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The ability to manage a heavy workload is a key skill. Constant change and demanding operational environments mean that there will inevitably be times when you have to find the capacity to do more. These occasions should only have a minimal, short-term effect on your work-life balance, and can bring enormous personal reward.
It’s important, when you need to find some extra time to get something done, that you have the energy and motivation to do so. Here we discuss the causes and drivers of workloads, how to manage high workload situations, and the benefits that come from delivering results against the odds.
Workload Drivers
Additional tasks or responsibilities that creep onto your ‘to do’ list, on top of your normal day-to-day activities, can significantly add to your existing pressure levels. What kinds of things cause this pressure?
Change
Change is a constant in the workplace. The need for organizations to continually adapt and/or transform themselves is driven by a number of things, including the threat from competitors, the economy and society’s needs in general. The effect is that you and your colleagues will often be expected to do things differently, more quickly and in a potentially unfamiliar way. You may have to quickly learn a new system or process, or work with different people on unfamiliar tasks, for example.
New Management/Team Members
New people bring new ideas. It’s often the case with new management that working practices, roles and responsibilities are overhauled. Getting used to new working methods and styles can be challenging. Inducting new members into your team can be time consuming and mentally demanding.
Moving Deadlines
Most tasks have deadlines and sometimes they move with or without your input or consent. However, deadlines are important – they are designed to ensure that things get done.
Clients/Customers
The customer is king. You will always have a customer, whether they are colleagues in another department or external (paying) clients. As they are the reason why your role exists, the need to satisfy their (often unpredictable) demands is a priority.
Absence
You may sometimes be required to take on aspects of other people’s workload due to them being on holiday, off sick, on secondment etc. Alternatively, a colleague may have left and their role needs to be covered during the recruitment process.
Self-Generated
If you’re highly motivated, keen to learn and a considerate team player, you may volunteer to take on additional work to develop your skills and experience, or to help others out.
Moving the Mountain
So, you already have a mountain of work in your in-tray and you’re wondering how on earth you’re going to get through it, when someone moves a deadline or asks you to do something as a matter of priority. What do you do?
Adopt a Positive Attitude
Demands and challenges are opportunities for you to demonstrate your skills and abilities. See additional tasks as a compliment – the person asking you clearly thinks you’re the one who can deliver.
Focus and Prioritize
Take some time to understand the requirements of your additional task(s). Before you start, remember to re-prioritize your existing workload and re-negotiate any deadlines where possible.
Manage Your Time
Time is often your key ally in getting things done. Assess how long things will take and create a schedule. Are you able to find the extra time needed by working smarter or will you put in some more hours by starting earlier or staying late? Often, time alone in the office is highly productive.
Get Help
Could you delegate some of your workload to create room for the new task? Could someone else work with you on the new task to get the job done more quickly?
The Benefit Buzz
Being able and willing to deal with a heavy workload is not only a valuable skill to have, but the outcomes can be highly motivational and rewarding. They can bring about:
- A sense of achievement that you’ve delivered against the odds and made an outcome possible for someone else.
- An enhanced profile, in that others will see you as conscientious, committed, professional and reliable. Your talents will not go unnoticed and other rewards such as increased responsibility, promotion and pay may well follow. The example you set may help promote a ‘can do, will do’ attitude amongst your team and motivate others to add value in the same way.
- New skills and experience from the aspects of the task you were previously unfamiliar with. The subject matter, other people involved and the results of the task can also expose you to new sources of knowledge and development opportunities. For example, working with another department to organize an event for clients from different countries could bring new skills.
A Health Warning!
Always remember that you have a responsibility to look after yourself, in order to avoid burnout. Most of us have busy times during our working lives, and with this comes a certain amount of stress. However, these should be short-lived. If you feel constantly under pressure and overworked, this can lead to emotional exhaustion, resulting in neither the work getting done nor the rewards being enjoyed.
To prevent this, it’s important to take responsibility for saying ‘no’ to new work when you don’t have the time or capacity to take it on. You may think saying ‘yes’ to every request will be good for your career and work relationships, but taking on more than you can do will probably end in disaster. Whether because it puts you under unmanageable pressure or because you let others down by not being able to fulfill promises.
It’s important, therefore, to find a balance between your commitments to work and your personal life/wellbeing. If things start to feel out of balance, talk to your manager about how you are feeling, what you’ve done to redress the balance, and how they might be able to help.
