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It’s 5 p.m. on a Friday evening and your desk is piled with paperwork. Your inbox is full and your phone won’t stop ringing. You have multiple deadlines and also have to prepare for an important client meeting next week.
We’ve all been overburdened with work at some point or the other. A fruitful way of resolving this issue is workload management. Read on to understand how to handle workload in the best way possible.
What Is Workload Management?
Before we get into the nitty-gritty of workload management, let’s look at what ‘workload’ means. The volume of work demanded of a person is better known as their workload. When you’re unable to manage the amount of work you’ve got, you run the risk of becoming inefficient and, in the worst-case scenario, even burn out.
Workload management is an efficient method of distributing and managing your workload. The goal is to ensure that you deliver your work within a predetermined time frame. A balanced workload not only helps you perform better but also gives you greater job satisfaction. You feel confident about the volume of work and perform well.
Why Tackle Heavy Workload?
Several studies have shown that one of the primary reasons for employee burnout is a heavy workload. When you struggle to cope with the demands of your job, you’re bound to feel overwhelmed. The imbalance further adds to your stress levels, leading you to no longer feel good about your work.
The way you distribute work also impacts the overall business. People are more likely to quit or change jobs when they feel overwhelmed with work. It doesn’t reflect well on teams or organizations for their employees to be unhappy with their jobs. Monitoring workload helps identify problems early on.
Effective Tips For Balanced Workload
These days, organizations expect you to stay updated with evolving industry demands. Workload management sounds like a Herculean task. Here’s a list of strategies that’ll help you manage your office workload productively.
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Acknowledge You Can’t Do It All
Many of us have a tendency to bite off more than we can chew. We think we can do more than we actually can. Try not to undermine the amount of work that needs to be done. To make substantial progress, assess what projects you should accept and decline. The more you establish boundaries and learn to say ‘no’, the better you’ll manage work.
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Focus On Your Unique Strengths
Whether you’re a leader, manager or teammate, you would have a unique set of strengths. There are times when you would end up doing things that don’t play to our strengths. In your pursuit to reach your targets, you may shoulder responsibilities that are beyond your capability. This can result in frustration and/or overworking.
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Avoid Or Minimize Multitasking
Heavy workload often forces you to work on multiple projects or deadlines at the same time. Multitasking may seem like the only solution, but it’s rather counter-productive. You don’t do justice to your projects when you multitask and the quality of your work may get affected. It’s best to focus on one task at a time. Prepare your list of priorities and work on things that need urgent attention.
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Make Space For Flexibility & Adaptability
There may be times when you face unexpected changes (market trends, customer behavior and so on) and you may need to revise decisions or deadlines. Changes are annoying because they throw you off your plan. In such situations, it’s important to remain calm and be flexible. For example, if one of the team members falls sick, you should be ready to revise your plan and rethink the workload distribution among your team.
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Maintain Healthy Work-life Balance
A healthy work-life balance is something we all long for. Work can be your number one priority but you should break away once in a while. Pay attention to your personal relationships and well-being. Spend quality time with your friends, family and peers whenever possible. Find time outside work. Resilience and mental strength will improve your decision-making abilities that’ll, in turn, help you constructively prioritize things at work.
Learn how to develop self-awareness in order to improve your workload management skills. Harappa Education’s Interpreting Self course will teach you how to identify your unique strengths and work outside your comfort zone. The Johari Window framework will help you better understand yourself and recognize your aspirations. Work on your inner self first to be able to work better with others!
Explore topics such as Professionalism at Work, How to Increase Productivity at Work, Eisenhower Matrix & Pomodoro Technique from our Harappa Diaries section and lead on a path of self-development.
