Hello, lovely neighborhood. It's Sarah here.
I hope you're having an amazing week. I'm popping into your feed with something a little different for this episode, but equally packed with value. You might have heard me over on the biz podcast recently, and I'm so excited to drop a special episode of Biz Inbox into your ears because I thought some of you might also benefit
from the conversations we've been having over there. I've joined forces with the incredible m Vernum to help solve your trickiest workplace dilemmas, and I'm pretty sure I've actually shared some stuff I've never shared before. In this episode, we're diving into something I know many of you struggle with and I definitely struggle with most days of the week, and that is procrastination. We test out some game changing strategies, including the eat the Frog method that might actually revolutionize
your productivity. We also chat about those tricky social media boundaries at work and share some tips on how to stand out when you're the newbie in the office. If you've got workplace dilemmas keeping you up at night, Biz Inbox is here to help with practical, real world solutions and a whole lot of yupping in between, and don't worry, your regular CZA content will be back in your ears next week. I just thought i'd give you this a little preview, and we'd love to hear what you guys think.
Now let's jump into this special biz Inbox episode.
Hello and welcome to biz Inbox. I'm m Vernon, bringing you your weekly dos of unfiltered workplace wisdom. Well, I'm gonna try.
I'm Sarah Davidson, also trying to help them dig into some workplace truth today.
And if you are new here, welcome, because biz Inbox is where your professional dilemmas get sold no names attached. So whether you're navigating office dynamics, launching a side hustle, or dealing with the manager from Hell, we've got you covered and your identity stays completely under wraps if you choose to do so.
Today we are diving into whether loud working is worth the hype and the awkward moment when your entire workplace discovers your Instagram handle.
Oh my goodness, embarrassing.
No, we'll help you out.
We'll help you out.
First, I want to dive into a question that I feel like I could have submitted myself. It's from Lulu, and she says I am the Queen of procrastination, which I'm going to say, no, Lulu, i am. Instead of finishing tomorrow's urgent report, I just did a full house, deep clean, scrolled TikTok for hours, and created a beautifully formatted, color coded to do list, which I then ignored. I'll literally do anything to avoid the actual work. Do you have any tips at all? I need serious help, Sarah.
I'm sad to say that I also need serious.
Oh my gosh, well that makes three of us.
And the hilarious part of this is when I was reading this question to think about, you know, I have a little think in advance about what I would suggest. I found it a hard one, and because it was a hard question, I ignored it. Did a full house, deep clean, scroll TikTok for hours, I made a beautifully formated, color coded to do list so I wouldn't have to answer the question because it's a hard one.
But it's such a funny question because I feel like we all do it. But Sarah, okay, out of all of us here, I mean, I'm not sure what Lulu does. I'm sure she's amazing. But you are the one who has very successful businesses, so you're clearly doing something right that I'm sure doesn't involve procrastinating.
Well, I mean, we all have our moments. One of the things that really helps me is, firstly I try and identify the reason, because sometimes your reaction is different or the action should I say that you can take is different depending on what it is. So for example, if you're procrastinating because you're exhausted, I think sometimes the temptation is just to push on keep going, especially if you've been sitting there doing something for a couple of hours.
You're like, no, I just need to finish, And sometimes it's counterintuitive, but maybe stop, Like sometimes it isn't pushed through. Sometimes if it's tiredness, you're actually not going to get any clearer or any more energized by just sitting there staring at the same thing over and over again.
So one thing.
That's really helped me is if that's the reason, if it's tiredness or brain fog, I actually stop for a minute, get up, maybe go for a walk, get a cup of tea, come back and try again later. But sometimes it might be that you need to break the circuit just because you're emotionally flat. So sometimes I'll get up and like you might need to go and do a workout.
Like sometimes the procrastination and leaving the task and coming back is a good thing if it's not one of those things, if it's not something that needs a bit of action before you can keep going. The best thing that I ever do is to break the big, scary, overwhelming task into mini tasks and then give myself little awards after each one.
Ooh, what's a reward?
Like if you do want to have a little scroll, I'm like, well, I can't have a ten minute scroll until I've done a thirty minute block of this hard task. Or you know, I want my second coffee for the day the afternoon slump, but actually I haven't earned that yet because I haven't done thirty minutes of my work. So I kind of build in little traits of things that I would want. And I know it's probably not like the best advice to use food as an incentivization.
But sometimes it's a snack.
It's like I can't go and get a snack, or I can't go on my coffee break until I've done this mini task and I actually think breaking it into smaller tasks, you don't even need to think about tasks two to ten. All you need to think about is number one. And suddenly your brain it frees up so much space for you to just begin because you're not trying to begin the entire thing. You're just beginning this
small thing. It's less overwhelming. The fear that you get from the size of the task is often what creates procrastinations. So yeah, I feel like dividing it into a list makes things more manageable. And then the other thing that I do is I actually just create obstacles for myself. Like I know that my biggest destruction is social media. For other people, it might be other things, it might be TV, it might be whatever it is, but I
know that. You know, my problem is I want to scroll, and then I say I'm going to scroll for five minutes, and I get on a tangent and then like eight hours later, I'm still sitting there.
You're just in the dark with your light on your face.
Yeah. Literally, I'm that mean. And so I make it hard for myself. I put my phone like physically elsewhere, so there's an obstacle. I'll turn it off, and like it takes a little while for your phone to boot up, and then when you pick up a phone that's off, you can't say all your notifications or you turn your notifications off. Like building in obstacles to the things that allow you to procrastinate further. It's like hacking your own temptation.
You just remove the temptation. And it sounds really basic, but sometimes I think humans are pretty basic. If there's a distraction, remove it and then it's less distracting.
So true, especially with this phone scrolling thing, because I do turn my phone off a lot of the time, and I think when you do that, you also become so hyperaware of exactly how much you pick up your phone without even realizing you're doing it, like subconsciously, and it's quite confronting. I pick up my phone so many times without realizing I'm doing it. I have two tips as well, because I am such a big procrastinator that these two things basically saved so much of my time
just from actually doing my work and not procrastinating. I'm sure my mum managers are gonna love hearing this episode from me. But basically what I do is I first I figured out my energy levels throughout the day because everyone has different jumps and energy and you just have to be just aware of your energy, figure out like where you feel most productive. And I realize I'm not a morning person, but I've had to become a morning
person because that's where all my energy goes. It's like in the morning, if I do things, it has to be done before eleven AM, because then I go into a bit of a slump between like eleven and three, and then I get another burst of energy after three pm. And I know we're recording this at three pm. So that's why I look a bit dull, well so proud. And the funny thing is is that I'm so lucky to be a creative here because it was actually my
producers who noticed my energy levels. And I realized that a lot of my recordings end up being in the mornings because I like, you sound like shit after three pm, Like you.
Just some constructive criticism here, literally.
Just like after you've had lunch, like you can't get anything good out of you. And I'm like, okay, that makes sense. And because I am a big procrastinator as well, So once I figured out my energy levels, I realized that The method of choice for me to get work done was eating the frog. I have to do the hardest thing first, and then once I've done that thing, I just end up doing everything else because you've got
the hard thing out of the way. So if you're like me and you have a lot of energy in the morning and you want to do everything in the morning, try to eat the frog method. Because once you get the hardest part of your workday out of the way, if you're able to do so, everything else just seems so much easier and you're less likely to procrastinate. It is like the best thing I've ever tried. I also wrote a piece of it, which will link in the show notes because I tell everyone to eat the frog.
It's so good.
Oh my god, that's so clever, because I do think you can end up. You think you've sat down to start the task you've been procrastinating about, but really you've just been doing the busy work. It's like I did the formatting. I literally chose the font, and it's like, is that really did you really start or are you just choosing the font?
Did you really start or you're just playing with your color palette? Yeah?
Literally, But then one of the ones that actually I forgot to mention at the start that is so so basic and it's almost laughable that this is a tip, but it actually really really helps me sometimes as well. Is just count down from five. Like when you get to zero, you just start like that's so good, just sitting there, like you're just sitting there.
Going, oh, I can't.
Then you get up and you walking around, You get a cup of tea, and then you're like, oh, I probably need a Wii. You go where you come back, like pacing around. Sometimes it's like just count have from five and don't give yourself the option. When I get to zero, I'm starting like there's no choice, and suddenly you kind of can't procrastinate anymore because the countdown's counted down. You know, we're at zero, it's two about a zero. You got to do it.
Oh my god, I'm going to try that next time because that sounds right up my alley. So whoever's procrastinating their work and listening to this episode right now, if you're going to stop, you're going to do one task and then you're going to come back and listen to the rest of the episode right now. Okay, our second question comes from Carly in Newcastle, and she says, I've just started a new job and I'm desperate not to
be the forgettable new person. Beyond bringing treats and smiling, what's one unexpected thing I can do to actually stand out and make genuine connections? The office already has a fun shirt guy and a sour dough lady. Help me find my workplace identity without trying too hard or being weird. Oh my god, this is really Sie.
I mean, Carly, I feel like you're doing so well even by caring about this, Like, I love that you want to be memorable.
I think also like beyond bringing treats and smiling, like I'd love to be known as the girl who smiles, like the smiling girl Like that's so sweet and I love joice everyone.
Yeah, look, I think my best advice on this one is make it something you can sustain, Like, I think it is easy to want to be like the fun shirt guy or the sour dough lady or find your thing, but don't force it if it's something that you're not, because then once you're the sour dough lady, you've got to bring sourdough for the rest of your time at that workplace.
And that's expensive, right, Like you're also funding that, like it's a side hustle that you're getting nothing out of it.
Like if you don't like making sourdo don't become the sourdough lady because everyone is going to expect it from you. You'll be memorable for the wrong reason if one day you start trying to charge them for the sowdough that you've been making this whole entire time. So main point number one is, don't become the sourdoughd lady unless you're
really ready to commit. But point number two, if you don't want to be the person who brings treats and kind of does something that you know is kind of generic, but you want to be memorable to make connections. One thing that I always did, which I actually loved doing because it was really rewarding for me as well to learn interesting things about my colleagues that I otherwise wouldn't is to make notes or don't even need to write
it down. But whenever someone mentions like, oh I did that at golf on the weekend, or oh I did that with my dog because I love you know, I breed dogs, or my mom's a dog breeder, or I
have a dog grooming business on the side. Everyone will drop a little fun fact about themselves at some point, and instead of just bringing a random treat that's generic to everyone, why don't you create some kind of thing that you do with that person, whether it's bring them a gift or send them a link to their email.
When you see that there's like if they have Golden Retrievers, for example, you see an ad for the Golden Retriever meet up boy, Like I think there was one in in Melbourne recently that was like the most Golden Retrievers ever in one spot and they said a Guinness World Record.
Like, oh my actual dream, Like that is what heaven looks like to me.
Legit, but like if someone says that to you, if you said that to me at work, then for me to send you back that link one day and say I saw this when I was like scrolling and it made me think of you. That's how I feel like you can create a really genuine connection that's so cute, or bring them in like a cute dog treat that's for their Golden Retriever, or you know, if it's a golfer, Like, next time there's a tournament coming out, just say oh, I saw that there were tickets or whatever it is.
I feel like there are ways that you can connect with someone and they will remember you. Like you don't have to be remembered by everyone is the same title. You don't want to be the entire officer's funshirt guy. You can just be the thoughtful person who remembered that. I like golden retrievers. I feel like that's a really cute way to do it.
That's so nice, that's actually so good. And also like what people will love about you, Like I think even outside of the workplace, anyone that like has showed that they paid a teen to what you said and listen and considered it and then thought of you when they saw this thing. It's just so so nice. It's such a good quality to have as a person in general.
And I also want to say that, like people could just know you for just being Kali, like just being a really nice, good coworker, Like you don't have to have a stick or you don't have to have a thing, because I think like people should just know you as who you are as a person, then they should know your name and just don't think too much into it because it would just come naturally.
That's so true. Reminds me of oh my gosh, my terrible memory. Guys.
If you've listened to a couple of episodes, you'll know I have a really bad memory, and I can never think of the powerful example that I'm going to remember it, like Midnight Tonight, but there's a TV show where someone's trying to manufacture their own nickname, and it's like, you can't give yourself the nickname, like you have to wait for it to come from what other people think of you.
So I also think, don't try and manufacture the thing you remembered for, like you said, just be who you are and let everyone decide thing that they love about you. Like it's kind of nice to think that if other people around you were asked what's the most memorable thing about Carlie, that they would have a different answer to what you might think. Like that's lovely about relationships.
Our next question comes from Drew and she says this is all about how to navigate social media when you've joined a workforce. So she said, I'm being flooded with social media requests from older colleagues. At my new job, I'm quite active on my personal account and prefer keeping work and personal life separate to complicate matters. I don't want to accept some colleagues requests while declining others. They
would know by now I've seen their requests. Help. What's the most professional way to maintain my social media boundaries without offending anyone? I actually have no answer for this. I love how it's older colleagues.
If I left my job. That's a really interesting one, and I think it's increasingly common because I don't know, a couple of years ago, even this wasn't an issue because you didn't really have social media. You didn't have to worry about that, and if there were connections, it was more professional anyway.
It was like LinkedIn.
So I think, as someone whose entire life is social media, including my career, like, I'm probably not the most qualified to talk about the delineation of the two and.
Keeping them separate.
But when I was in corporate and I did want to keep my career and even my side hustle very separate, I didn't want anyone to know that we had started the business when we did, so I didn't tell anyone you have two options. You can either create two and some people don't mind managing their work page and their
personal page. But that's more if you have a business and if you don't, if you're at a workplace, it's kind of a lot of effort to just create a separate personal It's like two fake life the ones with your work friends, and one isn't. Yeah, it's like yeah, literally, it's like a finster.
I love this business so much, having a great here's love.
Extra learning, here's a financial review that I'm reading with my green juice. I think that's probably a bit much unless it's the case of having a business page in a personal page.
And they've already had friend or requests from their personal page as well, so they like their colleagues, have already established they found the personal page.
And then I think in that situation, if you do come to a position with some of your work friends where you want them to be, you're not your real friends, and you want to accept them, but you don't want to accept everyone, I think you are going to have to just accept that. You will probably offend some people, like if they are going to know that you haven't accepted their request, but you still don't want them to
be your friend. There's really no way around it. My big thing is just make clear rules for you on who's going to become a real life friend versus a work friend. And when you let people cross that boundary, people might get offended, but at least you know where you stand. It's like, well, but we're not friends, we don't hang out. Is the rule that we've got to hang out outside of work? Is the rule that we
do other activities? Could you justify it to them if they actually confronted you, like if they said, why didn't you accept my request? Could you actually say, well, because I have coffee with that person, I don't have coffee with you. Like, if you could justify it, then you shouldn't feel bad about it, even if they are offended. If you can't justify it and it's simply because like I don't know, I don't like your fashion or something, then that's where it gets a little bit harder. But
it's your page. You don't owe them anything, So in the end you probably just have to get comfortable with the fact that you might offend some people. But that's the same with everything in life. It's your page. You don't know it to anybody.
It's so true, But I could personally never I'd be like, I'll accept you right now, here's some money, take everything.
No, same, I mean. My other thing is, I'm so curious that your colleagues would know that you'd accepted some people and not others, Like how would they know that? That's really interesting the level of forensic.
If it was on Instagram and they went back Injury's profile, they would see followed by and then mutuals Oh yeah, okay. You probably could be confronted.
You got to be brutal. Would someone actually ask you that?
I don't think anyone would actually say, hey, you haven't accepted my friend request. But also I don't know who like these people, Like they could be like boomers who are just like think that it's all free for all. Like my mum is someone who would definitely be like, hey, you haven't accepted my friend request.
Yeah, but my mom also thinks that like people's pages, like the newsfeed, she gets confused about what's public. Like sometimes she'd be like, oh, yeah, I thought that there was an update on the news or something. I'm like, no, that was a comment on someone else's wat like Yeah, it's a messy.
It's messy out there, guys.
It's a messy, so be prepared to have the conversation. But also, if I just started a new job and all my colleagues suddenly wanted to be friends with me on social media, I'd be really excited about that.
It's a compliment, for sure.
It's so good. But I guess that's just me and how I think about myself. That's a whole other thing to unpack.
I also think, think about what you like post, Like what do you use your social media for? And do you want to have to think every time you post my work friends are on here?
Oh that's such a good point. That's probably what Drew's dealing with.
Like, what's worse than not accepting someone and then knowing about it is you accepting them and then defriending them.
That's way worse.
Or constantly having to like upload and then realize and then delete and then add close friends and then it's this whole thing. It's going to be like management.
It's going to be too much admin.
Oh, good luck, Drew, that's just so much you're gonna have to think about.
But we were pretty useless on that question.
We made this question way deeper than it needed to be. Please don't smile. Well, thank you so much for helping us clear the biz Inbox. If you have a work question, send it our way. You will find a link to submit your questions in the show notes. You can tell us your name if you want, or you can remain completely anonymous.
It is your choice. You absolutely can remain anonymous. I mean, have these questions could have been submitted by me?
Who knows? They all felt very much like they could have been.
And if you missed any of our episodes, just groll back in your feed.
We'll be back in the biz Inbox next week. Bye Bia, thanks so much for listening. Guys.
If you like this episode, there is a whole lot more over on the biz podcast, which we'll link in our show notes. I'll catch you next time And in the meantime, I hope you're seizing your yeay.