10/29/2018 0 Comments The Correlation Between Dr. Marbourg and Dr. No's Cell Phone Habits and Your PracticeDid you update your iPhone to iOS 12? If you did, you have likely noticed that there is a new feature called Screen Time. (And if you are like most people, you have probably already checked to see if you can disable it!) Screen Time not only tells us how much time we are spending on our phones, but it also breaks it down to show us just how much time we are wasting. (Yes, you did spend 2.783 hours today on Instagram. Facebook? 1.3 hours...) A recent Rewire article titled, "Should Adults Have Screen Time Limits, Too?,"which dives into the subject of screen addiction, notes that "the average adult spends close to 11 hours looking at screen time and checks their phone every 10 minutes." Outside of Visionamerica's Dr. Jim Marbourg and Dr. Rod Nowakowski, we all probably spend too much time on our phones. While that is concerning on a personal level, it also has a direct correlation to how we spend our time at our practices.
The introduction of Screen Time got us thinking about time management in our practices and, specifically, how we handle both "urgent" and "important" matters. In his book, The Tyranny of the Urgent, Charles Hummel writes, "When I say, 'I don't have time for this project,' I really mean, 'I don't consider it as important as something else I want or need to do.' For whatever reason, I have decided to use the hours another way - on a task I am pressured to do or on one that I enjoy. It may be planned or impulsive... The first step to regain control of time is to decide what activities are most important so that we can plan to give them the proper priority during a day or a week or a month." Hummel points to the obvious when he states that we are all allotted the same 24 hours each day and goes on to say that the key to better managing your time is to first discover where it is currently going and then budget it according to what is truly important. This isn't a new topic, but it seems to be one that most professionals can't get their hands around. To effectively manage our time, we must know what is most important to our success within our practice. Hummel defines urgent as "something with a time restriction or a demand" and important as "something that brings value." But knowing the difference between urgent and important isn't enough. You have to know what is urgent and important to both you and your practice! Establishing what's important and urgent Here's the truth: While we can all agree on many things that aren't urgent or important, there will be some things that are uniquely urgent and important to your practice. But determining what is urgent and important isn't easy. The four categories on the grid are Important/Urgent, Important/Not Urgent, Urgent/Not Important, and Not Important/Not Important. (See the famed Eisenhower Decision Matrix to the right.) Covey, Merrill, and Merrill also conducted research and discovered the breakdown of time spent in each category by typical organizations and individuals. As you can see, this easily explains why many of our days are hectic and stressful. Let's take a closer look at what falls under each of these categories and how we can use them as guidelines to make better use of our time. Important/Urgent The Important/Urgent category is crucial, but you don't want to operate there. In a perfect world, things that are both important and urgent would be surprises. There are times when something significant comes up in the middle of the day that we simply have no control over. Things like:
In situations like these, we can only react as we played no part in the occurrence of the event. However, many of the things in our lives that fall in this category are self-inflicted. What could fall into this category?
In these situations, we have no one to blame but ourselves. This is why keeping an accurate calendar is so important! It helps prevent many, if not most, Important/Urgent matters from popping up into our lives. The words of Zig Zigler ring true here. He said, "If you don't plan your time, someone else will help you waste it." In this case, that someone is often you. Important/Non-Urgent THIS is where we want to be! In this quadrant, we are calling the shots and checking all of the important boxes. The key here, though, is to not get what is "important" wrong. These aren't the things that necessarily make you happy. What needs to be focused on here are things that are beneficial for personal and professional growth. Some examples:
When the choice is ours, we should be choosing things that equip us to achieve our goals. These things are not urgent, because they are constant. When we look at our calendar and to do list each week, they should both be filled with opportunities for us to get better as individuals and doctors. Instead of carving out time for these things, they almost always get pushed to the back burner. And let's be honest: The tendency many of us have is to simply say that we already have too much on our plates and that there is no way we can do more. The whole point of defining what's urgent and important in our lives is to make more time for the things that help make us be better. That brings us to the next category... Not Important/Urgent The previous section is for things that help us grow. This Not Important/Urgent category is for the things that suck the energy out of you. Have you said yes to something that you didn't really want to do? That's what we are talking about here. Things like:
Our schedules get so out of whack because we let other people impose their own sense of urgency on us! But the inverse is also true. As the leader of your practice, you cannot disguise your personal preferences as urgent and disrupt your staff's day. Define what is urgent for both you, your team, and your patients. Once you do that you will be in a good position to own your schedule and reclaim your time. Do you get too many random calls throughout the day? Let them go to voicemail or help your front desk team understand what kind of calls should be coming through. Only have one or two set days per week for lunches with friends and colleagues, stop wasting time on junk emails, and stop letting the preferences of others dictate your day. Not Important/Not Urgent There probably won't be any surprises in this category. What are your defaults? Default meaning the thing you naturally revert to when there is nothing urgent or pressing. (Or maybe even if there is?) It is most likely to pick up your phone and check out social media. Maybe it's to turn on the TV when you're at home? While these things aren't bad in and of themselves, they can easily occupy huge chunks of our time. Even when we are at work... What classifies as Not Important/Not Urgent?
Yes, this takes discipline, but it is crucial if we want to maximize our time. Conclusion The number of demands placed on our time and distractions in the workplace is only going to increase as technology progresses. It may not be a stretch to say that learning how to manage our time in order to be able to focus on what is truly important will only be secondary to the medicine itself for doctors in the 21st Century. What changes can you make today to become more efficient and focused in order to become a better doctor?
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorThe staff and doctors at VisionAmerica are committed to providing relevant information for you, your patients and your practice. We hope you find the information in our blog post helpful. Archives
August 2019
Categories |