Parkinson’s Law: Reduce responsibilities and open up your life

Why are we writing a report due in 15 days, in the last minutes of the 15th day? But why do we send what should be sent by Friday evening, at the end of the working day on Friday? Cyril Northcote Parkinson explains this with Parkinson’s Law and says, “A work is always stretched out to cover all the time it takes to complete it.”

Parkinson’s law

We humans tend to procrastinate, and whether we like it or not, we make our plans according to the deadline when we finish work. If the time it takes to get the job done increases, we continue to procrastinate instead of working efficiently. The longer we delay, the longer the process takes, and eventually our productivity drops. This is an experience that we all often have due to our psychological predisposition. However, this can be fought. If you want to learn about the causes of this tendency and how to deal with procrastination, then I wholeheartedly recommend my book Decide, Plan, Act. You can continue the article right now to learn how to use Parkinson’s Law to make our daily lives easier.

How should we use Parkinson’s Law?

The more time we have to complete a task, the longer we put it off. This is a look at Parkinson’s law. On the other hand, the less time we have to complete a task, the more productively we perform it. This is why dividing hours into short periods of time is the most practical solution to increase our productivity and make our lives easier, and the 25-minute focus and 5-minute break technique, known as the Pomodoro technique, is very effective for this very reason, because if we limit task time, the efficiency we get from this time is automatically increased.

Should I be more productive?

Of course not. I am one of those who believes that a good life is not only about being productive. However, you don’t have to be more productive to take advantage of Parkinson’s Law. We can also use Parkinson’s Law to make room for the enjoyable activities we want to have in our lives.

For example;

• While cleaning the house
• while ironing,
• while washing dishes,
• While reading a book,
• Getting ready to leave the house
• When watering plants
• Responding to your emails,
• planning,

You can take advantage of Parkinson’s law and perform these actions with a time limit. All you have to do is:

1. Choose a job that you have been putting off for a long time and too lazy to start.
2. Turn on the timer and exit when the alarm goes off.

What’s more, you don’t have to use the 25-minute timer like you do with the tomato technique. If you want, just set an alarm for 10 minutes and read as many books as possible in 10 minutes. Or set an alarm for 15 minutes and put the dishes in the dishwasher. Set a 20-minute alarm at your workplace and answer emails as often as possible. You will see that as time is limited, your work efficiency will increase.

Reduce responsibilities, open life

By limiting the time it takes to do what you have to do and the responsibilities that feel like a burden on your shoulders, you can spend more time doing what you want to do. Our goal is not to read more books or please our boss more. Our task is to increase the time for the things we love by limiting the time of our obligations. So it’s a very smart strategy to limit time in certain situations.

Let’s try to limit your responsibilities to short periods of time today. Let’s see how much your work efficiency will really increase? On a side note, if you like the idea of ​​the good life, then I suggest you take a look at my recently released Personal Development Agenda. In the new year, he will show you new ways to make more room for the things you love in your life.

With love…

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