S5E105: Productivity, Prioritisation & Focus with Nigel Creaser

In this week’s pod, we welcomed Nigel Creaser to discuss Productivity, Prioritisation, and Focus. 
Nigel is a Project Manager from Shropshire in the UK. He has over 25 years in the industry, delivering multi-million-pound projects across a myriad of sectors.  
He is also the host of the Sunday Lunch Project Manager Podcast and author of several books in the Project Management profession, with a couple of them poking fun at the profession. 
The main topics we discussed on the podcast were as follows:  

• Productivity is effectively making time to allow you to do the things you want to do rather than have to do 
• Time management skills are often perceived as a soft skill therefore it doesn’t get the same level of attention as more technical tasks 
• It’s assumed you’ll find a way to do it rather than a subject that is taught at school 
• The difference between productivity and efficiency is down to effectiveness. Businesses can be very efficient at producing poor quality outputs 
• If you don’t manage yourself it is easy to get diverted to something more exciting 
• All meetings need to have a clear agenda and attendee list 
• If you choose not to decide, you have still made a choice 
• Calendar management is ultimately your responsibility. There may be consequences to certain decisions but you should own this as it is your time 
• Try to avoid context switching which leads to distractions. Plan time to do the more mundane tasks and do them effectively 
• There is an art to knowing what is important. Be prepared to offer feedback and training when you see other people who are struggling to prioritise 
• Be conscious that other people will prioritise for you if you do not take charge of your prioritise. This may not be the right thing for you  
• It is useful to measure the amount of time you are interrupted in your day job and assess techniques to alleviate 
• Use technology to stop non-productive distractions e.g. mute button on Whatsapp or rules in Outlook 

Here are links to some of the concepts we discussed:  
Nigel Creaser – Project Manager Productivity Hacks: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Project-Manager-Productivity-Hacks-2021-ebook/dp/B094DJ9M38
Manager Tools Podcast: https://www.manager-tools.com/all-podcasts
How to Create Rules to move email messages to different folders in Outlook Office 365: How to Create Rules to move email messages to different folders in Outlook Office 365  Workplace Jazz: https://workplace-jazz.com/
Eddie Obeng – Qube: https://qube.cc/what-is-qube/  Tune in next week when we’re joined by Richard Newey to discuss Risk Management in endurance sports. 
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