Blocking off the Calendar

This is interesting. I've had three comments in a two week span from 3 different colleagues on the same thing. So, either I'm worse than I thought, or they are really awesome friends. I'm starting to think its a bit of both. :-)

The "third" colleague to bring up the topic of my insane work schedule spoke to me today. He said that I need to block more "me" time. At first I thought he meant spa time or something and then I caught on to what he meant. He said that I need to block off periods in my calendar to do my work so that others cannot schedule me in meetings. A very wise girlfriend at the office dragged me to dinner just last week and said exactly the same thing. And then, there is of course my other pod-made telling me to turn of the blackberry. All of them are right.

So, here we go. I'm going to block off and hour and a half a day to do work. And I'm starting next week. OK- I would start tomorrow, but I have back to back meetings with no lunch (no comments please). Thursday is waaaay too busy. Friday I work from home and have 2 conference calls, so that's my catch up day by default. Next week it is.

On another note, I received an award at work. I'm not trying to brag or something, just reflecting for a moment. Recognition is a funny thing. If I don't get it, I would feel really disgruntled, and would feel like I work for nothing. If I do get it, it just makes me work harder and it almost feeds the beast. Double edged sword I guess. My boss actually made a comment to me about this around a year ago. I had someone on my team who was working late hours and wouldn't stop. I kept rewarding him and he kept doing it more. I kept insisting he take vacation but he wouldn't. I asked my boss for his feedback. What could I do to help this guy slow down? He looked at me in disbelief and said "Are you KIDDING? I have the same issue with you...When you find the solution let me know"...

That's hilarious. My boss is great. He makes me laugh....But he's right. It's such a weird thing- A lack of recognition would make me mean and disgruntled. With recognition, I'm a workaholic. I need to find the balance.

I think I'm going to use the advice given to me over the past two weeks. My one colleague made the comment that if I lowered the bar just a bit nobody would notice. I think he's right. Let's do the experiment and see what happens. If I stop getting the rewards and recognition and become disgruntled, I'm sure somebody somewhere will be sure to let me know. :-)