Life Admin Life Hacks

In this episode we interviewed Lee Doherty about how small business owners can drop their mental load and address their personal life admin, while streamlining their business admin.Lee Doherty is the founder of Admin & Co, a market leader in the outsourcing of everything administration. As a senior administration expert with over 30 years of experience, Lee runs a team of  Online Business Managers and Virtual Assistants.She supports small business owners to become future-focused, less overwhelmed, less stressed, and to get back in the control seat of their business. She reviews, then does, then manages the tasks that small business owners shouldn’t be doing, don’t know how to do, or have time to do, so that they are freed to focus on the income and revenue tasks to grow their business.Our recent Australian survey revealed that freelancers, entrepreneurs, and small business owners were increasingly overwhelmed by life admin because it was an additional burden to the business admin that they also had to manage.So we turned to Administration professional Lee Doherty to get all her top tips.In this fun-filled chat: Lee reveals that Life Admin or as she calls it “Fadmin” is the same as business admin – it’s important to have the right structures in place to deal with it. Lee discusses the importance of getting key structures in place including your schedule (particularly for families) and a budget. We discuss the importance of  scheduling in time for both admin and self-care – setting boundaries and getting clear on what is important to you. We discuss the challenges of sharing life admin with your partner and Lee acknowledges that in her household she handles most of the life admin. We discuss the value of taking time away with your partner to discuss important life decisions and agree your goals – and how this sets you up to decide the life admin that is important for your household in your stage of life. We discuss how sometimes people realise they are operating their life admin as though they were a single childfree adult but in fact their life has materially changed and the life admin systems have not caught up with the complexity of their life. Lee also discusses the importance of enabling your children and teaching them life admin skills. We talk about the shame and inadequacy many people feel when they are seeking support or outsourcing We talk about the opportunity cost (and value of time) of not outsourcing We talk about what you need to prepare before you outsource: a task audit, documenting your processes (consider using loom), accepting it will take time to learn, and setting the acceptable standard.LIFE ADMIN RESOURCESAdmin&Co – Lee’s business websiteLoom – to record quick videos of processes on your computerKajabi – online course platformSHAREPlease head to the Life Admin Life Hacks Facebook,  Insta or Linked In pages to connect with listeners and share your thoughts, questions or suggestions.

Life admin can be stressful at the best of times but for people who are terminally ill or caring for a loved one, the admin related to end of life can feel overwhelming and relentless.In this episode we chat with Anna Bolitho about some of the practical matters people need to consider including: getting your estate planning in order Advance Care Planning using digital platforms to get your paperwork in order such as iDecide and My Life Wishes making time to allocate or pass on sentimental items the importance of not only documenting your wishes but also having a conversation with your loved ones about both your wishes and practical matters planning what might happen to pets.We also chat about the practical side of communications and helping out during someones’ end of life including: thinking about the different circles of communication the tools you can use for communication including WhatsApp groups and facebook groups digital tools to help with setting up rosters for meal delivery and pet walking such as Gather My Crew providing projects to people at their end of life to keep them busy and connected with their community.We also talk through the practical side of funerals including: things to consider when choosing a funeral provider and package understanding the different elements of funeral packages before you visit the funeral director (eg will you provide your own flowers?) being creative in planning your funeral and including personal rituals (eg bring a coffee cart, fly a kite, serve champagne, give away your book collection) considering a life celebration, to celebrate someone’s life before they pass.LIFE ADMIN RESOURCESAnnie Bolitho’s websiteAdvance Care PlanningEpisode 44: Planning your digital estateEpisode 11 – Drafting wills and powers of attorneyWebsites/Apps to assist with Documents and Passwords – iDecide and My Life WishesApps and Websites to help with rosters and communication – Gather My CrewCare of pets – RSPCA Home Ever After program & Community Aged Care programAustralian Centre for grief and bereavementServices AustraliaOffice of the Public Advocate – for guidance on medical treatment decision-making and advanced care directiveReference List – Your Final Checklist from Dying to KnowReference List – It’s Ok to die when you are preparedSHAREPlease head to the Life Admin Life Hacks Facebook or Insta pages to connect with listeners and share your thoughts, questions or suggestions.

There are more than three million homes across Australia that have rooftop solar, but with installation costs in the thousands, it can be difficult to figure out if it makes sense for you. This ep gives you all the shortcuts to figure it out, including how to optimise your investment if you already have a system. The first thing Mia and Dinah discuss is that if you are thinking about getting solar, get clear on why you are considering it. Is it an economic decision only or for the environmental impact or for some other reasons? It's also important to do some basic research about solar so you know what you should consider. Dinah recommends using the Clean Energy Councils’s solar buying guide to get some basic understanding (Link in Resources below).  Understanding if your house has the appropriate conditions - north facing and slope of the roof - is important to know. Understand your energy consumption - as this is the main source of savings as feed-in tariffs are much lower than they used to be.  Know yourself - will you be willing to change your energy patterns to make the most of your system?  Think about how long you are planning to stay in your home to take into account as part of your investment decision. How are you going to fund the purchase and what other costs will there be? Once you have decided to explore it, get a couple of quotes to compare. You can use a service like Solar Quotes to get a number of quotes from providers that are accredited by the Clean Energy Council. Providers will also help you with rebates available to support the system purchase. The things the quotes should include are: a site-specific system design (which takes into account shade at different times of the year) a performance estimate  an itemised list of components/products  a clear breakdown of costs, including the total value of any discounts or rebates  warranty (including STC snd state-based rebates) full terms and conditions of sale. The providers will provide a return on investment calculation but make sure you think about: the time horizon - do you plan to live in the house for that time period? will your energy consumption patterns change? what other costs will there be (eg buying more roof tiles)? what else you would do with the money? You may also wish to consider a battery, however, for most people, this doesn’t make economic sense and fewer than 10% of new installations include a battery. The costs start around $4k plus installation costs. You need to consider the same factors and you need to make sure the battery can be fully charged from your solar panels even in winter. In addition, for most people, the time to make a return is longer than the warranty period, so this is probably not something to do for purely economic reasons. For both solar PV and batteries, those that make the best returns are those that are willing to change their behaviour by downloading the apps and optimising your usage.  If you already have solar, it's important to understand the feed-in tariff and the implications when choosing an electricity provider and a plan. The feed-in tariffs have been falling across the board in the past few years. The higher the solar feed-in tariff (i.e. what you get for ‘exporting’ power), the lower the discount on electricity the household draws from the grid (i.e. what you pay for ‘importing’ power). In order to secure the highest solar feed-in tariff, you will need to choose the plan that offers the lowest discount on electricity imported from

If you’re looking for the motivation, apps, and process to get your digital photos sorted once and for all, this ep where we interview Carly Michael is for you. About Carly Michael Carly Michael has spent her whole life surrounded by photos having grown up in her family's camera store - Michaels Camera Video and Digital in Melbourne's CBD. When covid hit, the family decided to close the store so she took the opportunity to become a professional photo organiser - something she had developed a passion for during her time managing the family's photo lab. She now spends her days organising both physical and digital photos, helping people get back in control of their photo mess! Digital photos made the top five life admin pain points in our 2021 community survey and while Dinah has had her photos sorted for some time until we recorded this ep Mia felt like there would never be enough time or motivation in the world for her to get her photos into a format that other people can actually access and enjoy. After the interview Mia downloaded the apps suggested, they did their magic, and her photos are finally organised. Carly starts the interview by talking about her background and how she became interested in the digital dark age. The digital dark age is a concern that, as technology advances, we will lose access to photos and other data as our current media (including hard drives and USBs) are not designed to last. Mia and Carly discuss how setting yourself a deadline and having a photo project as a goal will give you the motivation Carly discussed the key characteristics of an organised photosystem being: organised - chronologically is the easiest centralised  accessible - ideally on your phone backed up  (consider the 3-2-1 system -  3 copies of your photos,  stored in 2 locations with 1 of those being off site) Carly discusses the risks around cloud storage (eg Google's recent change to its terms and conditions that states If you're inactive for two years Google may delete the content. She also discusses the importance of distinguishing between a back-up and a sync. The key steps to get your photos organised are: Gather - Make a list of all your photos (including on devices and in the cloud)and gather them into one physical location Centralise - Put all your digital photos into a central hub - ideally using a hard drive. If you have issues extracting photos consider using Dropbox. It is also useful as a backup Back Up - Carly recommends using BackBlaze Deduplicate - Get rid of duplicates - Carly recommends using Photosweeper for a Mac and Duplicate Cleaner Pro for a PC Organise your photos (folderise them) - Carly recommends using Big Mean Folder Machine for Macs and Photomove for PC. If you run into issues with dates you can use Adobe Bridge to assist with finding the original dates Maintain - consider using dropbox to make a backup of your photos from your phone (not a sync) until you reorganise them. Then create a habit (perhaps by pairing with another regular task) to make sure you oragnise your folders on a regular basis. Also consider changing your behaviour to curate your collection as you go. Adopt the same mindset as you had when you took photos with film. Carly also discusses scanning hardcopy photos - noting that if you are going to scan photos you want to scan once and to the quality you want. You can scan photos using your phone with apps such as photomyne, however, the quality will be limited. She notes that if you are going to scan you want to organise as you scan. <

It is important to have a mental model of what life admin is in order to be able to approach it in a more systematic way Mia and Dinah start the episode by discussing how: for most people, life admin is a blurry amorphous bundle of tasks - and with no mental model of the different categories and types of tasks is can be difficult to approach or share the tasks in a systematic way their definition of Life admin - that it is not housework or parenting but it often overlaps; housework is defined as cooking, cleaning and laundry, parenting is about child-rearing and supports the physical, emotional, social, and intellectual development of your child; life admin is the third piece of the domestic labour puzzle - it includes the scheduling, booking, shopping, paperwork, and planning that often facilitates housework and parenting tasks, but also has its own areas of responsibility. life admin is often conflated with housework and parenting and that can be  problematic because it can become hidden which is a big issue as life admin generates a significant portion of the mental load  life admin often gets more complex and time-consuming at the precise time you have less time to manage it - particularly having children generates a significant amount of life admin their recent survey of more than 300 Australians revealed that the average Australian does almost 500 life admin tasks each year parents grapple with 33% more life admin tasks than households without dependents  37% of people do life admin tasks for a parent or adult relative most people think the reason their life admin is out of control is their lack of motivation and/or time  - but usually, the problem is not having the know-how or system and/or the lack of a scheduled time to do life admin They discuss the cost of not having your life admin in control including: spending more time than is necessary on it wasting money  - it has been estimated that Australians are paying more than $11 billion in ‘loyalty tax’ by not shopping around.  cognitive load - stress, anxiety, overwhelm - worrying, scared of forgetting, monkey mind, brain chatter.  relationship friction - their survey showed that life admin causes friction in 85% of two-parent households  Mia and Dinah describe their framework for life admin: that there are two types of life admin - everyday life admin that occurs cyclically or seasonally and event-based life admin (eg getting married)  that there are four categories of life admin and that these can help you prioritise and determine how you will share them in your household household operations eg meal planning, decluttering, paying bills personal affairs such as tax, super, other investments wills and health checks comparison shopping for plans and policies leisure and social planning eg holidays, Xmas, social life, kids extracurricular think about life admin tasks by how much time is required to get them done -  Hour of Power - recurring slot in the schedule for chunky life admin tasks  2 Minutes Too Easy - tasks to complete as they arise 10 Minute Time Killer - tasks to complete in idle time - include them in a to-do list SHARE Please head to the Life Admin Life Hacks Facebook,  Insta or Linked In pages to connect with listeners and share your thoughts, questions or

In this episode, Lynette Coulston shares practical tips and recommendations for essential digital life admin tools. Topics covered include the importance of having a digital filing system, using inbuilt backup functionality, utilizing apps like Reminders, making the most of Voice Assistants, selecting a calendar app, understanding file management and filing systems on digital devices, the convenience of Siri for daily tasks, importance of strong passwords and password security, developing useful mindsets for digital literacy, and IT support resources and digital literacy.

This episode explores why transitions can be stressful, the key tools and processes you need to have humming to support daycare and school admin, and Mia and Dinah's top hacks for saving time, money and sharing the load. Mia and Dinah reveal that in a survey they conducted earlier this year, one in three respondents reported that their child starting at daycare or school generated a significant amount of life admin. Mia discusses how transitions, particularly when starting at a new daycare or school, can be hard for both parents and kids because we are letting go of the familiar and need to adjust to new ways, people and routines. We are hard-wired to resist change and it can trigger a stress response. There can be a sense of loss of what was, wishing things could stay the same and perhaps some fear and anxiety about what’s to come. Transitions are also an opportunity to lean on our strengths, reach a new equilibrium and bring a sense of renewal and growth. We can let go of old beliefs and assumptions with excitement and enthusiasm. Given the potential emotion of the transition to a new daycare or school, ensuring your life admin is sorted is a tangible way you can make the change easier and reduce the stress for everyone. Dinah discusses the key foundational life admin systems to have in place to make the transition easier: Have one central dedicated shared document or checklist for you and your partner to store all the information, to-dos or discussion points with your partner and child. It's important to get all that detail out of your head to reduce your mental load. Set up a folder in your cloud storage to file all documents related to the daycare or school when you enrol, so that you can file as you go, making filing a Two Minutes Too Easy task Use a shared life admin email address so all school communication can go there, and agree on a system for sharing the management of this inbox with your partner. Ensure your password manager is installed across all your devices, so you can easily store the multiple passwords needed for school portals, uniform and book ordering etc. Add frequently used form filling data to your password manager once so you can speed up the process of the endless form-filling. Set up informal communication networks like a WhatsApp group with other parents.  Plan any traditions that are important to you (eg photo on the first day) so that you don't forget and it is calm and intentional, rather than rushed and last minute. Consider the costs of a new school, such as fees, uniforms, books, technology, excursions and camps, so you can budget in advance and plan ahead if you prefer to buy second hand. Mia talks about morning and evening routines, considering which things will change and what will stay the same. Some continuity is reassuring. You can preview what the new routine will look like by replicating the new schedule ahead of time as practice. In terms of daycare transitions, particular life admin tasks to consider are: putting your child on the waiting list which may be more than one year in advance filling in enrolment forms including information about your child’s wellbeing such as sleeping patterns, emotional and social preferences, family circumstances and comfort items proof of immunisation status - download a PDF from MyGov and consult GP if need catch -up vaccinations procuring a second copy of your child’s comfort item in case it gets misplaced at daycare applying for child care benefits via Centrelink getting a Working with Children Check if you want to volunteer or spend time in the daycare dress cod

In this episode, we interview Tina Paterson, remote working and productivity expert, about burnout and how to avoid the ultimate level of exhaustion.  About Tina Paterson Tina Paterson has worked across nine industries and 12 countries over the past 20+ years. She has led large departments, governed billions of dollars of assets and her teams have delivered Transformation Programs and Projects worth hundreds of millions of dollars.  She has achieved all this while raising two kids with her husband James, running marathons, raising a million dollars for charity and taking 3-month sabbaticals every 5 years with her family. Following her own story of burnout (where she ended up in the local Emergency Department due to being at work with pneumonia), she now partners with large organisations to help their leaders embed the strategies she has learned, lives and breathes. What we talk about During the interview, we chat about: what burnout is - a state of emotional, physical, and mental exhaustion caused by excessive and prolonged stress Tina’s story of burnout and how it slowly crept up on her that people often abandon their self-care right at the time they need it the most how Tina’s burnout was the impetus to do things differently that the mental load of parenting and household management contributed to her burnout  that reducing the number of decisions she has to make is an important contributor to relieving the mental load how she relies on friends to make recommendations about what to buy to save herself the time to do the research that 'being busy' is not a badge of honour that doing a time audit of your 168 hours per week can help you consciously see what you are spending time on and how you can swap your hours to activities more in line with what is important to you that it’s common to get out of touch with what’s actually fun for you setting up your environment to make the things you enjoy easier to do  how Tina shares the load with her husband and kids - by having a regular family meeting and agreeing who owns what and ensuring end to end accountability  how watching Teenage Boss inspired Tina and her husband to put their kids in control of the family budget for a month to provide a real lesson in the value of money how she has a chart to help navigate what fruit and vegetables her kids enjoy to simplify family dinnertime. RESOURCES Tina Paterson’s website Tina Paterson on LinkedIn Time to Breathe : Navigating Life and Work for Energy, Success and Happiness, Dr Bill Micthell 168 Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think, Laura Vanderkam Teenage Boss Money Brilliant App SHARE Please head to the Life Admin Life Hacks Facebook,  Insta or Linked In pages to connect with listeners and share your thoughts, questions or suggestions.

This episode will help you think about how much time you need for life admin, in a whole new way.In a survey that Mia and Dinah conducted earlier this year, participants stated that when it came to life admin, finding ways to spend less time on it was of prime importance. Achieving peace of mind came a close second. Time was also identified as the biggest obstacle to getting life admin under control: 40% felt they never had enough time to do it, closely followed by a lack of motivation.The survey also identified that most people (60%) do their life admin at random and only 4% have a set time in their schedule to do these tasks.Mia concluded that while people say they don’t have time to do it, all the while they treat it like something that can be achieved in ‘magic time’. There is a disconnect in how long people think they need to do it and the fact that they don’t schedule a time to address it. It's time to accept that you will need to schedule some regular time in your calendar to get to some of the important, chunky life admin tasks. And while you may sigh with resignation about putting such a boring recurring meeting into your calendar, you will actually achieve peace of mind knowing there is time set aside to deal with your to-do list.When you have a dedicated time slot of life admin, you can stop worrying about how you’re going to get everything done.Mia explained the ‘rock, pebbles and sand analogy’ that is often used in time management, where each element represents important, essential and trivial activities in your life:: the rocks are the substantial life admin tasks that need dedicated time to get sorted – they call these Hour of Power tasks the pebbles are tasks that can be done in idle time – they call these 10 Minute Time Killers and the sand is small tasks that you should complete as they arise – they call these 2 Minutes Too Easy tasks.They discuss each of these categories of tasks: Two Minutes Too Easy – these are the fast, easy tasks that can be done as soon as they appear on your radar.  Ten Minute Time Killers – this category of tasks can be done in idle time. These tasks don’t need to be scheduled but you need to be confident that you know when you will get them done and a system to know what those tasks are. Dinah and Mia both have a dedicated list in their to-do list app to record these tasks.  They also note that people often turn to social media when they have those 10-minute gaps – however, completing something off your to-do list is much more likely to improve your happiness. Hour of Power – this is time committed to substantial to-do list items where you need to concentrate. It may be to change your electricity provider or plan a birthday party or review your superannuation. This deserves a recurring time slot in your calendar.  People give this time a fun name to get them in the right mindset. Dinah calls her time Life Admin Blitz and Mia calls her time –  Set Me Up Sunday.LIFE ADMIN RESOURCESEpisode 5 – Scheduling the Inevitable, the Inspirational and an Hour of PowerEpisode 4 – Mastering To-Do ListsSummary of Dave Allen Weekly ReviewSHAREPlease head to the Life Admin Life Hacks Facebook or Insta pages to connect.

We chatted with parenting expert Michael Grose about how we can get our kids to contribute more, relieve the life admin burden and grow up to be efficient at their own life admin. Michael Grose, the founder of Parenting Ideas, is one of Australia’s leading parenting educators, informing and inspiring audiences in Australia and around the world for more than 20 years. Micheal is a former primary school teacher with 15 years of experience. He holds a Master of Educational Studies specialising in parenting education and is the father of three children He is a bestselling author of 12 books for parents including Spoonfed Generation, Thriving!, Anxious Kids and his latest re-release Why First Borns Rule the World and Later Borns Want to Change It. Michael has had parenting segments on The Project, The Today Show, Weekend Sunrise, ABC radio and more. He has contributed to Huff Post, Kidspot and Mamamia, and is a former columnist with both News Ltd and Fairfax newspapers. What we talk about Our recent survey of over 300 Australians revealed that parents do 33% more life admin than those without kids, and they are twice as likely to struggle for time. During the interview, we chat with Michael about: how parents often underestimate what their kids can do by up to three years that we should never regularly do for our kids what they are capable of doing for themselves that kids want more autonomy and independence that as family sizes have shrunk we know more about each of our children, and so we give them less space to become more independent being aware of developing independence and providing small opportunities for kids to feel and be useful starting where your kids are at and pushing them along over time developing a 'junior version of the game' (eg like Auskick for AFL) for life admin and housework and setting the standards based on their age and stage that we need to not rescue kids so they can learn from their experience accepting what kids do as a reasonable standard if they have tried their best that pocket money is a great way to increase autonomy and independence and you can start from age 5 deciding what your benchmark will be in your family for handing over responsibility for a task (eg when they make their own lunch) thinking about sharing the 'jobs and the joy' and wealth within your family using a roster to allocate chores to create the sense that the roster is creating the “ask” rather than the parents when kids start asking for more independence we can look at ways that we can make it happen by giving them the skills they need to do at least part of the task pets are great to teach kids what it is like to have someone else reliant on them thinking less about the amount of time that kids are spending on screens and more on what they are consuming and what the opportunity cost is (what else could they be doing) teenagers need parents who will challenge them that gender and birth order can create different expectations girls are often more organised at a younger age and boys may need more coaching, due to the way the brain develops differently between the genders firstborns tend to be more detail-orientated and introverted there are three aspects to consider when parenting - a child's genetics & temperament, birth order and the family frame that sets the landscape for everything else. Resources Parenting Ideas website