E099: Procrastination

Hello. This is James and this is Jane,

and here we are again with another episode of a world of a world work podcast. What are we speaking about today?

Jane, well, today we are talking about one of my favorite ever topics. Was one of my favorite people. We're talking to Dr Richard McKinnon, and we're talking all about procrastination. That's

right, it's one of those subjects. We've been putting it off for a while, but, um, but sorry if there was no no chance I was going to not do that. So let's get straight into the conversation. Okay, so here we are in the main body of this podcast, and today we're speaking to Richard McKinnon, and we're exploring the conversation of procrastination. So we'll be learning a little bit more about what procrastination is, how it affects people, how we can develop as people, so perhaps we procrastinate less, and potentially impact on our teams of procrastination as well. Before we get into some of those points, though, Richard, would you be able to introduce yourself to the audience and say a little bit more about yourself, your background and what you work on?

Sure. So I'm Richard McKinnon. I'm a chartered psychologist. I work as an occupational or workplace psychologist. I run my own business that I started about six years ago, and that is focused purely on people development at work. So that's maybe one to one, coaching, provision of training or design and delivery of development programs. And I and the team work across three very broad areas, but they're very important to us, and we think they're very important to people's experience of the workplace. One is well being, helping people maximize their well being, helping them with their productivity and helping them be as effective as they can. And I use the word effectiveness rather than soft skills because I detest reference to soft skills, because they're really, really difficult skills. But everything that we do fits across those, those themes. I've been doing this for about 20 years now.

That's great, and we've got a similar views about that phrase, soft skills. We see it everywhere and and trying to change that the language of it, we use it around that's really important. Um, I like those three areas, and it feels to me that procrastination probably has a role to play, really, at the core of some of the stuff that you work on with people, if, if we start the conversation kind of broadly and simply. If I were to ask you what procrastination is, what would you say? How would you describe what procrastination is? Really, simply,

procrastination is when we engage in irrational delays to action, and that delay has a meaningful consequence. So it's important to include both of the points that it's both irrational, there's no good reason for it, and there are meaningful consequences. So it's not rescheduling work because events have happened, and we've had plenty of events lately that would lead us to do that, and it's not delaying pressing play on the latest Netflix box set. What's the worst that could happen there? This is delaying work for no good reason, and that delay has a knock on effect, or effects, I should say, and not good for us, not good for those around us, that is when we're procrastinating,

right? That sort of dual criteria for procrastination seems really important to draw out as a separation there, if we think about then some of the impacts that procrastinating does have. What sort of impacts do you see and do you see impacts on just individuals? Do you see impacts on their teams? Do you see impacts on other people that they work with or collaborate with or have relationships with? Absolutely,

it's one of the most important things, I think, to explore when we're looking at procrastination. So I'll predominantly address this topic in one to one coaching. And it's one that works really well in a coaching psychology context, because it's all about the thinking and the emotions. Traditionally, people will give advice to procrastinators that's very much focused on action. We need to understand what are the thoughts and the emotions that precede the action. So if you just imagine someone has delayed something very, very important, then they still have to work hard to meet that deadline. That last minute rush can really add to it, the experience of stress and anxiety. It can dent your self confidence if the finished product isn't really as good as it could have been if you'd allowed yourself more time and more attention. And of course, yes. It can damage relationships at work and at home, particularly if that last minute rush is associated with the expression of that stress, that anxiety, when those emotions spill over and people change quite significantly when they're in the grip of that it can also lead, over the longer term to maybe some more unsustainable or unhealthy coping responses. So what people frequently do instead of the work or what they do once they've come through that very stressful period, and a hook that I use regularly when someone has some great stories about why procrastination works for them, because chronic procrastinators often do is to explore their professional reputation, because it's not a sustainable pattern over the longer term, and it's almost a bit like gambling. There is the assumption that I can leave things till the last minute and I will get it done, because I work better under pressure. I get good results when I when I have a deadline, that's, you know, staring at me. But of course, that that emits any chance of things changing, of crisis and emergencies, of anyone going off sick, of you yourself getting sick, and so there, there's only a matter of time before their luck runs out. And it's about exploring the impact it's going to have on their reputation. That's a great way of getting people to take it seriously.

That's great. That sort of external perspective, I can imagine being really powerful as a way to sort of bring this, bring this to life for people. Do you Do you think that different people have different propensities to procrastination. Or do you think our propensity to procrastinate changes over our lifetimes as well? I guess are people more affected by it than others? Or what's your thought?

I mean, I think some people definitely procrastinate more than others, absolutely. I think everyone will engage in a bit of procrastination from time to time. I think the difference that you might see between some people and people who procrastinate a lot are typically if you procrastinate and it causes you difficulties, you learn from that, and you try and do it differently next time the people who procrastinate chronically sort of survive that wipe the sweat from their brow and go back to exactly what they were doing before. And so you just see the cycle again and again and again. That's maybe the difference. There are environments that can support it. Of course, something that I've observed in a number of organizations I've worked in is almost a sort of hero complex. When people do pull out all the stops to meet the deadline, and I mean, really pull out the stops and they meet the deadline, they get kind of faded as some kind of amazing professional. And of course, that's enjoyable to be told you're great. But in fact, it would be a very your perspective to say, well, if only it started two weeks ago this, this might have been better, and no one need have put in these these extra hours. So it will continue if people survive with no negative consequences for them, and if it's allowed to continue by the environment in which they work, if there's no comeback from anyone around them, then why would you change?

And do you find that there are multiple different causes of procrastination depending on the different people and the and their experiences of work. I

think at a very, very fundamental level, it's safe to say that we procrastinate because we're trying to avoid something we find uncomfortable. And in exploring it with each individual, it's to find out, well, what is it? What is the discomfort you're trying to avoid? Because the irrational nature of procrastination really comes out when someone is avoiding the fear of failure. But of course, at the same time, they're giving them less giving themselves less time to do a great job, and they're trying to avoid this future anxiety associated with the failure, and they're robbing themselves of resources at the same time. But other examples would be some rebellion, you know, I shouldn't have to do this, avoiding forms of discomfort, like boredom or not wanting to experience some of that FOMO. You know, there's something more interesting happening elsewhere. I'll do this another time, and there's a, you know, a little bit less, maybe self management going on there. But it's really useful to start with that exploration of what's the thing that's stopping you from doing this. It's not not having a laptop, a pen, a room. It's the thing you're trying to avoid. Let's get past the stories you're telling yourself about this and the first step is really about honesty,

and that, how hard is that for the people that you work with when you start on that journey of exploring the causes that might be relevant to them? Is it something that takes takes quite a lot of work, and. Interested to know about that?

Yeah, it depends. Is the deeply unsatisfying answer. I think what it does it does show is the difference between maybe a social chat where people are talking about this and sometimes procrastination is like a bit of a badge of honor, as in, look what I managed to do despite being right up against it. But in a coaching conversation, it's not my job to be impressed by that. It's not my job to be their friend, and I'm also not their manager, so they don't have to keep up a front of professionalism, or, you know, maintain their story anymore. It can be deeply uncomfortable, because I will keep challenging it. You know about how helpful is it that you keep doing this? And can you remember how it felt, and the fallout from the last time that that thing happened, and it's sometimes not quite a guilty secret, but it's something that people are less likely to own up to, and we'll get there after a little while, and it's definitely something that we can work on, and people can get great results when they try something else. You know, it's not something that you have to wear some kind of a badge of shame for your life. These are habits, and they're habits that we can drop and replace them with more helpful habits, and that's really how I try and frame it, rather than something fundamental to who the person is. And definitely, it's not about ethics or morals. It's about Look, your environment, your learning history to date has supported this, but it won't support it forever. Isn't it a good idea to make some changes before this doesn't work out for you now, frequently this topic will come up because it's already not worked for them, and they've found themselves experiencing difficulties because of it, and that can present them with that. And I really don't like the phrase, but the sort of burning platform they need to do something because it's now obvious to others that this passion isn't sustainable. I would say it's a minority of people are in that position. For most people, their procrastination is annoying them because things are being left undone or unfinished for a while, and just the psychological untidiness that comes with that they know themselves, that they're not making progress in the way that they should, and they find a way to do it. And that's most people's experience of that. They just get it done. But there are some people that find themselves in a very high, pressurized environment, where, as I say, in part, this has been supported. They've maybe been rewarded for it, but now it's no longer acceptable or appropriate or sustainable, and so they need to make a change.

So they're all so I've got so many questions already, but just going to start because you mentioned one thing that will be really familiar to our listeners. So James and I have talked a lot in previous episodes about the power of replacement versus trying to remove something, and you mentioned that, and I'm just really interested, like specifically, what sort of techniques do people successfully sort of employ to improve their situation? Because, as we know, all our listeners really enjoy some practical tips, so we're always really keen to hear that.

So a really common scenario is where someone is feeling overwhelmed by the list of things they have to do, and to avoid the unpleasant feelings of being overwhelmed, they'll do something really simple right in front of them, and ignore the really difficult stuff until it's super problematic. And so a really simple thing to do is to review that list and say, Well, hold on, is that list made up of things that can be done, or are these big projects and initiatives? Because if you look at a list and it's made up of projects, where do you start? So a very practical thing is to get specific about the work to be done and turn the task list into tasks that can be completed, or at the very least can be sliced up so that you can see your progress. Often, we don't want to work through the psychological discomfort of boredom or frustration, but we can do that. You know that that's I look at all of this, this work, through the lens of acceptance and commitment theory, and a big, big part of that is accepting the discomfort that comes with doing meaningful stuff. And so at the very tactical level, you've got, what am I telling myself I need to do here? Am I still accurate when I look at this list, could I slice it like salami to make it easier to do, or could I turn it into a checklist? But at a more strategic level, it's about remind reminding yourself what kind of a person you want to be, and getting in touch with your values so that you can say, well, I feel bored, but I can behave in a professional and focused manner, or I feel afraid of this task, but I can make a start. And so just unpicking those automatic links between our feelings, thoughts and our behavior and give people the opportunity to succeed. So this is not a magic bullet. So it does involve experimentation, and it does involve looking at different ways of dealing with the different kinds of procrastination. You know, there are things that you know you need to do, and no one is telling you you need to do them. And then there are things that you owe other people, and that's where interdependence with others is really important to explore as well. You know, even if you are surviving each of these monthly blow ups, what about those around you? What about the people you care about? What about your reputation and coming at it from either the tactical or the more strategic values based what kind of a person do you want to be will be very dependent on where our conversation starts.

I'm interested in the point that you had there about sort of redefining or restructuring what one needs to do in order to make it more accessible, so that maybe there is less procrastination in, I guess, sort of your average workplace. Where do you see that responsibility sitting? Is this something that an individual you would expect to take on themselves and ultimately do, or is it something that you see potentially a role for a leader or a manager having?

Yeah, because of the nature of most organizations, we are interdependent and so you know, workload issues at the very root are because maybe a job hasn't been designed well, or the role hasn't been reviewed in an extended period of time and it's just grown, or maybe the workloads and resource management isn't being done well, and that's To Do With manager skills. But actually, if somebody has just, you know, got a bunch of stuff that needs to be done as part of their job, but they just haven't formulated it for themselves in a way that each day, when I sit down, I know what I need to do. If they look at that each day list, and it's just massive initiatives, it's very difficult to know where to start. So it's not really changing your workload, it's just getting more specific about what can be done. So instead of, you know, write annual report, it's agree deadline for report is the first task. You know, start new documents, identify chapters. So just making it into actionable tasks that give you a sense of progress allow you to take breaks from the work and come back to it. And of course, when talking to others, to illustrate where you're getting because that can be a real sign for managers that someone might have a bit of a procrastination habit, is when they're unwilling or uncomfortable to talk about the progress they're making on something it could be because they've not made any and they're thinking it through, but they're thinking about what they're trying to avoid. So anything that helps people visualize work, share that visualization with others and identify the many, many, many small steps to the end goal, is a way of short circuiting this.

I've got another question for you. I mean, you've spoken a little bit there about how you can speak about and have some of these conversations. How do you think that people relate to and feel about their own procrastination? What is one's relationship with one's propensity to procrastinate and and how does one speak about that with others, or how do managers bring that up in a positive way as part of a helpful conversation?

So yeah, I think it's very important to talk about the goal that we're working towards and what we're here to do, and what work needs to be done, and standards and be really clear about expectations, rather than jumping straight into I just, I assume you're procrastinating here, and that being a kind of a value judgment. So there could be lots of lots of reasons someone might be trying to push this work into the future, you know, to give it to their future selves. I would recommend to managers, the first step would maybe to push down hard on the empathy pedal and really try and see it from the other person's perspective, and see what it might be, what kind of anxieties might be, the experiencing, or what, how are they in the headspace where they haven't asked questions about this? Is it, you know, what role have I played in this, and maybe not giving them a clear steer? Or am I unapproachable somehow? So thinking about it a little bit more broadly before going in with labels and accusations,

that sounds a very sensible way to think about it. And and if somebody out there is listening, and they're sort of reflecting on this kind of stuff, and identify themselves as a procrastinator, and maybe they're having a little moment saying, Oh, I maybe I do this. These are some other reasons. Do you think that they that people who maybe have a propensity to procrastinate are better suited to certain types of roles, or better suited to certain types of cultures, or better suited to certain types of working operations? Or do you believe that that it. A flexible variable, thing that exists in and out of our life.

I've had people tell me that it's fine because of their job, but I've yet to meet someone who is excelling in their role and loving it as a result of their procrastination. So frequently, people will talk about, well, you need to be creative and flexible here, or you need to be agile and great. Maybe you do, but that's not the same as irrationally not making a start on something important or meaningful or that someone else needs from you. So I think we need to make the distinction between thinking skills and personality and habits forming over a while, versus an unhelpful and unsustainable habit that you know is at some point going to get someone into trouble. I don't think we could really find a positive spin on that, although that is what someone who procrastinates chronically will do, because that's the only reason that they can keep doing this, I work better under pressure. I need a deadline. I can't start too early, or I won't be creative enough. We've all heard these stories, so I think the first step is this honesty. To be honest with yourself. I am telling myself a few stories here. I am tempted to procrastinate about this thing. The next step is specificity. Actually, the reason I'm trying to push this away is because I don't want to experience x, so I'm delaying starting this important task because of my fear of failure. Okay, well, at least I'm being honest with myself and I know what it is, rather than dark storm clouds surrounding me. It's a very specific thing I'm procrastinating about, because we don't procrastinate about everything in our lives. And then the third step is proactivity. Is just to make the smallest start possible, and that sort of breaks some of that inertia. And psychologically, we're saying instead of I will do that report at some point where now I am writing the report, and that's quite different, but really instructions to do things differently don't work. We really need to get to the the thinking level. What is it you're telling yourself about this, and what is it you're trying to avoid? Because the avoidance of the discomfort is the thing that causes us problems, be it procrastination, be it chronic anxiety, be it substance abuse, you know, it's I don't want to feel X or I don't want the experience of y, and so I'm going to do whatever it takes to avoid those things. And it's those avoidant things that causes problems.

And so do you think then that because that absolutely what you're saying makes sense. But at the same time, I've worked with people, and I myself have had challenges with procrastination in the past, and I think there are some roles that remove the expectation of as long deadlines. So finding roles that perhaps are reactive. So for example, working when stock markets are open and things like that, so you're very responsive and reactive, might minimize the number of longer term tasks you have to do, so that whilst you still need to manage your procrastination, because we all, as you say, we all do it kind of limits the sort of mess of that you can get yourself into. And I just wondered, if you thought that was, is that therefore also sort of counter productive, because it doesn't let people address or is it helpful for people to have roles? That may be,

I get you, I would even challenge that, because maybe someone doesn't have these long term deadlines to work towards. But let's move our focus less about deadlines and more about the discomfort of the task. And if someone's working in financial markets and they're responding really quickly to things and they're being very, very successful. There's also the opportunity for them to procrastinate and not complete absolutely required paperwork or administration because it's boring, and then they're getting themselves into trouble there. So it's not about you've got six weeks to do this task. It's this thing needs doing, and if it's not done, there will be consequences. The task could be today. It could be in six weeks, the procrastinator will find a way to tell themselves a story that it doesn't need to be looked at yet. I shouldn't have to do this because so it is less about the fact that we've got more time than we maybe need, and more about I just have this story about why I shouldn't have to do it, yet, that

makes total sense. And just, I just wanted to ask you about something, because you mentioned about making roles visual, or making the works visual, and I wondered how that can be useful with the to do list. Because, for example, I see lots of people write to do lists, and they'll write them out every day, but they don't really, they don't necessarily change each day. They might knock off one or two things. Yeah, and I wondered if there are there ways that people can make that more visual, or make it easier for them to understand how those big tasks might actually look on a to do list. So

that's a really common experience, and I don't think it always points to progress. Nation a lot of the time. It just points that to the fact that people have too much to do and they ran out of time on one day. But if that is your experience, and you're writing down the same thing, you know, the same few things each day, and they keep spilling over into the next day, well the question is, why those things and why not other things so you you didn't procrastinate about 80% of what you needed to do, but the same 20% keeps getting kicked down the corridor. What is it about that? Is it the people involved? Is it the task itself? Is it how you feel about the task? Maybe you're unclear, and this is the irrational bit. By delaying it, you don't have to get the clarity. You can just pretend it's like Schrodinger task. It's It's neither difficult nor easy, because I'm not thinking about it. It's for future me to sort out. But the point about getting specific about work means that you can say, instead of, well, let's use a non work example. I use this all the time in coaching. You know, if you had a to do list, and one of the items on it was sort out the family summer holidays, you'd be tempted to, okay, well, have a look at that later, because I need to do so many things and and then the next day, sort out the family holidays. Oh, yeah, where to start with that? Now that needs expansion. That needs to be broken down into, decide where we're going to go, book the time off from work, you know, identify the dates, book The flights, book the car, whatever it is, but sort out the holidays isn't manageable, and that is a prime candidate for getting pushed into the future. Because where do I start? So we come back to that proactivity piece. Make a start. What is the first next practical thing that you can do? Because this also speaks to the contemporary work environment. It's not likely that you'll be able to do tasks 234, and five on this list before you're interrupted again. So just pick the next practical thing that will move this forward, and now you're doing it. You're no longer talking about doing it at some point in the future,

and that makes that makes complete sense. And so when people I've got one question for you, as a practicing chartered psychologist who works with people all the time, I'm always keen to give hope to people, to our listeners who are facing various challenges. So for all the procrastinators out there, do you see pro people that you work with who have issues around procrastination making dramatic improvements, or is it just that they learn to sort of cope and manage enough to be able to cope with their work? And what do those successes look like? If you do see them,

I see I see great successes with procrastination, because for many people, just being able to talk about it openly and in a non judgmental environment is great, and being able to talk about their fear and their anxiety is a great I mean, just getting those thoughts out of their head is very, very powerful. But then when they say, Well, I've tried everything. They probably haven't. They've tried a couple of things. It didn't work, and they thought, well, this is me. Then I'm stuck this way. And so being able, by being able to explore the the situation they've they found themselves in from a few different perspectives, and give them extra tools and demonstrate that it's almost part of the human condition, and they're not a bad person, which a lot of people carry around, and they can experiment, and they will always have the support of me as their coach, but they also know there's a level of accountability in there, so we won't politely ignore it when they come back and haven't done what they said they would do. We will talk about the why, and people make great progress on this particular topic, frequently in coaching, but it does require honesty and openness, and it requires people to try a new way of doing things,

yeah, and that makes that, again, makes a lot of sense. And I think the piece that you pick up there about accountability and openness, and that that sort of power pairing of those two things, where you've both got an openness to be able to talk about it without shame or guilt, but also that ability to have someone who will hold you to account if you don't do and try and challenge what you said, what you said, you're going to do. I think, oh, sorry, go on. I was

just going to say that. I think it's we've all kind of done this to one extent. In this conversation, I think it's really important to talk about the behavior, not the person. So the habit is procrastination. The person isn't a procrastinator, because, no more than I am a water drinker or a stair climber. It's something that's part of what I do, but it's not the only thing I do, and so I procrastinate from from time to time on things. This isn't about being saintly. It's about working at this and realizing it's not a badge I have to wear. It doesn't mark me out as being a bad person, but actually having the skills of. Awareness of it and understanding the benefits of being honest with yourself and thinking about consequences like an adult, and then trying different ways to hack away at those habits. That makes a big difference so you don't have to, you know, own this label. And I think it's really unhelpful to to, you know, label the whole person. If that makes sense. It

makes it makes complete sense. I think I certainly have have occasionally very bad habits around procrastination. And I think that distancing of yourself from the activity, even from my personal experience, is really helpful, and

it's something we use in in Acceptance and Commitment theory coaching, I think maybe more than other forms where we talk, we use our own experience to bring things to life. Want to normalize it. Not to say, look how good I am at this, but to say it's part of being a human being. These things happen, and something that res I've seen resonate with people a lot, is sharing that experience of the moment you procrastinate about something, the delicious relief you feel that's the thing to look out for, because as soon as you've told yourself, well, next week is fine. Ah, lovely, and that should be a bit of a warning sign. And so we don't need a manager standing over us. We don't need a friend calling you up to say, Have you done this? Ideally, we want to manage this for ourselves, and so spotting these little tendencies, these little moments of clarity, can be a great way to humanize it and say, look, it's not that I'm talking to you as a coach, because I've never procrastinated. I wouldn't be human. But let's talk about how normal it is and how common it is. But now let's talk about why you want to change those habits and the anticipated benefits you'll get from that.

And you talked earlier, I think, very eloquently, about the role of a coach in all of this. But as you may know, some of we have quite a lot of listeners from small organizations who maybe don't have the biggest budgets. It'd be really interesting to know. Are there any practical things that managers can do for their whole team to just help, help their team sort of avoid procrastination, or to adopt better habits that are more sort of conducive to an enjoyable workplace? Yeah,

absolutely. One I've touched on already is around the specific specificity of the work to be done, so that people are clear on what's involved in key tasks, and that includes the deadline, but also the interdependence. So if this doesn't get done, these are the consequences for your colleagues or that team over there, or our reputation, or whatever it might be, so that people have a sense of purpose and meaning to the work that they're doing, that the door is left open for questions, even though, right now I might say, Yes, I understand it completely. I would like to be able to come back in 24 hours and say, Could you explain that again? Or can I ask you questions about this? I think team leaders, managers could really help people by not, you know, collaborating with them on this kind of behavior, and not saying well done for getting there in the end, but saying, Actually, that's not sustainable. That's not how I want this team to operate, and to point out that you made it this time, but I really need to see a change, and just because you reached the deadline, just because we won the work, or just because the client was happy in the end, what it took to get you there is not how I want to do things. So an emphasis not just on the goal or the win, but the process to get there, because it's something that, if you look in the rear view mirror, you can see, often, as sort of a trail of destruction. In order to get there, I think that's that's really important, and being really clear about the potential impact on other people. So we're a team, and when one person is doing things vastly differently to everyone else. It is going to have a knock on impact. That point about empathy, though, I think is really important. It might raise its head procrastination as a performance issue rather than look this has nothing to do with their ability to do it. This is something more psychological, and they don't need training in the task they do. They need support to reappraise the situation, so to have an open mind, perhaps for your interpretation of what the problem might be on the team and that

that relates probably to my final question that I'm really interested in. I've got loads more, but I suspect James is about to suspect James is about to tell us we're running out of time. You mentioned about this sort of idea of empathy and trying to sort of, again, we talked about people having the freedom to talk about it openly. Does that? Does? Do you see that? Because in some senses, people who procrastinate regularly and have caused an impact to their team. Sort of carry a large amount of guilt around. It is that? Is that a problem? And if so, how can managers? Is there anything else that managers should be doing to help people sort of relieve them of that guilt or navigate their way through it?

Yeah, I think we've touched on it, the avoiding labeling of the person and just talking about this is work, and this is a behavior at work and being really clear on what's expected of the individual, so that they can make those adjustments, so giving them an opportunity to try something else, of course, they can share their own experience and talk about how they've, you know, dealt with their own procrastination habit, or how they've dealt with their own anxiety about something. It doesn't mean that they're coaching them. It doesn't mean that they're mentoring them, but they're connecting on a human level, rather than saying, Well, you've done that thing and it's so terrible we can never speak of it again, or I'm marking you out as a as a difficult colleague now, so exploring it with curiosity, trying to understand their perspective and being open to hearing something that they maybe weren't expecting. When someone opens up to their team leader or their manager and working with them, you know, something that can take the anxiety out of a lot of work is fresh eyes, so to be able to sit down with them and clarify. Okay, I know you thought this. I know you thought that was the impending amount of work you had to do, but really, let's, let's clarify. This is the thing we need you to get done this week. Let's reappraise the other stuff next week. But this is the one thing that needs your attention to sort of get them out of the eye of the hurricane. And that's the point about being an objective person looking at it. Can say, well, I can see why you're worried, but you don't need to be, because this is the only thing that needs to be done right now,

we've talked a little bit about sort of approaching this from the role of a manager or leader, and we've explored that a little bit. What do you think people should do, or how should people behave if they believe one of their peers is procrastinating with a negative impact on the team, or if they believe that their manager is maybe procrastinating with a negative impact on the team, do you have any views about how to manage that type of interaction and what somebody should do? Well, when

you think about team dynamics, it's really important to avoid that kind of whole person evaluation, I would suggest, so we talk about consequences, talk about expectations and consequences. So the expectation was you would do x by Friday. You didn't. The consequence was me or my colleague here working all weekend. You know, we're disappointed. We don't want it to happen again, but we also need to find out why it happened. So as objective and task focused as you can be when you've worked all weekend because someone has let you down, but, but not to assume you know why that's happened, but to ask and look for reasons it could be, you know, a bit of procrastination, plus luck running out, you know? So I had this perfect plan to do it by Friday, and then a load of stuff came in on Thursday where someone was out sick, like I said, so. But you know, I don't think it's for peers to sort out each other's performance challenges, as much as it is to have a conversation about, do you know that that's the knock on impact of you doing that? I just want to make you aware of that, and what can we do, you know, to work better together so that doesn't happen again. Or here's what I'd like, but, but if it's the manager, I mean, I think that's that's pretty tricky, and I think that also requires people to focus on the impact of their behavior when we're when we're in that kind of bubble of anxiety and worry, we can forget about other people, and so they might just need the reminder that the more you sit on these decisions, the more pressure it puts us under. Similarly, offering help, you know, I see you've got a lot on we're not seeing the output, so we're not seeing the progress. Is there anything we can do to make that easier, these are difficult conversations. But again, if we remember what we're here to do, we're not here to have cozy conversations every day. We're here to do work, and work isn't always easy.

Yeah, okay, I think that's helpful. As Jane alluded to I'm going to come in in a minute and say that we're running out of time, but before, before I do that, if there are people who are listening and who've sort of recognized that they occasionally procrastinate and would like to maybe move forward and change some of their behaviors, we've talked about some of the benefits that can materialize for them, and some of the ways that it feels in terms of those very first steps, if they were going to leave this Podcast and go out and maybe do one or two things, but help them on that journey. What would you suggest their starting point to be,

possibly, to look at their own examples of when they have procrastinated and look for commonalities across those examples. What are the kind of contexts in which they're more likely to procrastinate? There? Will be specific things, because we don't procrastinate about everything. So get specific and look for those, those trends, and then be honest that that was irrational. It wasn't about, you know, the schedule. It was you decided to do this for no clear, good reason. And that honesty is, is a great, a great starting point. But if you can be specific about the uncomfortable thing you're trying to avoid, you can then experience that discomfort and see it for what it is. It's temporary, it's not dangerous. It's something that you can persist with. But I would say the starting point is really to get specific about your procrastination habit or habits, and find out when you're more likely to do that. And a really simple second thing would be to talk to someone else about it, talk to a colleague, talk to a friend. You'd be surprised what someone else might be able to share with you in terms of something you could try some tips. Great.

Okay, well, I am going to draw a line under the conversation now, just in the interest of time, before we really finish things up, is there anything people can do to learn a little bit more about you, Richard and the work that you do, or even get in touch?

They can, indeed, they can. The easiest thing is to go to the websites at worklife, psych.com, P, S, Y, C, h.com, I recently did a public webinar all about procrastination. You can find that on our YouTube channel, just search for work life Psych. And we covered this topic in some detail on our our own podcast, way, way, way early days back in episode number seven. That's called my pocket Psych. And well, if you're listening to this, you know how podcast works, so just search for my pocket Psych.

Perfect. Okay, well, that was a really informative and fun conversation. So that's a big thank you for me, and it's a thank you for me. Oh, thank you for having me. It was really great to talk with you.

Okay, so you are back in the conversation with Jane and myself. That was our podcast with Dr Richard McKinnon, where we spoke about procrastination. I think we covered a lot in that subject. We really dove into several different ways to look at procrastination. Jane, was there anything that particularly stood out for you from that conversation?

Oh so much. I love talking to Richard about things, I think he approaches things in such a simple way that's really accessible but still really meaningful, which is great, but I guess the two things that, or the one thing with two related points, that really stuck with me was, firstly, this idea of how important it is when you're working in teams to create space for people to be able to talk about it if they're experiencing sort of habitual issues around procrastination. I think that's so, so important. And I think his point around it that he made about two thirds of the way through around it not being an identity, so it's not the person, it's just a habit that we need to work with, I think is really, really important. Yeah,

I think that's really good that space, and that opening up those conversations is helpful. Um, following on from that, one of the phrases he used that really stuck in my mind was the need to push hard on the empathy pedal. I just like that image. And in terms of working with somebody who's a habit of procrastination, I think that's a that's a really good image to have in one's mind of how to engage with them at an early stage. So I thought that was a good takeaway. Another thing that really struck me and stuck with me from a practical perspective, was the importance of specificity. And that sort of appeared in two different ways. One, when somebody's thinking about their own procrastination and looking to to overcome some of those habits, the benefits of becoming specific about when they're more susceptible to procrastination and what some of the reasons behind that are, felt like a powerful starting point for about self discovery and exploration to make some progress here. And the other thing that stood out for me on the same theme was the importance of really becoming specific in terms of what the tasks are that we need to do. So how does one break down our objectives and our tasks into discrete, manageable trunks, so that each one of them individually feels accessible and we might not fall down our propensity towards procrastination and find ways to avoid tasks. I thought that importance of specificity important throughout that conversation.

Absolutely totally agree with both of those. And for those of you who's really enjoyed this podcast, we are actually are recording another couple, so look out for those as we enjoyed talking to him. And as a charter psychologist, he can really help us open up some different issues.

That's right. The other two podcasts we're planning on doing in the short term with Richard are one on anxiety and one on psychological safety, so those should be ready pretty soon.

Brilliant. Well, I guess that's all we have time for. If you've enjoyed it, don't forget to leave us a review. You on the podcast platform of your choice, and it's a thank you from me. Hi. Thanks