Workday Management Tips

I used to think that saying 'Yes' to every opportunity was the only path to success. This definition led me to a relentless chase for achievement, where 'No' was a word that simply didn't exist in my vocabulary. However, It wasn't long before this mindset led to a perpetual cycle of overcommitment, stress, and an inevitable sense of burnout. The toll on my well-being was evident, and paradoxically, my work suffered. The myth I held onto—that affirming everything would accelerate my career—was actually holding me back. I knew a change was needed. Only when I started embracing the power of 'No' did I begin to unlock higher levels of effectiveness and satisfaction in my career. This wasn't just about turning down requests; it was about affirming my priorities, respecting my limits, and ultimately, contributing more value in areas that truly mattered. To navigate this shift and build the skill of strategic “No," I turned to my friend Nihar Chhaya, an accomplished CEO coach with over 25+ years of experience. Nihar shared with me the following tips on how great leaders effectively say “No” (without burning bridges): 💬 "Let’s find another way to address this." ↳ Promotes collaboration and problem-solving. 💬 "I am unable to do it but I know [Name] can help." ↳ Suggests someone else who might assist. 💬 "I can't attend the event but thanks for the invite." ↳ Politely declines while showing gratitude. 💬 "Is there some other way I can support you?" ↳ Redirects the request while still offering assistance. 💬 "I can’t attend this meeting, but can I get the notes?" ↳ Declines while showing interest in staying informed. 💬 "I can’t join this project, but I can offer some advice." ↳ Declines participation while offering support. 💬 "Let’s set a different deadline that works for us both." ↳ Shows willingness to adjust and help with your limits. 💬 "Can we look at this again in a few weeks?" ↳ Keeps the door open for the future without a firm no. 💬 "Thank you for thinking of me, but I have priorities." ↳ Shows respect while setting boundaries. PS: Saying 'No' strategically prioritizes what matters to maximize our impact and supports our well-being. ---- Follow me, tap the (🔔) Omar Halabieh for daily Leadership and Career posts.

Your to-do list shouldn't control your life. 6 methods that kept me from losing my mind: (And doubled my output) 1. The Two-Minute Rule If something takes less than two minutes, do it immediately. Not later. Not tomorrow. But now. This simple rule prevents small tasks from snowballing into overwhelming anxiety. --- 2. Never Miss Another Detail I used to scramble taking notes during meetings + interviews, missing key points and action items. Now, I use Rev’s VoiceHub to auto-record and transcribe everything. It’s more accurate than alternatives like OtterAI and it’s easy to share the info with my team. --- 3. The Focus Formula 3 hours of deep work beats 8 hours of shallow work every time. Block your calendar, turn off notifications, set a timer, and just start. Watch your output soar. --- 4. Energy Management > Time Management Stop planning your day around the clock. Instead, match tasks to your natural rhythms – creative work in the morning, meetings after lunch, admin work when energy dips. Work with your body, not against it. --- 5. The Weekly Reset Ritual Every Sunday, clear your inbox, plan your priorities, set three main goals, and prepare your workspace. This turns Monday from a bottleneck into a launchpad. --- 6. Automate Everything Possible If you do something more than twice, automate it. From email templates to calendar scheduling, let tech handle the routine so you can focus on what matters. --- These tools & techniques will help you stay organized, manage your time better, and maintain your sanity. Try them out and see which ones work best for you. Reshare ♻ to help others. And follow me for more posts like this.

Why Leaders Must Put Down Their Phones—And What to Do About It We check our phones dozens of times a day, but the real cost isn’t just lost time—it’s lost leadership. Groundbreaking research from The University of Texas at Austin and others shows that just having your phone nearby—even if it’s off—reduces your brain’s available cognitive capacity and focus. 💡 Participants who had their phones in another room scored up to 11% better on cognitive tests than those who had their phones on the desk. For leaders, this “brain drain” is especially dangerous. When your attention is fragmented by your phone, you: • Miss subtle cues from your team • Struggle to make high-quality decisions • Model distracted behavior that your team will copy • Undermine trust and presence—key ingredients for influence and inspiration Constant phone use also stunts leadership development. When you’re always available, your team becomes dependent on you for every decision, stifling both their growth and yours. 💡 Research shows phone distractions can lower work efficiency by up to 20% and increase error rates after interruptions by over 20%. What Can Leaders Do Right Now? ↳ Keep Your Phone Out of Sight: Place your phone in a drawer or another room during deep work or meetings. Out of sight, out of mind. ↳ Turn Off Non-Essential Notifications: Mute all but critical alerts to reduce temptation and interruptions. ↳ Schedule Phone-Free Work Blocks: Set specific times for focused, phone-free work. Use timers or “focus mode” features. ↳ Model Digital Discipline: Show your team what real presence looks like. Be fully engaged in conversations and meetings—no phones allowed. ↳ Create “No-Phone” Zones: Establish clear boundaries for device use during meetings, brainstorming sessions, and one-on-ones. ↳ Use Technology to Fight Technology: Leverage apps that block distractions or track your phone usage to build better habits. ↳ Take Real Breaks: Encourage yourself and your team to take breaks without phones—go for a walk, journal, or connect face-to-face. Leadership in 2025 demands more than multitasking and constant connectivity. It requires deep focus, presence, and the ability to inspire others—qualities that can be eroded by unchecked phone use. The science is precise: putting down your phone is one of the simplest, most powerful ways to reclaim your leadership edge. Follow Joshua Miller for more tips on coaching, leadership, career + mindset. #leadership #executivecoaching #technology #mindset

I'm excited to share my system for staying productive all day, every day. This system allowed me to sell over $100M in my B2B sales career, then build a 7 figure coaching business working an average of 40 hours/week. Most importantly, my nights and weekends are free to spend with my family. Here's are the 3 simple steps I take every single week: Step 1: Complete a Weekly Plan & Scorecard at the beginning of each week On Monday mornings (or Sunday evening), I print and fill out a Weekly Plan & Scorecard. On this document, I write down all the important tasks and action items I aspire to get done that week in no particular order. I then rank each task in order of priority, typically prioritizing RGA's (Revenue Generating Activities) for my business. I originally took this scorecard from a book called the 12 Week Year, then adapted it to include a "Rank" column, which allows me to prioritize each action item. Prioritizing the Action Items allows me to know where to start every day, and prevents me from getting overwhelmed. Step 2: Daily Task Blocking in Calendar Whitespace At the beginning of each weekday, I fill up all the whitespace on my calendar for that day with high priority tasks taken directly from the Weekly Plan & Scorecard. This ensures that the most important tasks for the week get done first and eliminates daily decision fatigue. The key is to put the specific tasks on your calendar so there's no empty space. If for some reason any tasks on the calendar don't get completed for that day, I move them to the next day in any open whitespace. Step 3: Weekly Scoring At the end of each week, I score my performance using the simple formula: Tasks Completed / Tasks Written Down = Score % My goal is to score 85% or higher each week, although admittedly there are many weeks where I fall short. If there are any tasks that didn't get completed that week, they get moved to the following week. I rinse and repeat this process every single week. This ensures that I SHOW UP every single day, and stay productive throughout the entire work week. Additional keys to success include: 1. Taking short breaks when you feel mentally drained. Stretching, a short walk, and standing desk do wonders to change your state. 2. Minimize the number of daily meetings on your calendar (4 or less is optimal) to stay focused and ensure you have enough whitespace to get deep work done. 3. Give yourself an hour lunch to break up the work day. Every day I have lunch with my wife, and that's also on the calendar. 4. Do one thing at a time 5. If you have an unproductive day, forgive yourself. Of course, this is all easier said than done... That's why next week, in our 2nd *Transformation Tuesday* LIVE training session, I'm going to walk you through exactly how to leverage The 12 Week Year (and Weekly Scorecard) to transform your productivity and your life. Sign up here: https://lnkd.in/gsPsq2XR Only 500 spots available due to Zoom webinar limit!

Your boss keeps calling everything a "crisis," yet somehow, these "emergencies" happen every week. Here's the truth: Most workplace "crises" are completely predictable events that you or your boss failed to plan for. The solution is simple: schedule-syncing. Sit down with your manager and review your timeboxed calendar together. Show them exactly how you plan to spend your time, including when you'll be available for urgent requests. For example, if board members regularly call with urgent requests before every meeting, anticipate these requests by timeboxing your availability to assist. Alert your boss: "I'm happy to be available in case the CMO calls. However, that means I won't be able to do focused work during that time because I need to be ready for the call." Either you're doing focused work or you're the point person ready for the "unexpected." You can only have one priority at a time, and it’s your manager’s job to help you prioritize. Learn more about dealing with a distracting boss in my article here: https://lnkd.in/eKfD_9Sg

The most helpful thing you can do for your team? Start saying no. Sounds backwards, but 95% of those "urgent fires" disappear when you do this. "Just grab some time on my calendar and we'll catch up." You hang up. Frustrated. That call yanked you straight out of your coding flow state, and now you're staring at half-finished code like it's written in Eldritch runes. There goes your afternoon. No chance that PR is getting submitted by the end of the day now. Look, we want to help. We're wired to be polite, to not ruffle feathers. But all that politeness? It's killing our productivity one "touch base" at a time. Your calendar fills up with meetings that could've been solved with thirty more seconds on that phone call. Or… wild thought… an email. Here's your escape plan: 1. Learn to say no. Not "no" to be difficult, but "no" as a discussion tool. Force them to articulate what they actually need. Half the time, they don't even know. 2. Demand an agenda. No agenda? No meeting. Watch how fast "quick catch up" becomes "I need project status for the CEO report." Much more honest, right? 3. Question everything upfront. Got that agenda? Great. Fire off your questions via email. Provide your input on paper. Let the asynchronous magic happen. 4. Have the meeting… maybe. Funny thing happens when people get what they need through steps 1-3. About 95% of those meetings just… vanish. The remaining 5%? Those are the ones that matter. 5. Stay consistent. That one "quick question" becomes two, then four. Before you know it, you're calendar gets an INT32 overflow, and all that hard work gets reverted. Don't get me wrong. Workplace relationships matter. The human stuff is vital to your career whether you like it or not. But your time has value. And sitting in meetings for the sake of meetings wastes everyone's time… including theirs. Sometimes the most helpful thing you can do is protect your calendar. Your future self will thank you. #Leadership #ProductivityHacks #TechLeadership #SoftwareDevelopment #TimeManagement 🧃 Join the tribe. We’ve got juice boxes, job market scars, AI-induced existential dread, and real talk about tech leadership. Follow for rants, riffs, and the occasional roadmap out of the chaos.

That sign stopped me cold. "Stop trying to be liked by everybody. You don't even like everybody." Truth bomb right there. I used to be that CRC who said yes to everything. Late night monitoring visits? "No problem!" Weekend patient visits? "Happy to help!" Taking on studies I had no bandwidth for? "I'll figure it out!" Know what happened? The people I bent over backwards for still found something to complain about. The PI who got my weekends still questioned my commitment. The sponsor I stayed late for still pushed for more. Meanwhile, I was burning out trying to keep everyone happy. THE MOMENT EVERYTHING CHANGED: A senior CRA pulled me aside after watching me apologize for the fifth time during a monitoring visit. "Rudy, you're not here to be liked. You're here to be excellent." That hit different. So I started saying no. Not to everything. But to the things that compromised my quality. "Can you take on this 6th study?" "I can give you 100% on 5 studies or 60% on 6. Which serves our patients better?" "Can you skip lunch to finish this CRF?" "I'll complete it accurately after lunch, or rush through it hungry now. Your call." The people who valued excellence? They respected the boundaries. The people who just wanted a yes-person? They found someone else. And guess what? My performance reviews went UP. My stress levels went DOWN. My career took OFF. Because when you stop trying to please everyone, you start delivering excellence to the right ones. The math is simple: You have 100 units of energy per day. Spread across 20 people = 5 units each = mediocre everything. Focused on 5 people = 20 units each = exceptional results. You don't even like everybody. Stop exhausting yourself trying to make them like you. Excellence beats likability. Every. Single. Time. Who needs to hear this today? #ClinicalResearch #Boundaries #CareerGrowth #RealTalk

It feels good to be seen as the go-to person. But then the “yes” starts to haunt you when you realize you’ve got no idea where this extra work fits. Cue the late nights, the stress, and the resentment creeping in. We’ve all been there — wanting to be helpful, likable, or just a team player, even if it costs us. And while it’s totally understandable, it doesn’t make it any less overwhelming when you’re staring at a to-do list that feels impossible. Here’s the shift: Saying ”no“ isn’t about letting people down. It’s about setting boundaries that protect your energy, your time, and your ability to deliver your best work. And when you do take something on? It’s got to be with intention, not obligation. Here’s how to get there: 1️⃣ Pause Before You Say Yes: Instead of committing on the spot, practice saying, “Let me check my workload and get back to you.” This gives you breathing room to decide intentionally. 2️⃣ Get Real About Your Capacity: Take a hard look at your current commitments. What’s urgent, and what’s important? Where does this new request fit? 3️⃣ Set Boundaries Clearly: If it doesn’t fit, be honest: “I’d love to help, but I’m at capacity right now. Here’s an alternative suggestion…” If it does fit, define what you can realistically deliver and by when. When you stop defaulting to “yes,” you create more space for what truly matters. When you honor your limits, you show up better for yourself, your work, and yes, even your colleagues. The result? Less stress, fewer late nights, and more respect from colleagues who see you as someone with clear priorities and boundaries. Have you ever felt stuck in a “yes” you didn’t have room for? What’s one boundary you’re working on setting? Let’s talk about it in the comments.

Do you and your team struggle with competing priorities? Regardless of your role, business leader or practitioner, over the years I've learned that no matter the company, industry, start-up or enterprise, we have too many strategic initiatives and it gets in the way of focus and progress. 😤 What creates distraction from what we truly need to accomplish is: ✅ New TRENDS, TERMS, and TECH TOYS! ✅ There's more work than resources & funding. This creates DRIFT ✅ As things drift, we experience a lag with closure, resulting in FATIGUE ✅ As fatigue sets in, we forget our original PURPOSE and we digress. The cycle then repeats and it feels like an endless loop of projects without proper closure and celebrations. While this won't solve everything, it'll be a good start. It's worked for me in the past: ✍ Create a list of all the things that's requiring your time or the teams time ✍ Tag them as H (high value), M (medium value), L (low value) [you choose how you define value. For me I've used loose rules like "Is it aligned with our priorities and the companies mission? Keep it simple] ✍ Anything of H & M keep, anything tagged as L think about how to offload. [It may require a talk with your boss to say these lower value activities are distracting the team from the high-value activities, is there a way to delegate to de-prioritize? OR. It may require a discussion about constrained resources and budget, and how to best prioritize efforts so you can apply resources accordingly] ✍ Always prioritize resources and funding to the H's, and whatever is left over to the M's. [When asked about progress on the M's, you say the team is doing the best it can with the workload of the higher priority times. If things need to progress faster, its a good idea to discuss capacity & funding] ✍ When someone asks you to do something else, DO NOT immediately say 'YES'. [You say "I know the work is important and it needs to get done, I want to help. let me assess the teams capacity & bandwidth so I can get back to you with realistic timeframes to make sure its acceptable for you", or. something like that] ✍ Watch out for your own issues with over committing. Be reasonable about what you can and cannot accomplish in a 50-70 hour week. [Sorry I can't help those who have a 40 hour work weeks, never had that 😢] More to come ... sign up for my upcoming Newsletter! https://lnkd.in/ejvkkuGi (I'm a practitioner turned C-Suite exec 4x's over and one of the first Chief Data & Chief AI Officers appointed back in 2016. I have a lot of scrapped knees & bruised elbows to share). 

That scattered, stressed-out feeling? It’s not your fault—it’s the cost of constant distraction. Your brain isn’t designed to switch tasks 47 times before lunch. Yet, that’s exactly what tech distractions are doing to us. In fact, when we allow ourselves to be constantly interrupted by technology, we’re not just losing time—we’re showing disrespect. Disrespect for our own time. Disrespect for those around us. And disrespect for the important work we’re trying to accomplish. Here’s how I help leaders and teams take back control of their day: 1. Define your tech boundaries. Turn off nonessential notifications. Create clear rules for when and how you engage with digital tools. 2. Block focused time. Carve out space on your calendar where no interruptions are allowed. Protect it like your most important meeting—because it is. 3. Be the example. People follow what you model. Show others what it looks like to respect your time—and theirs. 4. Don’t just manage time. Respect it. Time is your most precious asset. Treat it that way, and everything else improves. You don’t have to abandon your phone. But you do need to be the one in control of it. What’s one small change you can make this week to show more respect for your time? #productivity #multitasking #davecrenshaw