Jon Clayton:

Are you ready to get more done than you ever thought possible?

Jon Clayton:

In this episode, we are talking about.

Jon Clayton:

Productivity, you'll learn a new human first definition of productivity,

Jon Clayton:

why productivity happens before you take action, and why space is more

Jon Clayton:

powerful than systems and stick around to the end where we share the real

Jon Clayton:

reason things aren't getting done.

Jon Clayton:

Welcome to Architecture Business Club, the show that helps you build

Jon Clayton:

a better business in architecture so you can enjoy more freedom,

Jon Clayton:

flexibility, and fulfillment.

Jon Clayton:

I'm your host, John Clayton, and if you're joining us for the

Jon Clayton:

first time, don't forget to hit the follow or subscribe button.

Jon Clayton:

We're joined by Louise Miller, a productivity mentor.

Jon Clayton:

The founder of Make It Happen Club and the host of the UN Frazzled podcast.

Jon Clayton:

She's on a mission to change the world by helping her clients change

Jon Clayton:

the world to discover changes you can make to be more productive.

Jon Clayton:

Take Louise's free quiz by clicking the link in the show notes.

Jon Clayton:

So Louise, we are going to talk about productivity.

Jon Clayton:

We can get more done without burning ourselves out, and we're gonna

Jon Clayton:

challenge, I think, what people think of productivity in the conversation.

Jon Clayton:

So let's begin with what's your definition of productivity?

Louise Miller:

Yeah.

Louise Miller:

So I am gonna contrast my definition with what a lot of

Louise Miller:

people would say if you asked them.

Louise Miller:

So if you asked most people what they would say, productivity is,

Louise Miller:

I think what they'd say is some version of doing more in less time.

Louise Miller:

It's about getting more done in less time.

Louise Miller:

But for me, I find that kind of makes me immediately go a bit tense and

Louise Miller:

kind of thinking about it that way in my previous life before I started my

Louise Miller:

business actually made me ill because it's constantly kind of in this battle

Louise Miller:

against time that you're never gonna win.

Louise Miller:

'cause time will keep ticking along.

Louise Miller:

You're never really finished.

Louise Miller:

So if you are looking at it as doing more in less time, and that's it.

Louise Miller:

I don't think that's particularly helpful.

Louise Miller:

So the definition I came up with, which I kind of, I was gonna say I

Louise Miller:

was forced to come up with, I wasn't forced nobody, you know, nobody was

Louise Miller:

standing over me with a big stick.

Louise Miller:

But in order for me to do my work, which you know, is helping people get stuff

Louise Miller:

done, I needed to redefine it so that I felt comfortable and that I wasn't

Louise Miller:

leading people along a merry path to burnout and making themselves ill.

Louise Miller:

So the way that I look at it now, and the way I talk about it with my clients and in

Louise Miller:

the work that I do, is that productivity is about doing what's important.

Louise Miller:

As efficiently as you can to create space for what you love.

Louise Miller:

And I think the two key things in that, that's different from what a

Louise Miller:

lot, a lot of people would say is it's about doing what's important,

Louise Miller:

not doing all of the things.

Louise Miller:

And it's about creating space, not about doing more, doing

Louise Miller:

so that you can do more doing.

Jon Clayton:

There's quite a big difference, isn't there?

Jon Clayton:

There between those two approaches to it.

Louise Miller:

I think so.

Louise Miller:

I mean, it can feel a bit subtle, but usually when I share that definition,

Louise Miller:

people's shoulders just relax a little bit and all of a sudden it

Louise Miller:

just puts a whole different um, yeah, different perspective on things.

Louise Miller:

'cause it's like, why are you doing what you're doing?

Louise Miller:

And if you can start to think about that as well, you can let

Louise Miller:

go of a lot of the stuff that actually might not be important.

Louise Miller:

It might not be helping you get where you wanna go.

Louise Miller:

And that was also, you know, quite liberating I think for people.

Jon Clayton:

think, I

Jon Clayton:

think with some people, their experiences that there's like,

Jon Clayton:

um, to be seen, to be busy.

Jon Clayton:

but not necessarily doing the things that really kind of push things forward.

Jon Clayton:

And I've absolutely have been guilty of this, you know, that, that thing

Jon Clayton:

you mentioned there about this idea of productivity where it's just.

Jon Clayton:

Trying to do things quicker so we can cram more in and do more,

Jon Clayton:

just more and more and more.

Jon Clayton:

Um, I've definitely found myself in that position before and felt quite

Jon Clayton:

stressed about it, to be quite honest.

Louise Miller:

Yeah, me too.

Louise Miller:

It made me ill, I ended up signed off work with, uh, work related

Louise Miller:

stress and anxiety when that was how I was going through life.

Louise Miller:

And I had colleagues also actually I was, um, working for a university at

Louise Miller:

the time and I had colleagues that whenever anyone asked them how they

Louise Miller:

were, their answer would be busy.

Jon Clayton:

Mm.

Louise Miller:

And I would quite often know that actually they weren't

Louise Miller:

busy 'cause I was managing them.

Louise Miller:

I had an eye on what they were doing, but they were so terrified

Louise Miller:

of saying that they weren't busy for fear of what that would mean.

Louise Miller:

Someone would give them more to do or they'd be seen as lazy or something.

Louise Miller:

It's a really strange relationship that we have, I think with that word.

Louise Miller:

It's interesting.

Jon Clayton:

Yeah.

Jon Clayton:

Busy.

Jon Clayton:

Busy doing what?

Louise Miller:

Yes, exactly.

Louise Miller:

Yeah.

Jon Clayton:

Something that I've heard you talk about, you, you believe that.

Jon Clayton:

Productivity happens before you take action.

Jon Clayton:

Can you explain that for us?

Louise Miller:

Yeah, absolutely.

Louise Miller:

So I'm going to share an analogy that I think is helpful when we think about this.

Louise Miller:

So, running a business can be a bit like walking through a forest, right?

Louise Miller:

You wanna get to the other side, um, and you set out all excited

Louise Miller:

that you're going on an adventure.

Louise Miller:

Um, but.

Louise Miller:

There comes a point, yes, there are nice areas of dappled sunlight and it

Louise Miller:

all feels lovely and there's squirrels running about and it's lovely, but

Louise Miller:

you also reach a point sometimes where, well, not sometimes, I think

Louise Miller:

all of the time, where you end up in those kind of damp, dank corners of

Louise Miller:

the forest and there's muddy puddles, and it all starts to feel a little

Louise Miller:

bit scary, and you can start to feel like you're walking around in circles.

Louise Miller:

You've got your eyes on your feet.

Louise Miller:

Because you don't wanna trip over the tree roots or those kinds of

Louise Miller:

things, and you've just got your head down and you're keeping going.

Louise Miller:

But then you start to wonder, am I actually going in the right direction?

Louise Miller:

Have I seen that tree before?

Louise Miller:

Start to feel a bit lost, perhaps get in a bit of a panic.

Louise Miller:

So at that point, you have a choice.

Louise Miller:

You can either keep walking and hope for the best, or you can

Louise Miller:

take a, you know, take a pause.

Louise Miller:

And in my little analogy, it just so happens as luck would

Louise Miller:

have it, there's a tree house.

Louise Miller:

So we've, we've stopped.

Louise Miller:

We're walking around, we're feeling a bit lost.

Louise Miller:

We stopped for a second and then we lift our eyes up and look up and you

Louise Miller:

can see that there's a lovely tree house in one of the nearby trees.

Louise Miller:

It looks all warm and cozy and inviting, and you think I'm going up there.

Louise Miller:

So you go up to the tree house, have a little rest, settle your nervous system,

Louise Miller:

get the panic, kind of gone, have a cup of tea, nice chalky bickie, and then.

Louise Miller:

You know when you're feeling a little bit calmer, you can look out of

Louise Miller:

the treehouse window and look down.

Louise Miller:

So you can look back to where you've come from, first of all, which will actually

Louise Miller:

remind you of how far you have come.

Louise Miller:

You might feel like you haven't, but you'll see how far you've come.

Louise Miller:

You can look over there into the distance.

Louise Miller:

Just remind yourself where you're going to get another sense of, you

Louise Miller:

know, yes, I do wanna get over there.

Louise Miller:

Give yourself that motivation again, and then you can look down a little bit

Louise Miller:

and actually start to map out the route.

Louise Miller:

And look for the easiest way to get to where you're going so that when

Louise Miller:

you are ready to climb back down onto the forest floor, you are feeling a

Louise Miller:

lot more resourced, um, resilient.

Louise Miller:

You know where you're going.

Louise Miller:

You've got a bit of a map in your head as to how you're gonna get where you're

Louise Miller:

going, and then off you go again.

Louise Miller:

Right?

Louise Miller:

So I think we can all agree that the most productive thing that happened there was

Louise Miller:

going up into the tree house, not just carrying on, walking around in circles.

Louise Miller:

And so for me that even though it might have felt like you weren't doing anything,

Louise Miller:

'cause you're not actually in motion, you're not, you know, putting one foot

Louise Miller:

in front of the other, that is still the most productive thing that we could do in

Louise Miller:

that situation because it's allowing us to take that pause and go right to remind,

Louise Miller:

remind myself of what's important, why I am trying to get to where I'm going,

Louise Miller:

where I'm going, how I'm gonna get there.

Louise Miller:

Um, and that all happens in that pause, not when we are taking action.

Louise Miller:

For me.

Louise Miller:

That's what I mean when I say that productivity happens

Louise Miller:

before you take action.

Louise Miller:

It's in that pause.

Louise Miller:

Does that make sense?

Louise Miller:

Resonate?

Jon Clayton:

Uh, it, it really does.

Jon Clayton:

Yeah.

Jon Clayton:

Um, it's like being able to step back from the day to day and to be able to see

Jon Clayton:

that big picture sort of helicopter view.

Jon Clayton:

Over what you're doing rather than being stuck in the weeds.

Jon Clayton:

I think that there's so many times, um, I've experienced this personally

Jon Clayton:

where I, I, you know, I, I have this idea of, of the direction I'm going

Jon Clayton:

in and then I just get stuck in the day to day and I lose sight of what it

Jon Clayton:

is that I'm actually trying to do and sometimes can end up spending time.

Jon Clayton:

Um.

Jon Clayton:

Working on things that aren't actually moving me forward in the right direction.

Jon Clayton:

And maybe I'm going off on a, you know, to use the kind of forest analogy that

Jon Clayton:

I'm kind of going off down a, down an alternative path or another winding

Jon Clayton:

path somewhere that's not actually taking me in the right direction.

Jon Clayton:

And, um, yeah, unless, unless there is some kind of pause or moment when

Jon Clayton:

you do step out of that and, and climb up into the, uh, the tree house

Jon Clayton:

to be able to see the big picture.

Jon Clayton:

Um.

Jon Clayton:

It's really difficult to get back on track again.

Jon Clayton:

I

Louise Miller:

It is.

Louise Miller:

Yeah, absolutely.

Louise Miller:

And I think for a lot of people, they think that productivity is in the

Louise Miller:

action that you're taking, but when all you are doing is taking action.

Louise Miller:

That can actually lead to overwhelm and becoming a bit frazzled.

Louise Miller:

And you're just, like you said, doing busy work that's not

Louise Miller:

necessarily actually helpful.

Louise Miller:

And you know, you start getting easily distracted.

Louise Miller:

You're picking things up and putting them down again.

Louise Miller:

But you are so fixed in this mindset that I've got a lot to do.

Louise Miller:

I just need to keep going.

Louise Miller:

I need to keep my head down and keep going.

Louise Miller:

It's just so counterproductive.

Louise Miller:

I describe, you know, you can get in when you're staying in that kind of action

Louise Miller:

space, you can end up in this sort of frantic and frazzled overwhelm loop.

Louise Miller:

And the only way you can stop that is to take that step out

Louise Miller:

of it and to take that pause.

Louise Miller:

And I'll just share here as well.

Louise Miller:

I think 'cause it's relevant, I've, I talk about this kind of progress cycle

Louise Miller:

and if you can stay in this progress cycle, you will be productive and

Louise Miller:

you will get to where you want to go.

Louise Miller:

And that all starts with the pause.

Louise Miller:

So the first thing to do is to pause, then you reflect.

Louise Miller:

So that's what we were doing when we were looking back to see how far we've

Louise Miller:

come, looking to where we're going.

Louise Miller:

Thinking about, you know, am I spending my time on the right things?

Louise Miller:

Um, have I spent my time, well this week, this month, whatever that is, we

Louise Miller:

take the pause, then we reflect from that place, we can then make a choice.

Louise Miller:

So that's when you choose what you're gonna do differently or

Louise Miller:

what you're going to do next, or what you're not going to do next.

Louise Miller:

Just making an intentional choice while you are feeling calm and connected

Louise Miller:

to where it is that you wanna go.

Louise Miller:

And then once you've made that choice, that's when you start taking action.

Louise Miller:

And when you work like that, it kind of becomes inevitable that the next

Louise Miller:

part of the cycle after action is to complete, to finish what you've started,

Louise Miller:

rather than bouncing around all over the place, trying to do 15 things at once.

Louise Miller:

And if you can find a way, um, you know, some people take a visual and put it on

Louise Miller:

on the wall, so they're looking at it.

Louise Miller:

If you can find a way to stay in this kind of pause, reflect, choose,

Louise Miller:

act, complete, and then start again.

Louise Miller:

It can be a really great way just to keep you focused and

Louise Miller:

moving in the right direction.

Jon Clayton:

I love that.

Jon Clayton:

I love that.

Jon Clayton:

That's, that, that's a really interesting way to think about it.

Jon Clayton:

So, um, Louise, I've, I've, we've talked a little bit about here, about,

Jon Clayton:

um, space, Often people talk about systems a lot though when it comes to

Jon Clayton:

productivity, but why, why space do you think more powerful than systems?

Jon Clayton:

That's something that you've talked about before.

Jon Clayton:

Um, what do you mean by that?

Louise Miller:

Yeah.

Louise Miller:

So what I see happen with a lot of people that are feeling that, like they're

Louise Miller:

not getting as much done as they want.

Louise Miller:

They're not as productive as they want to be.

Louise Miller:

The solution they start looking for is some kind of system.

Louise Miller:

So they start thinking, oh, I just need to.

Louise Miller:

Start a new Asana board or let me go and buy that gorgeous planner

Louise Miller:

that's gonna cost me 50 quid.

Louise Miller:

But isn't it pretty?

Louise Miller:

And you know, downloading apps and all of that kind of stuff that

Louise Miller:

will help you manage your to-dos.

Louise Miller:

People kind of look to those systems 'cause they think

Louise Miller:

that's what the problem is.

Louise Miller:

The trouble is when that's what you are reaching for.

Louise Miller:

If you are in chaos in your mind, all you're going to be doing is

Louise Miller:

transferring that chaos into your system, which isn't gonna help you.

Louise Miller:

Uh, in terms of being more productive, you know, if you've got someone in

Louise Miller:

your team, you're gonna be delegating, perhaps delegating or inputting

Louise Miller:

chaos into your team as well.

Louise Miller:

So yes, those systems can be helpful, but they shouldn't be the starting point.

Louise Miller:

The starting point should be the, the space, the pause that we just

Louise Miller:

talked about, so that you can figure out what is most important to you.

Louise Miller:

Remind yourself of your goals.

Louise Miller:

You know, figure out what are the actions I need to take to get me there?

Louise Miller:

What can I let go of?

Louise Miller:

Um, understand what else is going on in your life that

Louise Miller:

might be impacting on your work.

Louise Miller:

Because we are, you know, we're not robots.

Louise Miller:

If there's something big going on outside of work, it is gonna impact

Louise Miller:

what you're able to achieve in work.

Louise Miller:

So you need the space to figure all of that out.

Louise Miller:

And then from there, by all means, you know, find a system that works for you.

Louise Miller:

But what I see happen over and over again is that people are just bouncing

Louise Miller:

around from system to system to system thinking that that's the problem.

Louise Miller:

When it isn't.

Louise Miller:

The problem is that they're not giving themselves space.

Jon Clayton:

I've had quite a bit of experience with that.

Jon Clayton:

Louise, um.

Jon Clayton:

You know, trying all sorts of different.

Jon Clayton:

Productivity systems and, and methods and, you know, been on loads of like

Jon Clayton:

webinars and, and you know, watched loads of content online about, oh, you

Jon Clayton:

need to be doing time boxing, or, you know, you need to be doing this, or you

Jon Clayton:

need to be using this fancy software.

Jon Clayton:

And as you say, like subscribing to all sorts, you know, some free

Jon Clayton:

tools, some paid that are promising.

Jon Clayton:

Oh, this tool's gonna save you like a day, a week.

Jon Clayton:

'cause it's just amazing.

Jon Clayton:

And it's like the most amazing productivity task management, project

Jon Clayton:

management magic tool in the world.

Jon Clayton:

And, um, none of that really worked.

Jon Clayton:

None of it really worked for me.

Jon Clayton:

I, I tried all sorts of different things, um, and really struggled to

Jon Clayton:

find, you know, tools that did help.

Jon Clayton:

Um, and the fact being that.

Jon Clayton:

What you described about that being just like sort of chaos, um, in my mind was

Jon Clayton:

probably that, that huge contributing factor that, that those things just

Jon Clayton:

weren't, weren't really working for me.

Jon Clayton:

Um, yeah, so I did try an awful lot of different systems over the

Jon Clayton:

years and, um, struggled to find something that worked for me.

Jon Clayton:

Um, and it's, I think as well that it can then make you feel

Jon Clayton:

pretty rubbish because you, you then feel a little bit like, well.

Jon Clayton:

Well, I was promised that this system was gonna work and it hasn't worked, so does

Jon Clayton:

that mean there's something wrong with me?

Louise Miller:

Yeah.

Louise Miller:

Yeah.

Louise Miller:

And you're not alone in feeling that ev You know, I work with so many people

Louise Miller:

who have been through that experience.

Louise Miller:

I've been through that experience.

Louise Miller:

Um, I bought David Allen's getting things done, booked back in about

Louise Miller:

2006, thinking that was gonna solve all my problems when I was completely

Louise Miller:

overwhelmed in an office management role.

Louise Miller:

And I spent a whole weekend in my office setting that system up and it didn't work.

Louise Miller:

And I was exactly as you described, feeling like, oh, that must be me then.

Louise Miller:

There's clearly something wrong with me and it kind of breaks my heart and

Louise Miller:

you know, and it's kind of unfortunate, really, this is why I'm really

Louise Miller:

passionate about sharing this stuff.

Louise Miller:

Because what often happens is by the time people come and find me,

Louise Miller:

they've already gone through that cycle and they're kind of already

Louise Miller:

feeling rubbish about themselves.

Louise Miller:

And I find myself in a position of having, and it's, you know, I'm happy to do it.

Louise Miller:

But trying to reassure people when they say, well, I've tried everything else.

Louise Miller:

Why is working with you gonna be any different?

Louise Miller:

Because they're feeling that sense of.

Louise Miller:

I'm broken and I'm then having to explain, which is fine.

Louise Miller:

You know, that's what I'm here for.

Louise Miller:

Explain why the way that I work is so different and how it does help.

Louise Miller:

And I find once people are brave enough, 'cause I think it is an act

Louise Miller:

of bravery when you've been burnt like that, to step into a different space

Louise Miller:

and pay money to come and work with me.

Louise Miller:

And then they find that it works.

Louise Miller:

It does so much more than just help them get stuff done.

Louise Miller:

It rebuilds their self-confidence.

Louise Miller:

And their self-esteem around all of this.

Louise Miller:

So it does run deep.

Louise Miller:

You know, productivity kind of sounds like this very practical, pragmatic thing,

Louise Miller:

but actually it's got a huge emotional weight to it for a lot of people.

Jon Clayton:

Absolutely.

Jon Clayton:

Yeah.

Jon Clayton:

I think that because often, you know, I mean everyone's, so

Jon Clayton:

let's use that busy word again.

Jon Clayton:

Everyone's so busy these days and.

Jon Clayton:

I think there's a tendency to put an awful lot of things on the to-do list,

Jon Clayton:

and I've, again, classic, this is a thing that I've done loads where I'm like

Jon Clayton:

overestimating how much I get done in a day, so I have a big to-do list, and

Jon Clayton:

then I don't complete everything on it.

Jon Clayton:

Inevitably, it doesn't get completed because no sooner

Jon Clayton:

am I ticking one thing off it.

Jon Clayton:

There's other things that are getting added to it, and then you get to

Jon Clayton:

the end of the day and think, well.

Jon Clayton:

Oh, I've not, I've not done very well today 'cause, well, I've not finished

Jon Clayton:

half my to-do list, so I'm, I'm not very good am I, you know, I'm not, I'm

Jon Clayton:

not very good at what I do because I've not managed to get all this stuff done.

Jon Clayton:

I should have been able to get more done because all these productivity

Jon Clayton:

gurus online and telling me that I should be able to get tons of stuff done

Jon Clayton:

in a day and I haven't been able to.

Jon Clayton:

So it's quite a, a vicious kind of circle to get trapped in.

Louise Miller:

it is, and it makes me really angry when I see people saying,

Louise Miller:

well, you just need to do it like this.

Louise Miller:

Like you mentioned, time blocking and putting all of that out there as if

Louise Miller:

that is the solution that's gonna work for everyone and it, it really isn't.

Louise Miller:

And I think if it's all right with you, John, I've got six pillars that.

Louise Miller:

Underpin everything that I do.

Louise Miller:

And if I quickly, if it's all right, just rattle through what they are.

Louise Miller:

And hopefully that will help people understand that it, there are, it

Louise Miller:

is quite simple actually what you need in order to get things done.

Louise Miller:

Um, and it's not about the system.

Louise Miller:

It's not about the tool, but so we've already talked about space.

Louise Miller:

That's the first pillar.

Louise Miller:

So I don't need to say anymore about that, but it's space away

Louise Miller:

from the noise and the distractions.

Louise Miller:

The second thing that we need to have in place when we're doing our planning

Louise Miller:

and our to-do list, or whatever it is we're doing, is alignment.

Louise Miller:

So.

Louise Miller:

Taking that moment to just make sure that the things you're writing on your list are

Louise Miller:

actually taking you in the right direction and the direction that excites you.

Louise Miller:

So there's alignment, then there's the life friendly kind of pillar, which is

Louise Miller:

about not just thinking, this is what I need to do for my business, but thinking

Louise Miller:

what else is going on in my life.

Louise Miller:

You know, I'm, I worked with someone once who was moving house.

Louise Miller:

And hadn't, it hadn't occurred to her, that might mean she had less capacity for

Louise Miller:

what she was trying to do in her business.

Louise Miller:

She was moving across the country.

Louise Miller:

So thinking about things like that and the smaller things as well.

Louise Miller:

You know, if you've got kids and one of your kids is off school sick or

Louise Miller:

something, you know, bearing all of that in mind and not expecting, you'll still

Louise Miller:

be able to get a normal full day's work done if you've got a poorly child on

Louise Miller:

the sofa that needs your love and care.

Louise Miller:

Um, which kind of leads us onto the fourth pillar, which is about your plan

Louise Miller:

or your to-do list being achievable.

Louise Miller:

Um, so it's not just a brain dump that then you're calling a plan.

Louise Miller:

It's you looking at what you've got capacity for.

Louise Miller:

And also, actually, as an aside for this one, understanding, you're not gonna

Louise Miller:

get that right all of the time and if you don't get it right, 'cause we all

Louise Miller:

underestimate how long things take.

Louise Miller:

I still do, but all that is, is underestimation of

Louise Miller:

how long something took.

Louise Miller:

It doesn't mean you're a bad person or that you failed in any way,

Louise Miller:

but the more we can notice that.

Louise Miller:

The better we can become at predicting it.

Louise Miller:

So just a little side note.

Louise Miller:

Um, and then rhythm is the fifth pillar, which is around, we don't just

Louise Miller:

take that pause once and then think we're set for the rest of the year.

Louise Miller:

How can you build that pause, reflect and choose into your month,

Louise Miller:

into your week, even into your day.

Louise Miller:

So you know, when you and I finish this conversation, we

Louise Miller:

could both pause for a second.

Louise Miller:

Reflect on what the rest of the day holds, and then choose what we're gonna do next.

Louise Miller:

You can do it in a really micro way, but making that a rhythm.

Louise Miller:

And then the, the final pillar is, the way that I work is

Louise Miller:

very rooted in neuroscience.

Louise Miller:

I'm also an NLP practitioner, so there's this whole thing around making sure we're

Louise Miller:

getting our subconscious mind on board.

Louise Miller:

Um.

Louise Miller:

Believing that it's possible for us to have success rather than

Louise Miller:

talking to ourselves in a way that we just keep reminding ourselves,

Louise Miller:

well, I didn't get everything done.

Louise Miller:

I'm a terrible person.

Louise Miller:

Let's shift that.

Louise Miller:

Um, and then we'll start to prove that new story true.

Louise Miller:

So those are the six things that I think are key as far as being

Louise Miller:

more productive is concerned.

Louise Miller:

Um, and however you can, you know, think about and implement them into

Louise Miller:

how you're moving through your days, your weeks and months, I think.

Louise Miller:

Yeah.

Louise Miller:

You'll be onto a winner if you even just a couple of them if you're

Louise Miller:

not doing any of that right now.

Jon Clayton:

Absolutely.

Jon Clayton:

Yeah.

Jon Clayton:

And they, um, the, the life pillar, I totally resonated with me that

Jon Clayton:

because you know, when, when you have things, other things going on in

Jon Clayton:

your life, then you can't, you can't expect to show up in the same way.

Jon Clayton:

you're not gonna be able to be.

Jon Clayton:

As productive.

Jon Clayton:

Um, if you've got this things going on, like you say, if you've got like a child

Jon Clayton:

off school that's ill you're not gonna be able to show up in the same way.

Jon Clayton:

And I guess it's.

Jon Clayton:

It's part and parcel of being a business owner that sometimes you've got all

Jon Clayton:

the things going on at the same time and you know, with all good intention,

Jon Clayton:

you might not be able to work as many hours that week or, or the hours that

Jon Clayton:

you do work, you might have other things on your mind at the same time.

Jon Clayton:

So, um, I think recognizing that and being okay with it, that,

Jon Clayton:

we're not able to, you know, just turn up and, and work like

Jon Clayton:

a robot every day of the week.

Louise Miller:

yeah, absolutely.

Louise Miller:

And for many of us who started our business, we started it because

Louise Miller:

we wanted that flexibility.

Louise Miller:

So why are we not letting ourselves have it without feeling bad about it?

Jon Clayton:

yeah, that's so true, because that's most people that do

Jon Clayton:

set up their own business, they're not, they're not doing it because

Jon Clayton:

they're wanting to do more work.

Jon Clayton:

You know, they're, they're doing it usually because they are wanting more,

Jon Clayton:

more freedom and more flexibility in their life and more fulfillment

Jon Clayton:

from the work that they're doing.

Jon Clayton:

And that's, that's the, the thing, isn't it?

Jon Clayton:

That, you know, you want to be able to, well, okay.

Jon Clayton:

I'd, I can just.

Jon Clayton:

Work less hours today and be with the kids, or, you know, I can take

Jon Clayton:

some time off to go to the, the sports day or that event or whatever.

Jon Clayton:

Um, because I'm in charge, it's my business and I can choose to do that.

Jon Clayton:

Yeah.

Jon Clayton:

But as I say, sometimes you can kind of, um, I think sometimes we can lose

Jon Clayton:

sight of that if we get stuck in that the busy work or that, um, the client

Jon Clayton:

work, like delivering the client work.

Jon Clayton:

And then forgetting about like why we started doing it in the first place.

Louise Miller:

Yeah, so I think that's where, if you're gonna do anything with

Louise Miller:

those pillars that I just shared, I think the space, which is what, you know, the

Louise Miller:

time in the tree house and the rhythm, so that you're doing that regularly,

Louise Miller:

because the more often you do that.

Louise Miller:

The more of a sense of perspective you'll have and the more that you'll know,

Louise Miller:

this actually isn't that important.

Louise Miller:

Yes, it needs to be done, but going to sports day with my kid,

Louise Miller:

you know, is more important.

Louise Miller:

And you'll have that sense of perspective and you'll be able to make those

Louise Miller:

intentional choices rather than feeling like stuff's just happening to you,

Louise Miller:

which is, doesn't feel very nice when you feel completely out of control.

Jon Clayton:

So what, what do you think for most people then the,

Jon Clayton:

the real reasons are why, why they're not getting stuff done.

Louise Miller:

Yeah, I think there are three main things that prevent people

Louise Miller:

from getting stuff done first is that they don't have a clear vision and

Louise Miller:

then they get stuck doing busy work.

Louise Miller:

Because if you don't know what you want your life, your business to

Louise Miller:

look and feel like, how can you evaluate whether the work you're

Louise Miller:

doing today is gonna get you there?

Louise Miller:

So I think a lot of people don't have that clarity, which then means

Louise Miller:

they've got nothing to evaluate their to-do list and their plans against.

Louise Miller:

So I think that can, again, like you said, they can feel like they're

Louise Miller:

busy, but they're not necessarily busy doing the right thing.

Louise Miller:

So yeah, not focusing on the right thing because they haven't got

Louise Miller:

this clear vision, I think is a big problem for a lot of people.

Louise Miller:

The next thing we've all, we've already kind of touched on this a

Louise Miller:

little bit, is that people don't set themselves up for success.

Louise Miller:

Because they're not considering their capacity when they're making their plans.

Louise Miller:

So, you know, as I flippantly just said a minute ago, writing a, doing a brain

Louise Miller:

dump and then calling that a plan when all you've done is empty your head and

Louise Miller:

then stuck some arbitrary, well, I can do all of that today kind of thing on it.

Louise Miller:

So you're setting yourself up to fail when you're doing that.

Louise Miller:

So, yeah, this is it.

Louise Miller:

It's not about the fact that you are, you know, you're not lazy,

Louise Miller:

you're not incapable of focusing, you are just trying to do too much

Louise Miller:

and not considering your capacity.

Louise Miller:

So.

Louise Miller:

Yeah.

Louise Miller:

If we can do that, set yourself up for success by considering your capacity.

Louise Miller:

I think that makes a big difference for people and it makes you feel better.

Louise Miller:

'cause you can ride that momentum of going, you know, I tried to do

Louise Miller:

fewer things today on purpose, and look at me, I've got 'em all done.

Louise Miller:

Doesn't that feel better than overloading your to-do list and then not

Louise Miller:

getting any of it done because you're bouncing around all over the place.

Louise Miller:

So yeah, setting yourself up for success.

Louise Miller:

And the last one, um, again, we touched on it earlier, is that people

Louise Miller:

are not giving themselves enough time to work on their business.

Louise Miller:

They're constantly in the doing kind of zone in that action kind of space

Louise Miller:

because they feel like well so much to do.

Louise Miller:

They've got goals they wanna meet, they're not where they wanna be.

Louise Miller:

And are we ever really where we want to be?

Louise Miller:

I think all of us, we reach a certain level of success.

Louise Miller:

And then there's another one.

Louise Miller:

So if you're waiting until you get over there somewhere, I, you'll be,

Louise Miller:

anyway, that's a little tangent.

Louise Miller:

You'll be waiting a very long time.

Louise Miller:

But yes, working on your business, um.

Louise Miller:

Give yourself that time to think, make some really good choices about

Louise Miller:

what to focus on and what can wait.

Louise Miller:

So yeah, I think again, people just go wrong by thinking they've gotta

Louise Miller:

keep their heads down and our culture kind of reinforces that as well.

Louise Miller:

So again, if you're hearing that and feeling like that sounds like you don't

Louise Miller:

feel bad about it, it's not your fault.

Louise Miller:

Um, it's just coming around to this different way of thinking that actually

Louise Miller:

going up in that tree house is the most productive thing you can do quite often.

Jon Clayton:

What, what would be the main thing that you would like everyone

Jon Clayton:

to take away from our conversation?

Louise Miller:

Yeah, I think if people can remember the idea of the progress cycle.

Louise Miller:

And if the image of the tree house is helpful, you know,

Louise Miller:

put those two things together.

Louise Miller:

Go up into the tree house.

Louise Miller:

If you can do that at least once a month, if you can do it more often,

Louise Miller:

I would recommend, um, just to take that pause, reflect on what's going

Louise Miller:

on, how things have been going, where you wanna get to, and then make some

Louise Miller:

conscious, intentional choices about where you are going to put your precious,

Louise Miller:

precious time, energy, and attention.

Louise Miller:

That will help you to take the right action at the right time so you can

Louise Miller:

finish what you start, keep going around that lovely cycle and get what

Louise Miller:

you wanna get done done in a way that feels good and doesn't need to burn out.

Jon Clayton:

I think, um.

Jon Clayton:

On the point with the tree house as well about having that space, um, that can

Jon Clayton:

actually be a separate physical space.

Jon Clayton:

That something that I've found that's worked really well for me is

Jon Clayton:

leaving the home office and going somewhere completely different.

Jon Clayton:

And, uh, my favorite, which I admittedly I haven't done for a

Jon Clayton:

little while, is to have a, like a, I dunno what you wanna call it, a

Jon Clayton:

CEO day or in a away day where I.

Jon Clayton:

Head over to the coast and I go to the seaside for the day and I'll have a

Jon Clayton:

little bit of a walk in the morning.

Jon Clayton:

I find a lovely coffee shop.

Jon Clayton:

I'll have my, my tablet with me, my notebook, and I'll just spend a few

Jon Clayton:

hours, um, give myself space and time to just think about the bigger

Jon Clayton:

picture stuff in that setting and somewhere totally different from home.

Jon Clayton:

And I get so much done on those days.

Jon Clayton:

You know, I, I come away feeling like.

Jon Clayton:

I've been refreshed and a lot clearer about what I need to be working on

Jon Clayton:

and, um, you know, for the price of, you know, fish and chip lunch at the

Jon Clayton:

seaside, that's always part of it as well, and a couple of cups of coffee.

Jon Clayton:

Um, it, it's, it's fantastic, you know, and I, I really get so much done and

Jon Clayton:

it, yeah, that change of environment and if you're not able to do that,

Jon Clayton:

I mean, the other thing that I do on, um, probably at the weekly level

Jon Clayton:

is I go to the local coffee shop.

Jon Clayton:

I take my notebook, I go there for maybe one to two hours, and

Jon Clayton:

I, I think about, you know, what I need to be doing this week.

Jon Clayton:

You know, what I, what should I actually be working on?

Jon Clayton:

I've got all these things.

Jon Clayton:

I know I'm not gonna get them all done.

Jon Clayton:

But the change of scenery for me actually physically going somewhere different is

Jon Clayton:

really important because I, I know that if I stay at home in the home office.

Jon Clayton:

I struggle to make that space to, to do that type of work.

Louise Miller:

Yeah, a hundred percent.

Louise Miller:

I love that.

Louise Miller:

That sounds gorgeous.

Louise Miller:

Stay out at the seaside.

Louise Miller:

Yes, please.

Louise Miller:

Um, you know, and the smaller way you can do it if you just need 10

Louise Miller:

minutes, is to just get up, walk away from your desk and sit on the sofa, go

Louise Miller:

into a different room in your house.

Louise Miller:

If you don't have time to go out and have a lovely coffee, you

Louise Miller:

know, we can, I think you're right.

Louise Miller:

Changing the environment makes a massive difference.

Louise Miller:

And what are some small ways we can do that so it doesn't become.

Louise Miller:

This kind of aspirational thing that we somehow don't manage

Louise Miller:

to give ourselves time for.

Louise Miller:

We can find little small pockets of, you know, ways of doing this as well.

Louise Miller:

But yeah, I love that.

Louise Miller:

Can I come to the seaside next time you go?

Jon Clayton:

You can, yeah.

Jon Clayton:

Yeah, we could have A-A-A-C-E-O Day together at the seaside.

Jon Clayton:

That'd be fun.

Jon Clayton:

Um, Luis, was there anything else you wanted to add, um, about

Jon Clayton:

productivity or something related that we haven't already covered?

Jon Clayton:

I think we've covered quite a lot there, but, um, was there anything else that

Jon Clayton:

we overlooked that you need to mention?

Louise Miller:

I think the only thing, I'll try and keep it quick, and we did

Louise Miller:

touch on it earlier, but I just think it's really important to reemphasize.

Louise Miller:

There is nothing wrong with you if you are trying to copy what someone

Louise Miller:

else is doing, who you see as being productive and it doesn't work for you.

Louise Miller:

There is nothing wrong with you.

Louise Miller:

We are all different.

Louise Miller:

You know, I'm not John.

Louise Miller:

John's not me.

Louise Miller:

What works for me isn't necessarily gonna work for you, John.

Louise Miller:

So the best piece of advice I can give you is to just.

Louise Miller:

Get curious about what does work for you.

Louise Miller:

Build your own self-awareness experiment to find what works rather than looking

Louise Miller:

out there for people to tell you what is gonna help make you more productive.

Louise Miller:

You know, get curious and figure that out.

Louise Miller:

I know it can be difficult.

Louise Miller:

Um, come listen to my podcast if you want more on that.

Louise Miller:

Um, but yeah, I think you are not broken.

Louise Miller:

There is nothing wrong with you and you just haven't found what works for you yet.

Louise Miller:

And if you get curious, stop paying attention and experimenting.

Louise Miller:

You will figure that out.

Jon Clayton:

Thank you so much for coming on the show, sharing your expertise.

Jon Clayton:

Um, where's the best place online for people to connect with you?

Louise Miller:

Yeah, I come and connect with me on LinkedIn.

Louise Miller:

I love LinkedIn.

Louise Miller:

I'm quite active over there, so come find me.

Louise Miller:

Come say hello over there.

Louise Miller:

That would be great.

Jon Clayton:

That's great.

Jon Clayton:

And could you remind us about your quiz?

Jon Clayton:

Could you tell us a little bit about that?

Louise Miller:

Absolutely.

Louise Miller:

Yes.

Louise Miller:

Thanks John.

Louise Miller:

Yeah.

Louise Miller:

So I have created a free assessment which will help you to identify, um,

Louise Miller:

where you need to put your energy when it comes to getting more things done.

Louise Miller:

So it talks about focusing on the right things, setting yourself up for

Louise Miller:

success, and working on your business, which John and I talked about earlier.

Louise Miller:

Um, it will help you figure out which of those areas is the weakest for you.

Louise Miller:

And then I've curated some very thoughtful.

Louise Miller:

Practical resources that will help you to make improvements in

Louise Miller:

whichever area, um, needs some work.

Louise Miller:

So yeah, it's at louise miller.uk/quiz if you'd like to go and take that.