Procrastination
Category: HRM
1) Work Sheet
Consider each of the factors below and circle a number, which represents your particular behaviour. Remember there are no right or wrong answers to the procrastination indicator and its purpose is to give a general guide to your behaviour. The guide is for your personal use, so be honest with yourself.
| 1) | I always clean and tidy my desk whenever I have to start a difficult job. | 1 2 3 4 5 | Whenever I start a difficult job, I just carry on at my desk as normal. |
| 2) | I often wish that crises, interruptions, boss-demands will happen when I am doing a difficult job. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I try hard to avoid crises, interruptions, boss-demands when I am doing a difficult job. |
| 3) | Even when a job is going well I sometimes doubt I will be able to complete it satisfactorily. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I am generally confident that I will be able to complete a job satisfactorily. |
| 4) | I am sometimes guilty of not putting a sound plan into action. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I always put a sound plan into action as soon as possible. |
| 5) | I am always wasting time at work. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I very rarely waste time at work. |
| 6) | I always have to concentrate hard and discipline myself to get started on a job. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I start jobs very easily and naturally. |
| 7) | On many occasions I have avoided unpleasant, difficult, unfamiliar or emotionally upsetting jobs. | 1 2 3 4 5 | Whenever I m faced with unpleasant, difficult, unfamiliar or emotionally upsetting jobs, I just get on with it. |
| 8) | I very often work late in the evening or at weekends. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I very rarely work late in the evening or at weekends. |
| 9) | I very seldom question whether I can do a large job in time. I always assume I can do it. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I generally plan my work and will not accept a large job unless I know I have enough time. |
| 10) | I am often guilty of putting a small job in front of a large job even when I know it is risky to do so. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I never put a small job in front of a large job unless I have a very sound reason for doing so. |
| 11) | I am very fond of chatting and gossiping at work. It keeps me in touch with what is “going on”. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I very rarely chat and gossip at work. I do not feel the need to be in touch with what is “going on”. |
| 12) | I often delay a job because I fear I will make a mistake. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I very rarely delay jobs because of the fear of making a mistake. |
| 13) | I often leave difficult jobs until the end of the day. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I always do difficult jobs when I am at my best. |
| 14) | I often delay a job so that I can wait for better information or resources. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I very rarely delay a job for better information or resources unless it is absolutely necessary. |
| 15) | I often miss a deadline because I have delayed a job. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I very rarely miss a deadline because of my delaying. |
| 16) | I am very fond of wandering around at work even when I have no reason to do so. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I very rarely wander around my work and normally I only leave my office when I have a specific and necessary reason. |
| 17) | I often delay a job until the last minute and then work very hard to get it done in time. | 1 2 3 4 5 | I generally plan my jobs well in advance and I very rarely delay a job until the last minute. |
2) Procrastination worksheet — answers
Answer the 17 Questions and divide by 17 to get an average.
Low scores
| 1.0 — 1.4 | You have a highly negative attitude towards planning and probably all your past attempts have proved unsuccessful. |
| 1.5 — 2.4 | You are negative about planning and you have difficulty in coping with past planning problems. |
| 2.5 — 3.5 | You are neither negative nor positive and are still seeking the benefit of planning. |
High Scores
| 3.6 — 4.5 | You are positive in attitude and receive benefits from planning. You are probably still dealing with a few problem areas. |
| 4.6 — 5.0 | You are highly positive and achieving the full benefit of planning in your job. |
Procrastination action plan
Procrastination is a very common and indeed natural problem. How can it be dealt with effectively? Here are a number of golden rules that will help you to overcome any problem you might have:
Accept the procrastination is common and that you are not unique (or the worst procrastinator!) and that we procrastinate because we fear failure. Fearing failure is perfectly normal and generally there is no real foundation for our feelings. This means you can solve your problems.
Procrastination tends to have a common theme or foundations to its manifestation in individuals. You only procrastinate on certain actions or in certain situations. This means the problem is smaller than you think.
Procrastination is solved by doing little things in your area of procrastination. When you know where your weak areas are, and then you need to concentrate on these, persevere and discipline yourself. This means that the “do it now” technique can be very powerful when you know where to focus your effort.
Always be positive in the face f procrastination. Reward yourself when you succeed and boost your morale when you need to do so.
Get into the “single handling” thinking, which means you are going to do the job once, and once only. You will pick the job up and finish it before you put it down again.
Never put low priority work in front of high priority work.
Keep your socialising down to the level of good working relationships, but no more.
A very powerful discipline for effective self-management is the “START TIME” philosophy. Scheduling the start of work and not just the finish leads to better planning and personal organisation as well as keeping procrastination firmly under control.