Soft Deadlines to Get You Started and Keep You Going

Clock-Soft Deadlines

Use soft deadlines to save yourself THIS kind of stress!

Soft deadlines offer you a powerful path away from procrastination and toward time success. I touched on this time skill in yesterday’s post titled “Prioritizing Your Time to Power Up Your Day!

Today I’m going to dig deeper into ways that you can implement soft deadlines to amp up your productivity and avoid pitfalls of procrastination.

So let’s jump in and explore today’s timely tip:

Tip: Soft deadlines keep you from bumping into hard limits.

Completing a task before the absolute last minute supports your success and helps your flexibility. So, starting today, begin to routinely provide yourself with earlier, soft deadlines. This creates a cushion of time for tying up loose ends and handling unanticipated glitches.

ACTION STEP: Start assigning soft deadlines for important tasks.

Write your soft deadlines into your calendar. Consider writing all of them in one color, and adding the hard deadlines in another color so you can easily distinguish between the two. Then practice focusing on the soft deadline, so that you create the latitude you desire.

EXPLORATION: When establishing a soft deadline, ask yourself:

1. How familiar is this task?

Schedule extra time for new challenges – remember the “times two” rule and double your time estimate!

2. How many people’s cooperation and assistance do you need to complete the project?

Allow for more time as the number of dependencies increases.

3. How vulnerable is this project to disruptions?

Are you squeezing a big enterprise into an already full space? Expect spillover and schedule accordingly!

4. What is your personal history with meeting deadlines?

If you habitually drag your heels for any reason, build in buffer time to help overcome your resistance.

5. What consequences will you face if your final deadline is not met?

Let your soft deadline create a safety zone to protect you from harsh outcomes.

As you explore using soft deadlines, along with honing your prioritizing skills, you’ll be amazed and pleased with how these tools affect your experience of each of your moments.

And if procrastination is something that holds you back, you’re certainly not alone. Millions of people struggle with this energy draining time thief. Procrastination’s costs include lost productivity, lost income, lost opportunities, frazzled nerves and damaged relationships.

My accessible and immediately actionable E-Guide Book titled I Don’t Know Where to Start!” How to Stop Stalling, Get Clear, and Turn Procrastination into Productivity offers you a clear path to get to the roots of your procrastination and start doing rather than delaying — today.

“I Don’t Know Where to Start!” unmasks this time thief with exercises to help you identify your own unique brand of procrastination. And it provides insights to help you successfully address what you discover.

That’s the good news! You really can make conscious choices about your time and how to use it. And you really can change old habits and patterns. Using the tools and skills you’ll learn in “I Don’t Know Where to Start” you’ll get started and keep going!

To learn more about this powerful E-Guide Book and its accompanying bonuses, just click this link.

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