it’s not enough to know the word and its basic definition of putting off a task or event. It’s more critical to recognize two things. The first is that you must admit that the “productive” work you, your team or your clients are doing (versus what SHOULD be done) is not really going to bring biz goals to fruition.

No. To truly glean whatever your definition of “success” is for your business (or your clients'), you really need the second step: to actually move onward with your specific project.

To delay or to not delay

Let’s be clear. Avoiding procrastination is not the same as taking a break. In any type of communications, it can clear our minds when we stop staring at our computers blankly. It can be even worse when we retype...and retype...and retype; that can make us feel truly dimwitted.

There’s a difference between taking a break to get some exercise, eat a regular meal (or healthy snack), or have a (quick) chat with a friend or loved one.

But even presumably health-enhancing behaviors can actually bring negative mental and physical consequences. These range from severe anxiety and depression to heart disease and high blood pressure.

Your brain can enhance sneakiness

Similarly, "important" business work can actually be a delaying tool. In the 90s, before the ‘Net was a great research tool, it was far more efficient to recognize the need to set aside a full afternoon to go down to the library and map out potential clients, their phone