GC:OPINION

GC:OPINION Is your life on big KPI

I don’t know about you, but the last six months I have kind of felt like my existence on this planet has become one big KPI. With my daily life adjusting to the new world of pandemic life, it feels like one continuous to do list with little demarcation between work and as self help gurus call ‘me time’.

The best way to describe myself is the world’s most productive lazy person. I am addicted to making daily lists of things and objectives to complete, where I offer myself some arbitrary celebratory metaphorical carrot at the completion of said list. I then treat myself by writing out tomorrow’s list.. The best way to describe me is similar to Sisyphus, where my rock is a continuous list!

I have always been a sucker for writing lists to get stuff done, I think I get it from my mother, where one of the childhood memories I have is her writing down a list the size of an an ancient scroll, which she would then recite back to me. I knew even then that it was going to be a long day with small sore feet.

When we were all forced to work from home we were told a great way to keep things regimented was to have lists and some type of order to your day. This in theory should prevent you falling through the cracks mentally, in what seemed to be an unsure time for us all.

I will be honest with you, this did secretly make me happy, as now people could see the joy that making a list can bring to your life. There may have been a global pandemic, but we all had our to do lists and lists can save the world! Listening to the self help gurus to keep myself on the up and up in the lockdown, only felt like having a more negative effect on me by adding it to my list of things to do each day. They said I should exercise and set a time for daily contemplation. These things just seemed to add to my daily list or KPI that this life had become.

To assist me with the daily exercise KPI, I purchased a generic branded step and sleep counter to monitor my progress. I would have brought a Fit Bit but I am just too cheap. I want my data to be harvested at a very competitive price. If a piece of technology is going to harass me to move every hour, then let’s keep it to under thirty Euros.

As I am one of those weird people who get addicted to gamified solutions, so instead of getting my child to go to the kitchen to fetch me some food (dont judge me, it is no different to the young bringing back foraged food to the village elders), i was more than happy to get them extra 30 steps in.

However, by further digitising my life with my sleep even now becoming a KPI I would try and set new personal bests for quality of sleep, waking up the next day wondering how to improve it.

Where many criticise and objectify social media influencers for just being very good looking empty shells, are we also falling prey to this from self help gurus who do not follow their own advice. Who realistically has the time to read one book a week, as we are advised by some excitable mental maven.

Moreover, we are told to enjoy the two words I detest the most in the modern lexicon ‘grind’ and ‘hustle’. When did the words hard work and focus become so old fashioned. Further to this, the new phrase which also annoys me is its bed fellow ‘trust the process’. I think a lot of the happy clappy self help gurus should also teach people when they should cut their losses on things which are a drain in your time, rather than thanklessly hanging in there.

Before anyone confuse this with quitting too early, I would say one of the best life skills you can learn is when to acknowledge when your time is needlessly being spent and can be used more productively, By trusting the process, you are acting passively in thinking that the universe will fix the badly planned project you are working on.

Knowing that I had to change things and cure my addiction to my list based lunacy, I spoke with Dr Nicholas Steeringwheel, who argues that by making these three small amendments can make huge differences.

• Don’t overload your list with unachievable as-

signments. Think about how and when you would achieve a task on your list before you commit to it.Break huge difficult jobs into smaller achievable goals.

• Don’t use your list as a memory aid. It’s tempting to put every passing thought on to-do lists.Having scores of impossible wishes on your list will only camouflage those tasks that you actually need to do.

• Arrange list by deadline. Work out what is urgent and time sensitive, and those that are less so.This will focus your time and help you cut through the list. Dr Nicholas did actually offer a longer list of things to do, however taking this discussion into account, it was probably not good to have a list to check on your other list.

Game Changers favorite master of the mind Maria Meramveliotaki, who gave us a couple of ideas on how to streamline your list system. “There are two ways to attack this. Firstly, a common practice is to get the quick wins at the top of your list, so you can see your self gathering momentum. Moreover, also take a moment to see on your list what are the critical tasks, and allocate the time that you believe is adequate to complete them.”

Maria goes further and adds “Whilst having a list can give you focus, don’t become a slave to it and use it as the cornerstone of your life. It is important to have some kind of flexibility and fluidity to your day.”

Taking into account what the guru’s say, I think it is time to streamline my list system and only add what is relevant to the here and now, and hopefully I will not turn into Guy Pearce from the film Memento!

Speakers Corner Why I hate Woman’s Day

ANONYMOUS

I must be some type of masochist, it’s Monday morning I am looking at Linkedin procrastinating with a huge list of things to do. However I had to contact GC to write an anonymous article based upon what I observed this morning.

The fact I have to write this anonymously is pretty self explanatory, as we live in a time where if you make a critique or have a view that is conflicting with a very vocal minority, it can be detrimental to your career.

I am going to hopefully successfully construct a somewhat coherent argument where the minimum I aim for is just to acknowledge my position before, and avoid the blind rage of cancel culture and all the related collateral damage that comes with it.

It’s international Women’s Day and judging by the mess that Linkedin has become, I feel that many people have missed the mark totally on its meaning. They have made it into, at best a huge bundle of self congratulatory nonsense, and at worst weapons grade day of virtue signalling.

Usually on a Monday I have my standard morning caffeine injection so I can think clearly (although some reading this you might think that I have started drinking early), I have not had any major disagreements with my partner over the weekend to make my opinion based on some residual gender rage from any weekend activity.

Furthermore, before the angry comments start about me being a woman hater, or perhaps having the same psychological profile as a serial killer, let me state my position. I am not one of those weirdos who argues that there should be a men’s day (which there is one already), I just get tired of organisations hitching their wagon to the latest cause, or whatever special day we are commemorating today..

Let’s take Women’s Day for example. An institution gives them gifts with the following formula in mind, five percent gratitude and ninety five percent with the express intent that they take a picture and put it on social media with the brand tagged. How does this improve women’s empowerment.or is it just an easy piece of content generated to satisfy the algo gods of social media.

I think what spurred me on was one particular example that stood out to me. Now they probably had the very best of intentions when they created the content.However, they published a picture of US Stateswoman Madeleine Albright, with a standard empowerment quote attached to it. Sadly, they did not make a second one where she stated that 500,000 children dying in the Middle East is a price worth paying to bring stability to the region (60 Minutes, May 12th 1996).

My point is, if you’re going to do this, then at least do some basic research into which person you are attaching to your message, as your good intention may be completely honorable, it can go horribly wrong.

How many times do we see organisations put out the standard we love our woman message on their socials. To me respect is not shown by a gif or a meme. Perhaps a pay rise, decent maternity leave and understanding if there is a family issue that needs to be contented with would be the best way rather than a group photo holding a bunch of flowers.

Is this nothing more than virtue signalling, peer pressure and weak minded marketers who think it is great to attach their brand to any cause or whatever special day it is today. Why do we do it? Marketing departments are riddled with FOMO directionless box tickers, who think this is a great way to get ‘eyes’ on their brand.

Do organisations ever really take the necessary action to follow their bulkily constructed memes and words that they just fired out into the social media universe? Not from my experience. If you take a look at the composition of CEO’s, the overwhelming majority in an FX company are male. The only roles that women dominate are compliance, marketing roles and support roles.

How long before we have to employ a woke consultant who tells us what are the ’hottest’ causes to follow to raise our brands profile. Based upon what I have seen in looking at this subject, people very rarely buy from you because you are supporting a cause. Keep it simple, just sell me your product. It’s a nice clean relationship between buyer and seller.

A further point is taking the knee. Whilst it was a very worthy thing to do, which did highlight a huge injustice. However, it did lose its power with it becoming nothing more than a we better do it as we dont want to look bad exercise.

Where were these brands when Colin Kapernick did this several years back before it was fashionable? More importantly, when do you stop doing it and how do you stop without offending others. Is there a set criteria for how long something like this should be adhered to?

In essence I think it is a modern phenomenon which we are all guilty off, myself included. In that you post a supportive meme or add the latest cause over your picture on your socials, and it absolves you of the need to take any actual positive action that should be taken to redress the balance. By highlighting a cause it really is a cop out of doing something positive. For example, if you were laying on the side of the road with a broken leg, would you like someone to highlight your plight with a wonderful linkedin campaign, or would you like them to actually take action and help?

It really is a moral quandary which you can solve by taking the first step and making sure that you treat people of all genders, ethnicities and backgrounds with the dignity they deserve,rather than just virtue signalling us all.

think more importantly we can stop the evil nexus of the HR and marketing departments coming together with their ridiculous employee appreciation day cake on my desk. Let’s take positive action and give me a decent salary from your booming brokerage that is dripping with money.

Anyway...it’s Monday and my rant has cleansed my spirit. Have a great day everyone.