If you’re reading this, then one thing is for certain. It isn’t out of curiosity but a deeper reason. You want the answer to what’s most probably your 2 am in the morning question.  ‘Why is my career not going the way I want it to, maybe it’s me?’

That’s a question a number of high achievers have when they hit a roadblock in their career.

These are the A-plus students who got great grades and were supposed to achieve a lot in life. The success path continued at college, and you got an awesome job that gave you financial freedom.

You’re probably doing pretty well in your career right now but for some reason, you’re unable to reach your peak and achieve that much desired position despite all the hard work you put in.

To the outside world it looks like you’ve arrived, and, in a way, you have but not at your desired destination.

Inside you know you deserve more and can do better but your career trajectory feels like it’s stalled a little or even plateaued.

If the issue bothers you too much, you might go looking for answers on Quora, try connecting with someone who you feel might have the answer on LinkedIn and after connecting ask to pick their brain (and then get cold shouldered if the brain picking is something that professionals pay them good money for).

You might do a Google search on the topic which could lead you to a page with details of booking a Discovery or Strategy Call with a Coach and you book the session expecting a silver bullet to solve your painful problem.

The point of these sessions is not to play Agony Aunt or provide free advice or coaching but to assess the person’s problem, see if they are a good fit for the coach’s services and if you are ready to do what it takes to change your situation.

I’ve got an easier first step you might want to consider and then go looking deeper for a solution that gets your career back on track.

Somewhere you might be the problem and your mindset, habits and actions are sabotaging your career.

The good news is, you’re also the solution.

Maybe sabotage is a harsh word to use so let me rephrase it.

Take a good and honest look at yourself. See if you’re being held back by one or more of these five factors that commonly stop people from reaching their career peak.

These are also signs that you’re sabotaging your career and need to take proactive action.

Fear of failure

I elaborate more on this limiting belief in my post Take the sting out of Fear of Failure it’s only a Belief  sharing the story of Willis Carrier. It’s how he turned failure into success with a shift of mindset.

Fear of failure stops you from taking risks and seizing opportunities. What we often forget is that we have free will and can choose how we deal with failure.

You can allow it to engulf you and never take a chance or you can use it as a steppingstone to success.

That means reframing what failure means to you personally. It doesn’t have to be an all-out disaster. Simply the shift to thinking that you haven’t found what works yet. It can be paralyzing, but only if you let it.

My favorite example is of Thomas Alva Edison, who famously failed to invent the working light bulb more than a thousand times before he hit on the right formula.

The converse of failure is persistence. And persistence will out-perform innate talent every time.

Lacking Focus, Endurance and Easily Distracted

In any activity or endeavor, it is important to build endurance. Endurance can be defined as the ability to focus on the task at hand and bring it successfully to conclusion.

Some call it fortitude, others call it strength or stamina.

No matter what you call it though, endurance is the ability to persevere and get the job done, no matter what.

Usually, when we speak of endurance, we’re referring to physical activity. Yet, endurance is as important in the business world as it is anywhere else.

In business circles, endurance usually takes the form of focus. Instead of physical prowess, it becomes the ability to concentrate successfully on a given task.

Focus is a critical skill set for any professional. Especially in today’s fast-paced world where success often means keeping several equally important balls in the air at one time.

So, how do you focus on multitasking, a situation where, by its very definition, several things are happening at once?

The key to successful focus is attention.

When several things are happening simultaneously, you need to concentrate on only one thing at a time. This doesn’t mean you bring one task to full completion before you start on another.

Rather, you spend just enough time on a given task to take it to the next stage of development and then you turn your attention to another task. In some sense, it’s a little like being a mother duck with ducklings.

You give your attention to the duckling that is farthest out of line, nudging it forward to where it should be, before you turn your attention to the next little duck.

Each duckling gets a measure of your focus, but none gets your full attention all the time. In this way, each task gets moved along in turn, and all are successfully completed in time.

Staying focused on big picture goals is the key to achieving success. It’s easy to be distracted by side issues and the demands of your email or phone. Staying productive requires attention and focus.

Make it easier to produce high-quality, consistent work by keeping focused on the current priorities and sticking to your plan.

If need be, take steps to power up your focus muscles.

Self-doubt

Sometimes we get a bad boss who undermines our efforts or a project that you worked hard on fails and your confidence takes a hit. Depending upon the situation and the fall out, your otherwise confident self now starts to second guess decisions and actions.

This internal feeling shows up in the quality of your work and impacts your career progress when your boss begins to think you’ve reached your optimal level of competency (remember the Peter Principle?) whereas that is not the case.

Self-doubt can undermine all your efforts if you let it.

The way I see it, you are responsible for writing your own success story so why indulge in self-sabotage?

Instead, when the self-doubt gremlin surfaces, remember your past achievements. Look back, see all the steppingstones that brought you to where you are now. You have the skills, and you have the know-how to get where you want to go.

Procrastination

It’s normal to feel overwhelmed at work sometimes. A solid time management plan can help to focus on the tasks that really need to get done within a time frame.

But sometimes, there are actions we need to take which feel uncomfortable or difficult. We start to delay them until we’re in full procrastination mode.

You may not want to talk to a difficult client or have that performance feedback session with your subordinate even though you know how important it is.

You don’t want to experience the discomfort and that’s normal, you’re human but the longer you put off uncomfortable tasks or discussions, the worse it is going to get. Leaders can feel discomfort too, but they do what is required of them.

It comes down to a failure to take the right action at the right time.

There are times when procrastination is good and I outline them in this post, but for the better part of the time, this creates an impression that you’re not responsible or diligent and that can impact your career.

Instead, why not commit to the action in your diary, plan for it and do it?

I recently read a great article by Justin Bariso where he shared the 5 Minute Rule used by emotionally intelligent people to overcome procrastination. It works provided you take action.

Procrastination is a habit and it can be replaced with a better habit – the habit of considered action.

There are many studies that look into the psychology of procrastination. It isn’t just a time management issue although procrastination gets bunched into it.

If you need some quick help, then my mini-course How to Stop Procrastinating Right Now is a good starting point.

Complacency

Who would have thought being complacent can adversely affect your career path?

This behavior kicks in when you know you’re good at your job and have potential. Instead of working to demonstrate you’re ready for the next level, you decide to rest on your laurels expecting to be given the next promotion or a leadership role.

Here’s a truth bomb for you. Different positions up the corporate ladder require different skill sets. If you’re not demonstrating you have them or the keenness to acquire them, then that will pull the brakes on your career progression.

If you’re lucky to have a good boss who takes an interest in your career while also ensuring the work gets done, then you might be guided to undertake specific training to develop new skills.

When that isn’t the case, then you need to figure out what new skills are required to match your ambition.

One key skill you need to acquire is Executive Presence. Your higher ups need to ‘see’ you’re ready for the next level. Competition gets tougher as you climb up the corporate ladder and you need to stand up above the others for all the right reasons.

If you really want to reach the top of your field, then you need to balance your actual work with working on yourself. In this TedTalk, Anthony Cheam shares what it REALLY takes to become the best version of yourself.

So stop being complacent and expecting things to happen but make them happen!

The bottom line is, you’re responsible for your career success and it starts by being proactive and professional development.

Don’t wait for your employer to do it for you – do it yourself!

Do you have a goal achievement routine to close the month and kick off a new month?

If not, I highly recommend you start one. Procrastination and going with the flow are not effective tactics.

Month-end is a time of reflection and planning for me. I wrap up the month that is ending, celebrating my wins and set clear intentions to guide my work for the new month.

This 1 ritual keeps me on track for my business and helps me to maintain my work life balance.

It also gives me a chance to reflect on what I want to achieve and how far I’ve progressed with my goals for the year following the guidance in Goal Achievement Simplified.

My theme and focus for May was goal achievement and I shared my strategies and tactics with Karmic Ally Coaching’s subscribers.

In this post, I’ll show you what I do to stay focused, especially when procrastination rears its ugly head.

It’s really quite simple, provided you have the Willpower to stick to it.

7 Step Process for getting monthly Goals and Tasks done

I love checklists and To Do Lists. There’s nothing like making big tick marks or crossing out actions and having a document that captures evidence of goals achieved and what needs to be tweaked to succeed. The image below captures the process.

It’s a simple 7 step formula which works because it brings your attention and awareness to where you are and where you want to go.

In fact, all Karmic Ally Coaching programs work on this premise – to move you from point A to B in the fastest and easiest manner possible.

I have another little practice that I use during steps 5 and 6 which works even for those of us who aren’t into metaphysical practices. It involves using the Power of Intention and Gratitude backed up by commitment to get the work done.

The details of this practice are given in my blog post Are You Intent on Intending?

This isn’t just a Law of Attraction or Creative Visualization Technique. It works well with time management strategies and I recommend you try it.

For example, 2 of my goals for May were to complete a new mini-course for you to help you decide what you want from your job, career or even business and launch a shorter coaching program for a career action plan that will incorporate my favorite metaphysical techniques.

I used the powers of intention and gratitude to raise my vibrations and completed these tasks while I also served my clients, had time for my family and hung out on LinkedIn and Facebook engaging in interesting Group discussions.

Are you game to try it too?

Fine-tuning your game plan for middle-term goals

When it comes to middle-term or quarterly goal achievement and results, I further fine-tune my ritual and practices for successful goal achievement.

I like to plan my main work for the middle month in any quarter and then use the 3rd month for the big push and get results.

Our business or career isn’t the only thing that is important in our life. Our life consists of various other aspects and it’s important to make sure our Wheel of Work doesn’t go wonky. (There’s an entire lesson dedicated to this in my Career or Job Change mini-course).

Considering the demands on our time whether it is work, business, health, family, community or time for spiritual practices, it’s important to run a tight ship or at least be in control of our time.

The cost of procrastination is too high!

Cost-benefit analysis approach to combating procrastination

Quite possibly it’s my finance background and love of numbers but many of my decisions are finalized after doing a cost-benefit analysis or CBA.

CBA doesn’t necessarily have to be a monetary one although money can be a cost or benefit. It’s also useful as a time management tool when we look at it from a task payoff perspective.

One thing that I do know from experience is that procrastination is a luxury that costs us more than it benefits us.

Delaying a task or action will definitely have some consequence on either our time or money.

1. Time – you’ll recognize this one from standing in long queues to pay your bills because you delayed it or thought you would do it online. But you didn’t factor the minimum banking clearance time provisions in the service providers rules
2. Money – ever missed the deadline for your credit card payment and got whopped with penalties and interest? Need I say more?

Not all our procrastination will cost us both at the same time but what if it did?

If you are prone to procrastinating, then the next time an urge arises to delay a task, ask yourself the simple question

Which of these 2 things will my inclination to procrastinate cost me? Time or Money or both?

Then work out the benefit that you will receive from procrastinating.

The only benefit I can think of is worry and that is not a benefit by any stretch of imagination!

Simply asking this question will raise your awareness of the issue and hopefully, you’ll take some action.

Procrastination is a habit and it can be replaced with a better habit – the habit of considered action.

There are many studies that look into the psychology of procrastination. It isn’t just a time management issue although procrastination gets bunched into it.

If you need some quick help, then my mini course How to Stop Procrastinating Right Now is a good starting point. If you need more help, then check out the additional resource at the bottom of this page.

Have you ever compromised the potential of achieving your goals by sacrificing them at the altar of Procrastination?

Or do you have a method to get back on track? Do share with me in the comments box below!

Additional Resource for Serious Procrastinators

If the habit of procrastination is deeply embedded and you need more support, then consider my How to Stop Procrastinating right now mini course. You get immediate access to this habit changing self-development course. Use it whenever the urge to procrastinate raises its ugly head.  Click here or on the image below to learn more.

Procrastination is a complex personal challenge. For many, it’s an enigma associated with time management and our inclination to stall important actions ultimately adversely impacting our personal and professional lives.

In my Procrastination Quiz, we looked at different activities to ascertain whether a person was a habitual procrastinator along the deferment spectrum.

The good news is procrastination is a habit and habits can be changed with the right approach and attitude. We have a choice.

Procrastination is an equal opportunity habit that interferes with the productivity of people from every economic level, profession, age, or other demographic category.

That’s what I discovered for myself at Quora where I often answer questions on self-development. This time, there were 2 different people with different demographic profiles who wanted to get rid of their procrastination habit.

One was a student who admitted that he got easily distracted whenever he tried to read or study. His concentration level was less than a few minutes even when he was studying. He wanted tips to overcome this dilemma and find an efficient way to overcome procrastination.

The other person wanted to be a top performer at work. He was aware of the fact that when work got too hard, he’d cop out and enjoyed procrastinating. He wanted to change this time wasting behavior.

Practically everyone has at least 1 or more serious procrastination challenge to meet, especially workplace procrastination.

Procrastination is multifaceted

It’s more than a delay tactic. The concept isn’t as simple as you might think. There are 3 elements that make up procrastination and both readers who had asked for advice demonstrated these elements.

I mentioned earlier that procrastination was a habit. To be clearer, procrastination is an automatic problem habit; where we put off an important and timely activity until another time. It’s a process that has probable consequences.

We procrastinate because we have a negative perception about an anticipated activity.

This creates an urge to diverge by substituting something less relevant, and our procrastination is more often than not accompanied with thinking of justifications to delay action.

The decision to delay action brings immediate relief and hope but also reinforce the procrastination decision, making other procrastination decisions more likely in the future.

Have you ever had to do an important task and thought, “I’ll do this later when I feel ready.”? Or suddenly realized you have to take the dog for a walk, wash dishes or start cleaning the desk?

You’ve procrastinated and avoided the task. You can justify the urgency of the substituted tasks till the cows come home but the truth is, you’ve postponed the more important task.

More than a simple act of avoidance, procrastination involves a process of interconnected perceptions and thoughts, emotions and sensations and actions.

Choice comes into play when you recognize that you can either take corrective action or do nothing and hope for the best.

What’s an efficient way to overcome procrastination?

Procrastination is often a sign of deeper problems and useful in avoiding things that we know we need to do but want to justify not doing them. I don’t know anyone who chooses to develop a procrastination habit. If you are unsure try this Procrastination Quiz

Recognizing the tendency to procrastinate, for whatever reason, is half the battle.

Then it’s time to analyze the specific situations where you procrastinate and ask yourself some hard questions. What is the trigger for the procrastination?

It certainly isn’t a challenging task but some underlying reason. Is it fear of failure, perfectionism or a secondary benefit or pay-off? We procrastinate to put off things that make us uncomfortable.

Once you know the true underlying cause for procrastination and the key area where your exhibit this behavior, you can move forward and turn yourself into a top performer.

Perhaps better planning and chunking down tasks to acceptable bytes and building in some relaxation time might help as a starting point.

Think along those lines and then create a doable action plan to overcome your procrastinating tendencies.

I’ve found the Pomodoro technique to be useful when work feels like a huge mountain in front of me. You can learn more in my post Can a Tomato improve your Time Management?

Ultimately change is a choice, and it is our responsibility to take corrective action.

However change is also a process and is a habit that keeps us in our comfort zone. Would you like to change this inefficient and productivity reducing habit?

I suggest you take the How to Stop Procrastinating right now micro-course. Click here for the details or on the image below. The course is housed on my Karmic Ally Coaching Training website.

Do you know why you procrastinate on some actions and breeze through others? How do you keep this habit in check?

Do share your tips and experience in the comments section below.

At an Effective Time Management Workshop that I facilitated, we were nearing the lunch break and the topic under discussion was Procrastination.

Now as anyone who has ever facilitated or participated in a Time Management Workshop would tell you, procrastination is a known impediment to effective time management needing to be dealt with immediately…

…. Like yesterday and we are urged to join the Procrastinators Anonymous without further delay and seek help. 

On a more serious note, yes, procrastination is an issue but it’s not a terminal condition. Knowing why one procrastinates is half the battle.

I prefer to analyze the reasons and triggers for procrastinating and then work out solutions rather than jumping in and putting into action every known anti-procrastination tactic in town.

How to eat a frog

It often helps to take a lighter look at life when tackling one’s problems and that is why I simply love and recommend reading Brian Tracy’s book Eat That Frog!

This book deals with procrastination and compares tasks to frogs.

Here, your frog is the task that will have the greatest impact on achieving your goals, and the task that you are most likely to procrastinate starting.

The secret to reaching higher levels of effectiveness and efficiency is to tackle your major task, the one that will impact your goals the most and which you are most likely to procrastinate. You need to do this first thing each morning without thinking too much about it.

Quite similar to closing your nose and taking that tablespoon of cod liver oil every morning for good health. (Nowadays we can just take a capsule, but that is another story).

To quote

“If the first thing you do each morning is to eat a live frog, you can go through the day
with the satisfaction of knowing that that is probably the worst thing
that is going to happen to you all day long!”

Another nugget of advice

“If you have to eat a live frog, it does not pay to sit and look at it for a very long time!”

But what if you have 2 important tasks in front of you?

How do you decide? Well, then

“If you have to eat two frogs, eat the ugliest one first!”

In other words, start with the biggest, hardest and most important task first. Apply self-discipline to begin immediately and then to persist until the task is complete before you go on to something else.

In the corporate world, we are paid and promoted to achieve the organizations SMART Goals.

Our own goals and development plans are part of the Big Plan and we are paid to achieve these goals while trying to set our own goals. Successful professionals know how to merge the macro with the micro goals. They are efficient and effective.

When Procrastination is healthy

So a spell of silence fell upon the room when I asked “Can procrastination be healthy?’

Suspicion about my intentions was apparent. But one participant found the courage to say that procrastination could be healthy if a person was tired and knew that performing a task in that state would result in mistakes. Or having to redo the task again thus wasting time. Bingo!

The room came alive with 4 more reasons to procrastinate with consensus that procrastination may be healthy if…..

• Done when necessary to recover from fatigue

Some tasks require alertness and attention and may go wrong if undertaken under conditions of fatigue

• Allows time to consider alternatives, plans, etc

Sometimes new information or issues emerge which require closer attention and deferring decisions or tasks is imperative to consider all options and strategize to ensure success of the ultimate goal

• Allows regrouping

A better decision and course of action may emerge when one thinks it through, undertakes more research and has discussions with others who may have experience of the situation

• Is understood to be short-term and will not affect one’s self-confidence

Literally, it has to be short-term and within an appropriate time frame. There are no brownie points for delaying actions or decisions which can turn the green on your milestone chart to red!

If the delay is due to diffidence in making choices or decisions, immediately ask for support from your colleagues or immediate supervisor.

There is another reason when procrastination may actually work in your favor.

Sometimes, we procrastinate, inspite of ourselves. That feeling to delay action.

Is it your intuition?

When that happens to me, I apply the same rational approach to analyze why I am procrastinating and if it is not a life and death situation, wait a day to action it. Something usually happens to validate the delay in action. 

That’s where Karmic Ally Coaching’s online course How to Stop Procrastinating right now comes into the picture.

Learn more by clicking the image below.