A Simple Hack for Completing Long-Term Projects
Don’t be fooled. Getting a project done is important, but getting a project done well is significantly more important.
The fact is that many of us get projects done by cramming. There is certainly an increase in productivity right before a project deadline, so experience has taught us that cramming is good. Cramming is natural, and it has its place. But let’s be honest – the quality of the work almost always suffers as we reduce our scope and lower our expectations just so we can finish the project by the deadline.
This means there is a major difference between good cramming techniques and good techniques for completing a project well. This article is about moving beyond cramming.
To be clear, there are many factors that lead to project success; attitude, knowledge, process, opportunity, resources, and more. This article gives one simple process technique that anyone can do. I chose this one because it has been a significant part of my process for the last 20 years and has been the foundation of my best work.
The simple technique is based on the fact that it is natural for us to pay more attention to short-term issues than long-term issues. Long-term projects often take a back seat to short-term projects and tasks even if those short-term projects/tasks are known to have minimal value, such as cleaning out the inbox.
In fact, we have gotten so good at doing short-term projects that many of us turn long-term projects into short-term projects by either decomposing the larger project into many smaller projects, or by simply waiting so long to start working on the project that it becomes a short-term project.
For most of my career, I’ve been a researcher. It is particularly challenging to do scientific research, because it is by nature a long-term project with no obvious deadline. As researchers we seek new discoveries, new knowledge, new understanding – none of which ends up on a to-do list or can be treated as a short-term project. To thrive as a researcher, cramming is not a viable option.
Very early in my research career I learned a critical technique that has never failed me. I learned it from my PhD advisor, Professor Achille Messac, as he taught me about researcher efficiency and effectiveness. He said: Every day you must ask yourself this question:
What have I done today to further my research? By extension, for any long-term project: What have I done today to further Project X?
Everyday something meaningful should be done that actually furthers the work. No matter how hard we try to rid our lives of them, short-term projects and tasks will always be high pressure, and will always want to be completed first. So we must have the discipline to make our long-term projects equally high pressure – otherwise, they won’t get done well.
Sure, there will be days here and there where nothing was done to further Project X. But if you ask yourself every day the critical question What have I done today to further Project X?, you are very unlikely to have multiple days in a row without progress.
This simple process technique sounds easy, but in practice it is not. If you’re like me, being honest about your work and progress is never easy. To succeed, you’ll need to force yourself at the end of each day to literally ask and answer the question what have I done today to further Project X? Notice that this is different than asking what did I do today?
Try it today, perhaps on your commute home. Spend 10 minutes being honest with yourself about Project X. I have found that asking the question has produced generally three answers:
I neglected the project, and thus it didn’t progress today. The benefit of asking this question and answering this way is that it naturally leads me to ask what I could/should do differently tomorrow to avoid the same answer.
I worked on the project, and did X, Y or Z, but it wasn’t as useful to do those things as I had thought they would be. This naturally leads to thinking more carefully about what actions result in useful outcomes, and how I can better plan to do those actions.
I worked on the project, and did X, Y or Z, and it was great. This naturally leads to thinking about how to build on those successes by taking the next steps tomorrow.
One final thought : Whether or not you ask yourself the question what have I done today to further Project X?, there is an answer to what you did. Explicitly facing that answer and critically assessing how you planned and used your time is guaranteed to be more effective than ignoring it.
I have asked myself this question nearly every day for the past 20 years. It has helped me put into perspective what I’m spending my time on and if its meaningful. Its helped me see the progress of my long-term projects more clearly. And most importantly, its helped me make small course corrections as I step towards completing my long-term projects well.
