Routine

You already know what you are expected to do/complete during the course of the day. It is possible to plan ahead and some of us (if not most) actually do that. The problem is – even a slightest deviation from the routine is enough to ruin the entire day. Some thing like an unexpected traffic jam, a visit to the doctor, car service, accident, disruption of internet services... could be just about anything!

The problem is significantly worse in my case. Once I have organised the routine tasks and managed to successfully find an efficient manner of executing them, I end up having some extra time on my hands. Now, when this happens in a work environment – what I end up doing is including additional tasks into the routine. These are not mandatory but have been included in an attempt to assist in the execution of future tasks.

For example – I am required to do a weekly reconciliation. Now, it is not mandatory that I do a daily reconciliation but given that I do have some time on my hands, I end up doing it. The objective is - if the daily recon has been done for the 5 days, the weekly reconciliation will be a breeze and not a time consuming / tedious chore.

To validate further how a daily recon helps - It is a lot easier to verify the transactions for one day, as opposed to verifying transactions for 5 days in one stretch.

This is where things get even more complicated. You come across an issue that wouldn't have been a big deal – had you come across it at the end of the week. It would be a minor deviation from the manual calculations and would have negligible impact when considered over the period of 5 days.

Since I came across it NOT at the end of the week but at the end of the day – I know the deviation is for the transactions of that day itself. In my attempt to resolve the issue, a lot of people are going to get upset. Their problem - "Why do you have to bother with a daily recon when only a weekly is required? If you weren't doing this, you wouldn't know about the deviation and we wouldn't have to sit and fix it. At the end of the week, it would be a normal adjustment and no one would have a problem".

That was just an example. Now factor this in:

• To make the weekly tasks easier, I include a few tasks into the daily routine.
• To make the monthly tasks easier, I include a few more tasks into the weekly routine.
• To make the quarterly tasks easier, I include a few more tasks into the monthly routine.
• To make the yearly tasks easier, I include a few more tasks into the quarterly routine.

And I have been doing that for so long that these extra tasks no longer seem like extra tasks. They have become part of the routine. Not just in my head, but now everybody else has gotten used to it and expects it!

I started with this to make things easier. I can assure you – that has not happened.

Just rambling. Don't expect anyone to actually understand that. Just thinking – all that talk about efficient time management bla bla, and in the end – you get screwed over anyway.