I've made it my initiative as of late to do the little things to get back onto the track of lower levels of stress at the office.
Deadlines
I dream of the day where everyone realizes that deadlines lead to anxiety, rushed or poor deliveries, and the never-ending acceleration of the pace that we work and deliver. Yes, there are people out there who need deadlines in order to function, but I fully support the idea of respecting that others will work as quickly as they can while remaining sane and maintaining a high level of craftsmanship. If I doubt that they are intelligent enough to handle themselves in a deadline-less world, I'm not hiring them, working with them, or buying or selling to them. If someone told me that I could have my newly ordered cell phone in a week, but that it really takes them three weeks to produce it correctly in a low-pressure environment I would rather wait the three weeks to ensure top-notch production of my phone to ensure the long-term value.
Unfortunately, deadlines do exist in my current position, and they are created by clients, project managers, other managers, co-workers, and myself. I've learned in less than two years that up to this point in life you really could please almost everyone. Working, going to school, and maintaining a social life seemed rough at the time. There were times in college where tests or project due dates fell closely together, and I was challenged. In the workplace though, especially in the technology sector, the pace of business blows anything I experienced in college away. It comes in waves just like college, but the intensity level gets a little nuts at times. My first reaction is to get frustrated at the lack of time left, the effort of others, the wrong expectations by involved parties, or any other factor outside of my control.
I go home, I get pissed thinking about it, and then I sleep. I wake up the next day thinking more reasonably, and realize that I brought most of that stress onto myself by trying to do too many things at once, rather than doing what I can do now while waiting for other pieces to fall into place. I realize that learning to estimate how long it takes you to do something is tough. I always want to deliver lightning fast, and make the mistake of giving myself a deadline that is overly ambitious, to say the least. I'm starting to really know what I am capable of, and actually and realistically delivering. Many times I tend to give an unrealistic date of delivery out of fear that the other person will be disappointed with what I predicted. More often than not, they would not have cared at all. I'm getting the hang of this and slowly regaining control. Deadlines were always set for me my entire life: test dates, homework assignments, sales goals, athletic development planning, and so on. We need to do a better job of educating students on setting their own deadlines and project planning - a skill that I was definitely in need of more practice on before entering the workplace.
Email, IM, Phone
If you want to get anything done, ignore at least 2 out of the 3 at all times. Plan meetings and times when you can call a client or they can call you. I like to provide top-notch service and convenience for my clients, so too often when they ask when I am free on a certain day I will respond anytime if I only have a few short meetings. They then hang up, I start to work, they call out of the blue, we have an unplanned 45 minute conversation, I hang up, go to the bathroom, have a quick chat, and finally sit down taking another 20 minutes to figure out what I was doing before the call came in. It's much easier to know when the call is coming in, so that you can plan to take it and work on a task that should wrap up around the time they are calling. You can at least form a more defined stopping point in a more continuous or larger task. You cannot eliminate all surprise calls thanks to our "on-demand" nature and way of life, but limiting these types of calls leads to you keeping your head on straight. Voicemail is a good thing, though.
For email, I recently turned off the Outlook pop-up feature that lets you know if a new message has arrived, who it's from, and the first part of the message. I have my inbox and calendar minimized most of the day. I try to check it at stopping points or breaks in my current project or task, or at the four logical breaks of the day: arrival to the office, before lunch, after lunch, and before leaving for the day. Now, since many people have become accustomed to instant responses from almost everything else in life thanks to everything from McDonald's to Google, some people get ticked if you don't respond right away. I always say if something is on fire, they will probably call me. I can't always count on this, as some people for whatever reason would not pick up a phone and make a call even if they were on fire. I'd love to check my email only 4 times a day while at work, but you just can't due to the way email has evolved. My best plan of action (and most reasonable) is to only plan to answer emails 4 times a day at the intervals discussed above, check it during breaks in project work or right after a meeting, and only respond to frantic or immediate attention emails outside of the planned answer periods. That's about as managed as you can become with Outlook without being a dick to everyone who is emailing you.
Pray that your IM goes out or is destroyed somehow. Ours was just out for two weeks, and now no one uses it now because two weeks is a long time and everyone has forgotten. 9 times out of 10 I use it to receive a comedic remark from another employee or to make a similar point. Older employees take it more seriously which is nice, I guess, but at the same time just come over and talk to me rather than trying to have a formal conversation through IM. If you put up your "busy" or "away" icon, people still send you messages that pop up, so just turn it off if it is not a "mandatory" communication tool in the company you work for.
If your company has not blocked AIM, GChat, Yahoo, or Windows messenger, don't even open it. One, most of the people my age are starting to grow away from it, and those who aren't it seems like are never available at the same time to actually have a conversation. Personal messaging at work is probably not a big deal as long as it is minimal, IMHO, but as a young gun in a corporate office it definitely would not send a good message if you are seen chatting every time someone walks down your cubicle aisle unless you are in data entry and they recognize your mad typing skills. I have never used a personal IM service while at work, but see people doing it all the time - especially through Gmail since it is not detected.
Breaks
Basically, if I'm thirsty I go get a drink. If I have to go to the bathroom, I make a trip to the bathroom. I don't plan these breaks, but the urge to get up usually occurs when I am just finishing up something or running into a wall of frustration - both of which are good times to get up. My eye doctor stresses the importance of a 5 minute break to stretch your eyes every hour is so important in a monitor-staring intensive job. I do not do a good job of this as I don't plan my breaks, but maybe I should.
The biggest productivity killer for me is going out for lunch. You have the 10 minute period prior to lunch trying to figure out where to go, you eat way too much, you come back and keep a conversation going for another 10 minutes, finally get to work, and then fall into a food coma. Bring smaller portions of food in a brown bag lunch with snacks for throughout the day, and you will be more aware and capable of staying on track. Not to mention, you could leave early or accomplish more in the same amount of time. Plus, you save a crapload of money. Brown bag your way to a million.
