The shadow side of making a Plan B

I'm going to France next week for a vacation!

But I'm not trying to make you jealous. Instead, while planning for the trip, I learned an important lesson I want to share in case it will help you.

For the last year, anyone flying to the United States had to have a negative Covid test to board the plane.  If positive, you would be stranded for at least a week.

Being "stranded" in France actually sounds lovely! But, there would be hassles. Lodging, arranging another test, new plane reservations, extending our dog's stay at the kennel. Not to mention re-arranging everything already planned for that time back home.

I became pretty anxious about this possibility. I may have even lost some sleep.

I needed a Plan B.

        

Plan B:  "a strategy or plan to be implemented if the original one proves impracticable or unsuccessful."

The original plan was to get on a plane to depart from France. A positive Covid test would make that plan "unsuccessful."

For the next several weeks, I gathered the information needed for the plan. But, the worrying did not stop.

On June 10, I decided enough was enough and spent four hours finalizing a plan. I finished at 12:13 pm.

At 12:15 pm., I jumped back on the web to check out one more detail.

What greeted me was a New York Times "breaking news" headline. The Covid test requirement was to be dropped the next day.

I was thrilled! But then...

I started thinking about all the worrying I had done. 

Had the time I spent on the plan been worth it?

All this thinking helped me understand the dynamics of making a Plan B.

The upside 

If the original plan goes awry, instead of scrambling to make a plan from scratch in the heat of the moment, you can plan calmly, with the benefit of time and access to needed resources. 

Having a Plan B gives you confidence in your ability to move forward even if the original plan goes off course.

The shadow side

You have guessed it: Worry.

Worry (n).  “A state of anxiety over actual or potential problems.  As in, ‘he's demented with worry’.”

That was me. Demented. The more I worked on the plan, the more worried I got.

And then I thought of an additional dynamic: superstition.

Have you ever said, "I think I'll take an umbrella so it won't rain?"

My rational self knows this is a superstition, but another part of my brain believes it. I always take the umbrella.  It's not much of a leap to "If I have a plan for this Plan A  problem, it won't happen."

Superstition feeds the need for frantic planning. 


Ideas for dealing with the shadow side.

A little worrying provides motivation for planning. Incessant worrying is counterproductive.

The trick is to learn how to make a plan without continuing to worry.

I won't claim that it's always easy... But changing your "self-talk" (as used in cognitive therapy) can help.

Perhaps something like this for worry:

" I know things seldom work out exactly as expected, and most of the time, nothing bad happens."

"This worried feeling is letting me I need to plan. Any more worrying is of no use at all."

If mere superstition is driving my planning:

"I cannot control the future by planning. There is no plan I can make, no matter how elaborate, that can prevent things from going wrong."

However, - and this is very cool! - it turns out that there is a benefit to following some superstitions! (I thought this merited two exclamation points - actually three!)

From the psychologist and cognitive scientist Stuart Vyse:

"There is evidence that positive, luck-enhancing superstitions provide a psychological benefit that can improve skilled performance. There is anxiety associated with the kinds of events that bring out superstition.

The absence of control over a vital outcome creates anxiety. So, even when we know rationally that there is no magic, superstitions can be maintained by their emotional benefit."

Who knew!

How to make a Plan B.

• Do it writing.  (Typing allowed!)
  
• Do a risk assessment of your Plan A.

• What could go wrong?
• What is the likelihood of each?
• Which things, even if unlikely, would have the most negative impact on the outcome.  

• For each likely event and each unlikely but significant adverse impact event, make an if-then plan:  

IF  this happens, THEN I will do this. 

• Put the plan in a place that will be accessible when you need it.
• Monitor your emotions and use self-talk to avoid excessive worry and superstition.

Post Script

You may be wondering if the time I spent planning was wasted.

No!

A plan B can be helpful even if the exact thing you were thinking about doesn't happen.

For the France trip, one of us could get symptomatic Covid and not be able to fly. If that happens, I can pull the plan out.

In other situations, you may do something you will do again. I have a Plan B for when I travel by air to give professional presentations. By now, I know by heart. Whenever there is the hint of a disrupted flight, my plan is ready to go.

Au revoir!

Try this "day of pain and suffering!"

"Nothing is so fatiguing as the eternal hanging on of an uncompleted task." - William James

If you are like me, your to-do list can get really long.

With so many urgent and important tasks on our plates, how can we ever get to our backlog of undone work?

One recommendation is to delete tasks that are not done after a preset amount of time has passed. One author suggested giving yourself only 7 days.

Yikes!

I don't know about you, but for me, that would be a recipe for disaster. I have tasks I still need to do even after seven months have passed.

I learned a method from Thanh Pham that has been effective for me. Thanh is the founder of the excellent productivity training company Asian Efficiency. (Do check out their offerings!)

Thanh and his colleagues schedule a full day to reduce their task backlogs. They call this day "Doomsday," because it feels like it will be a "day of pain and suffering."

Are you hooked yet? 😉

I have used this method for several years, and find it transformative!

How can this be? Like Thanh, I begin my day with the expectation of pain and suffering.

But when it is over, this is what I actually get:

• An updated, current task list.
• An immediate boost of energy.
• Readiness to tackle the important projects on my plate.

Tynan, another blogger I follow, describes it like this:

"These things have to get done, and it's nice to bring them to a close for their own rewards, but the real benefit is how smoothly everything else goes afterwards. What a feeling it is to work on a big project with no collection of minor tasks nagging in the back of your mind."

An added benefit: finding tasks that are on the brink of turning into emergencies.

Years ago, I received a routine reminder to renew my medical license within the next 3 months. Because this was usually a 5-minute online task, I waited until the day before the deadline.

Alas!

The very last question asked for the date of my recertification in dependent and child abuse.

Hmmm... I had not recertified.  

I had until the next day to get this done. I located the 2-hour video training, watched it, completed the post-test, and waited for the CME office to send my official certificate. Miraculously I had a free schedule that day and was able to pull it off.

But, lesson learned.

The mechanics

I recommend an "assembly line" approach. This eliminates the need to think about what to do next.

• Get out your list.
• If you can order the items from oldest to newest, do that.
• Read the first (oldest)  item, and complete it.
• Go to the next item, and do the same.
• And so on until the time is up.

FAQs

How often should I do this?

The simple answer is "often enough to avoid big backlogs."

You can schedule a regularly recurring time - I'd recommend at least every 3 months. Or do an ad hoc session when your list feels overwhelming.


Do I have to do a full day?

No.

If you can do a full day, you will of course get more done.

But, even a 2 or 3-hour session is beneficial.


What counts as "done?"

Does this seem obvious? If you have done the required work and crossed off or deleted the list item, it's "done!"

But two other outcomes also count.

• Great when it happens: You decide you don't need to do this task. Delete it!

• More often: The "task" is actually a series of tasks.

If you have time for the whole thing, go ahead. But more likely, you won't.

 Instead, pick the next thing you can do to move this item forward. Once you have done that, you are "done" for today. Replace the original item with the next thing you must do to finish this work, and take that up later.

Can I minimize the development of backlogs?

Yes, you can!

One option is to spend a little time every day taking care of small tasks.

Dianna Wiest, for example, recommends allocating up to one hour a day for this purpose. The hour can be all at once, or, a minute here, 5 minutes there as you have free moments between other work sessions.

A similar method, recommended by many productivity consultants, is to Do It Now!

David Allen (Getting Things Done) formulates this approach as "the two-minute rule." Any new task that you estimate will take no more than 2 minutes should be done immediately. (If you are wrong, just stop and add to your list. If you were right, you've avoided one more item on your list.)

What you can do next

If your lists feel too long, schedule a two-hour session and see how far you get.

If you find that helpful, plan another session soon to do more.

Then, if you find this method helpful, make a future plan using one or both of these triggers:

Schedule a recurring day or half-day
When your list feels too long, do an ad hoc session

Remember, this "doomsday" experience is not at all about pain and suffering!

Some thoughts on preventing email backlogs

Have you ever put off responding to an email for longer than you should?

Is there anyone that has never done this?  

I recently described a method for eliminating a backlog of deferred emails. (Make a list of the messages, and then plow through them in assembly-line fashion.)

This works, but wouldn’t it would be better to avoid backlogs?

I still let backlogs develop more often than I would like. I recently wondered about whether other people have this problem - which I suspected was true. And, what types of messages trigger a “non-response.”

So I asked my next client Amelia if she had a problem with deferring email responses. She gave a resounding “YES!”

And, she immediately rattled off these six messages types that cause her trouble:

• The requester is asking about something that is not part of her job.
• The message looks long and/or complex, and she avoids reading it.
• She can’t tell what the sender wants.
• She thinks the response will take a long time to write.
• She plans to say “No,” to a request but is uncomfortable saying so.
• She thinks that her response will unleash an avalanche of back and forth messages, or, as I call it, the “ping pong” effect!

I thought "Wow - these all are on my list as well!"

At that moment, the idea for this post was born

Not So Fast!

"Isn't it OK to defer responding to some messages?”

Yes!

The most common reason is that you are not yet prepared to respond, because you need to do something else first. You and your partner are invited to dinner next Wednesday, and you need to check with them. You are asked for input on a manuscript, and you have to read it and add your suggestions. You are asked for a decision, and you have to do some research and think. And so forth.

If I need more than a day or two, I usually send a brief message to say when I will get back.

Here, we are discussing procrastination: “to be slow or late about doing something that should be done.”

So, when does a legit deferral change into “it's been too long?” I can just feel it. 

I bet you can too.

Now, back to the coaching session.

For the rest of the session, Amelia and I talked about ways she could overcome her six “deferred response” triggers.  Here is what we came up with.

1 . The requester is asking about something that is not part of her job.

Hurray!  She should pass on the message to the correct person. 

I sometimes obsess over how I could take care of the request so that I don’t have “bother” someone else. If it is their job, it's not a bother!


2. The message looks long and/or complex, and she avoids reading it.

The only option is to dive in and soldier through. Sometimes it can help to skim the message to see if there is a clear “ask.” If there is, that will help her make sense of the rest of the message.


3. She can’t tell what the sender wants.

I recommended that she immediately write back to clarify. Sometimes you have an idea but aren’t sure. If so, say something like “I think you want the reports from 2017 and 2018, but I want to make sure that is correct.”


4. She thinks the response will take a long time to write.

I suggested three options :

• My “go-to” approach is to immediately write a quick “bad draft” of what I am thinking I might say, either by hand or in a note app. (You can also do it in the "reply" screen, taking care not to accidentally hit "send!")

Most of the time I find that this draft only needs a little editing to be ready. Otherwise, I discover what I need to do next, for example, more thinking or research, or other tasks before I can reply. In either case, I have a path forward.

• Make a phone call or schedule a meeting, so that you can clarify and answer questions in real-time. 

• For frequent requests, I recommended creating template responses. Both Outlook and Gmail have an option to save templates for future use.

5. She plans to say “No,” to a request, but is uncomfortable saying so.

Usually, this is when the requester is someone we want to have a good relationship with. Whole books have been written about how to decide when to say “no,” which was outside the scope of our session that day.

What I did suggest is that once she has decided, she should not dally in sending her response. The sender needs to move on and find someone else!

I shared a method I developed for another client who gets frequent invitations to give talks at other institutions. She knows she can't agree to every request, because of the time taken away from her own work. But she puts off the reply because it is painful.

We crafted a template that conveyed “thanks very much, this sounds like a great project, I value our relationship, but I won’t be able to do it this time.” When it’s time to say “no,” the template makes it easier to get started.

I suggested to Amelia that if she gets frequent requests for something she never wants to do, she could also make a (firm but polite) template for those as well.


6. She thinks that her response will unleash an avalanche of back and forth messages - the “ping pong” effect!

Again, three options:

• Just because she replied immediately does not mean she has to reply immediately again. If there is going to be a significant delay, write back saying “I’ll get back to you tomorrow,” or whatever is true.

• Pick up the phone (or schedule a meeting).

• Take Cal Newport’s advice, and instead of asking open-ended questions, make a proposal.

For example, instead of: “Would you like to have lunch next week?” Try this: “Would you like to have lunch next week? If so, what about Tuesday at noon at the India Café on Iowa Ave.? If the day, time or restaurant don’t work for you, send me another plan that works for you.”

7. And one more, from my list: The “3 tireds:”

Tired of this email string with John

Tired of John

Just plain tired…

The key feature of the “tireds” is that you know what you want to say, but you just can’t get yourself to say it. Because you are tired. It's emotional/energetic, not a lack of knowing what you want to say.

The solution? Recognition that this is the problem. Then, you can choose to either plow through with the response, or, take a break and come back later the same day.

What you can do next.

Before you defer a reply, stop and ask yourself why you want to do it. Do you need to prepare before responding, or, are you procrastinating?

If it’s procrastination, see if one of the suggested approaches will help you move forward.

If it’s something else, see if you can come up with your own plan to try.