Procrastination leading to stress
I hear it all the time: I have no work; I am so busy; I have no work; I have no time, I’m really busy; I have no money. What really gets to me are the complaints of no work followed by the statement that “I didn’t have time to get the proposal done.” I want to simply say give me a break. If you’re too busy to do the proposal, then you have work. If you don’t have work, then you aren’t working on your business. Let’s put a plan together so you have time to do some effective public relations and marketing. Even more importantly, let’s figure out how you can plan the time to do those proposals, so you will have work that makes you money.
I have been thinking about this phenomena of “no time, no work” for awhile. I hear it enough that I know it is not just an isolated case or two, but it is critical that we figure out how to handle it. I have been speaking to too many people who say they have no work, who are also saying that they are not doing anything about it. Of course there are a lot of reasons for this, but reasons and excuses don’t bring in the work.
When it comes to marketing, proposals and sales there is too often the tendency to make it perfect. Unfortunately that tendency leads to procrastination. Quite frankly, waiting to do something until we can make it perfect is a sure way to just not get anything done. While you are thinking about the perfect letter, ad or message, someone else will be out there communicating to your prospective clients. While you are thinking about creating the perfect proposal, someone else may be presenting their proposal and winning the client, or the client may start thinking that they don’t really need it anyway.
Sometimes we wait so long that it really is too late. I am sure we can all think about times when this has happened. Not only did “it” not get done, but we experienced the stress of that project hanging over our heads.