Episode Details
Back to EpisodesOvercoming Project Freeze: How to Start When You Feel Stuck
Description
"I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth."
That was President John Kennedy in 1961, speaking at the Joint Session of Congress. It is possibly the best example of a project statement ever made.
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Script | 397
Hello, and welcome to episode 397 of the Your Time, Your Way Podcast. A podcast to answer all your questions about productivity, time management, self-development, and goal planning. My name is Carl Pullein, and I am your host of this show.
Starting projects. It can be tough. Where do you start? Where will you find the time? And what do you need to do?
These are just some of the questions you will find yourself asking.
Yet the biggest obstacle to completing a project on time is overthinking and over-planning. Thinking about and planning a project are not the same as working on one. Working on a project is doing something that moves it forward.
Decorating your bedroom will require paint and brushes. The only pre-project decision you need to make is what colour.
The first two steps, therefore, are:
- Decide what colour to paint the bedroom
- Buy paint and brushes
I would add a third decision: when. When will you do it?
Once you’ve done those three things, you’re ready to go—no more planning, no more thinking. Just get on and start.
Yet, that’s not how most projects go, is it? There’s thinking, planning, then creating tasks in your task manager, and if it’s a work project, a meeting, then perhaps another meeting.
Often, by the time a project is conceived, 80% of the time required to complete it gets spent on thinking, planning, and meetings.
And that brings us nicely to this week’s question—a question about finding ways to reduce the thinking and planning time.
So, let me now hand you over to the Mystery Podcast voice for this week’s question.
This week’s question comes from Phil. Phil asks, “Hi Carl, how do you work on complex projects?” I find I spend a lot of time planning a project, end up with a long list of things to do, and when it comes to starting, I freeze. It’s as if I don’t know where to start. Do you have any tips on handling this type of problem?
Hi Phil, thank you for your question.
“Project freeze” is a common problem for many people. I suspect this stems from the belief that every aspect of a project needs to be planned before starting. Yet, for many projects, this would be impossible.
Imagine you were part of NASA in May 1961, and yo