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Leslie Shreve is a workload management and productivity expert, and the Founder and CEO of Productive Day®. Leslie is also the creator of Taskology® The Science of Getting Things Done, an all-encompassing system for managing tasks, time, email, information, and more. For more than 20 years, Leslie has worked with corporate leaders and professionals from more than 30 different industries to show them how to increase efficiency and productivity by 4X, gain 1-2 hours back in their workday, spend up to 50% less time in their email Inbox, and make more powerful progress on projects—WITHOUT giving up all of their personal time to do it.

 

In this episode, Jason and Leslie discuss:

  • Streamlining organization and eliminating wasted time with the Taskology system
  • Effective task management strategies for reducing overwhelm and improving focus
  • Email management best practices for maintaining a zero inbox and productivity
  • Aligning time blocking with prioritized tasks for productive workdays
  • Impact of productivity processes and workload management on goal achievement

Key Takeaways:

  • Taskology emerges as a game-changing system that eliminates wasted time by streamlining organization and protecting calendars through strategic time blocking.
  • The importance of aligning time blocking with prioritized tasks is emphasized, advocating flexibility to adapt to changing demands.
  • Breaking down large projects into smaller, actionable steps using the "next action" strategy proves to be an effective method for reducing overwhelm and maintaining focus.
  • Effective email management, including deciding email usefulness and maintaining a zero inbox, prevents critical tasks from slipping through the cracks and promotes efficiency.
  • Productivity is shaped not just by the work itself but by the systems and processes in place, highlighting the vital role of workload management in achieving goals.

 

“Your workday isn’t just about what you do best—it’s also about how you’re working. If your processes—task management, email management, information management—aren’t running smoothly, they’re like a ball and chain stealing your time and productivity. That’s holding you back from your goals, whether it’s less stress, more sleep, or time with family. Productivity isn’t just in the work—it’s in the how of your day. Let’s fix that and get your time back.”

 - Leslie Shreve

Connect with Leslie Shreve:

 

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Listen to the podcast here:

 


Leslie Shreve- Is HOW You're Working Really Working?

Hello and welcome everybody to this episode of The Insight Interviews. My guest today is none other than Leslie Shreve. Who the heck is Leslie? Leslie is the founder and CEO of Productive Day and the creator of Taskology, which is the science of getting things done. Specifically, Leslie is a workload management and productivity expert. That means she helps people do things like, oh yeah, get one or two hours back in their day. She also, helps people spend up to 50% less time on email. I know that that's something that I'm interested in specifically, and I can't wait to dig in. But Leslie, first, welcome to the show.

Thank you so, much, Jason. It's great to be here today.

You've listened to one or two of our episodes, so, you know the first question right out of the box. And so, I don't know if you're prepared for this or not, but who or what are you grateful for today, as you and I engage one another?

I am grateful for a couple of things and people. The first thing would be just my ability to serve others. I think it's really a gift that I've discovered over the years, what it is that I can do best in order to help other people, and that brings me joy every single day, and for 21 years now, ever since I started Productive Day in 2003. So, it just makes me happy to help others hit milestones and reach targets and reach their goals and then move on with their lives, because who wants work to hold you up? You spend all your time at work, and you really need more personal time. So, it brings me joy to help people find more time to enjoy joy in their lives. So, that's the first thing I would say. The second would be that I don't have to do this journey alone. And I think for too many years, I guess it's a blessing and a curse, that I can do a lot of things pretty well, but there's a lot of things I can't do really well. And I think at one point I just finally hit that limit and thought, okay, we've got to build the team, and it took me a while to get there. And I'm really grateful for the people who are with me on this journey to help Productive Day grow. And last but not least, I'm really grateful for my boyfriend. He's one of my biggest fans and supporters and sweetheart and best friend, and almost like a business coach in many ways. And we talk so, much about business, and he's there with me and has been for eight years, and I just love him to pieces. So, I'm grateful for him.

Leslie, you're making me feel all googly inside. Thanks for that answer. Those are fun answers. Very, very cool. And I can tell you, listener, that Leslie walks her talk. Prerecording, we talked about just a little bit about what we topics we might want to hit on, and your answer then Leslie was very similar as to what you just answered, which is, hey, I just want to serve, or just want to help. And here you are talking about doing exactly that. So, let's dive in. You weren't always a productivity expert, and so, it would you mind just introducing yourself a little bit more in depth than I did? We know you’re a founder, CEO, you created this system, but what led you to be the productivity expert that you are today?

Great question. I love looking back. It's kind of a fun road. I guess it would all start very, very early in my life, when I would go to my father's office at Black and Decker. He was there for more than 30 years, back in the day, when people were staying in jobs a heck of a lot longer than they do now. And I remember when I was little, he took me on one Saturday, and I didn't go very often, this wasn't a regular thing, it was kind of a special thing, but he had a program that he needed to kick off for work, and so, he needed to go in on a Saturday. And I remember, I don't know why I remember these details, but this deck of cards, they were all aces, and it was the ACE program. I have no idea what the program was about, but I remember he needed to take a card and put it on everybody's desk. And he said, would you like to go in with me and help me put these around? And I said, sure. I was probably, I don't know, 7, 8, 9, 10. I can't remember that part. And when I walked into that office, I just was like, wow. Like, all these huge offices and this beautiful dark blue, like really dark blue carpet, and everything was just so, professional looking, and I was wowed. And I thought, I just want to be in business. I want to be in corporate business. So, knowing all through high school that that was going to be the degree I go after in college was kind of easy for me. Everybody else was spinning, going, I don't know what I want to do, I don't know what I want to major in, I don't know where I want to go, and I knew exactly what I wanted to do and where I wanted to go. And so,, after college, I fell into a career in material management, purchasing and contracting, mostly for healthcare, for some of the systems around here that you're familiar with, like LifeBridge.

Sure.

And I got my job two weeks out of college. Like, I immediately hit the Baltimore Sun back then, when you were circling things in the newspaper.

I remember those days.

Yeah, a lot of interviews in those two weeks, I just hit the pavement, and I got the first job two weeks later after I graduated. So, I was excited to dive into the business world. I loved my career because I was good at it. I loved Excel spreadsheets and negotiations and learning how to do contracts and cost benefit analyzes and all of that. And it was fun until it wasn't. Theres more. And it didn't go sour at all, and I love the people I worked with, I just had this pull inside of me that said, Leslie, you can do more. You can serve other people, doing something that is innate to you. And I was looking for probably a year. And I looked high and low. I tried some wacky things and just looking, not trying, but just looking and going, well, let's look into this. Let's look into that.

Sure.

Finally, I had a friend who introduced me to one of her friends who was a professional organizer, and believe it or not, that's how it all started. And I thought I was going to help people get organized, but that's not it. That's not it at all. And I figured that out very quickly. But in the meantime, it was the segue to get me to start my own business. And I thought, okay, this is going to be fun. It'll get me out from behind the desk. I'll know what the weather's like out there, I can deal with a lot more people help, more people doing something that comes naturally to me. So, when I first started, I started with homes and businesses, and I very quickly realized homes are not my jam. It was the business folks that I was like, wow, these businesspeople are really struggling. And so, long story short, in the first couple, you know, months or the first year, I realized, okay, great, you can help somebody get organized. That's just papers and files, though. What I saw were the gaps, and I realized, well, sure, you can find or file something in three seconds or less, but that's not going to help you, if you can't keep up with email and you're buried, or you can't get any time at all to do anything that you need to do strategically. And if you can't get a grip on your tasks and know how to plan and prioritize them, you are going to be all behind, like, behind every day. And I thought, okay, I have X ray vision on these gaps, and I've been in corporate. I've had workdays, I know what this is like, and I've been using Microsoft Outlook at that point for 13 years, and when I quit in 2003 and started working after a couple of years of this, I thought, well, we can do something about this. And so, the first five years I realized I was teaching the same thing over and over and over again. And I thought, hmm, I think we have a system here. Let's get it out of my head. So, it came out in eBooks, one component at a time, and by 2010 I trademarked it and called it Taskology, the science of getting things done. And since then, I've created every product there needs to be for that. But the whole time, I've been doing private one to one consulting. And, you know, after six months or a year, I never did anything with homes. I rebranded, I changed the name of the company. It just instantly became all about business again, because, you know, that's where my heart has always been, and it's funny how I kind of left and then came back. And so, ever since then, I've been working with business professionals, and mostly C level leaders in the past 10 or 12 years. Business owners and C level leaders are really the ideal client, but I also, do Taskology for teams training. So, I help a lot of other people in groups, and I'll work with any motivated professional who is tired of having too much to do, too many emails, not enough time, and they want their personal time back.

Well, I don't know many professionals who don't fit that category, but a couple of comments on that. I mean the name of your company is brilliant. I read the name of the organization Productive Day, and first of all, I smile. Secondly, I'm like, I want productive days, and I think to myself often, like many professionals do, I wasn't as productive as I would have liked to have been that day. And so, this episode may end up being more sink your teeth into tangible than others, but when your organization and you cross my desk, I was like, boop, we're gonna put a finger on that one. We need her. And so, yeah, thanks for being on the show, and I'd love to really dig into specifics. I mean, what the heck is Taskology?

Sure. So, I can give you lots of details about it. It has three main components: task management, time management and email management. It does include information management as well, it just happens to be tucked into the time management piece because there's two ways that we get time back for our clients every day. The first way is by protecting time, and the second is by saving time. So, we protect time because of a time blocking methodology that we use that's much more specific than what a lot of people out there might say that they know already. Like, well, I know how to block time on the calendar, but I get down deeper in a more granular way to show my clients how many days a week to do it, how far out into the future to do it, how many times a day, how long the time should be, and what to do when things go wrong in your day. When priorities shift and the day changes, there's a very extensive plan for that. So, it allows my clients to always have protected time on their calendar, and they never have to say, oh, well, I started protecting time proactively until June, and then it fell off the calendar. We don't have that productive day, so, we go into that, and we talk about interruptions and distractions and multitasking and all that stuff, but then they're saving time. So, this is part B, and it's not like saving time in a bank for later on, it's saving it from being lost in the first place. What I mean by that is that too many professionals right now are losing time looking for things they know they have but just can't find. So, they're losing time that they could have held on to, if only. If only they had systems in place to manage all the things in their day. So, we're talking about looking for contact information where we already have a contact system or a CRM, but they're looking in that email that's now tucked in a folder on the left side of the screen, and now they're running a search to try to find it, you know? Or there's attachments in the hard drive, there's papers and files and file drawers. You know, there's a lot of reference systems in your workday, but you really want to make sure they're streamlined and ship shape, so that you can reach for something and know that you're going to find it, because too many times people are looking for these things and they're not finding it. It could be emails, it could be to do lists, you name it. The list is long. So, that's just the time piece. But then there's tasks, and then there's email. So, we have a very special approach to task management that sets us apart from what everyone else is doing.

All right, I have questions based on just the little bit that you said there. So, Rewire, you know, we coach, I think you and I probably have very similar clientele. We coach the C suite on all kinds of organizations, and even the best of the best and the most productive executives out there, there is a phenomenon that happens, and I'm generalizing here, but this is why you have the company that you have and are enjoying the success that you have. Okay, time blocking. Sure. We go through time blocking, and I could pull up my calendar right this minute, and you would see time blocks. Leslie, I do see a gap that exists, and you talked about gaps earlier between the activity of time blocking. It's on my calendar and every Wednesday I should be prospecting, or whatever it is that I've time blocked, but then Wednesday comes and actually doing what's in that time block doesn't always happen because of a variety of reasons. Talk about that phenomenon and talk about what to do about it, please.

Sure, actually, we do it differently at Productive Day. The time block doesn't have a definition by design.

Okay.

Time blocks are for two of the main processes in your workday. It's for task management and email processing. We do not name the time blocks unless it's something general, like office time, or Dan's time, Jason's time, Leslie's time, you know? This is why this whole system ties together. It's not just about email management or just about task management or just about time management. That's why all these parts of your day and of our system go together. So, when they learn the rules of the road of this time blocking, they know that those blocks on the calendar, however many there are, tie back to and align with what they have on the Taskology task list. They also know that that time can e also be spent for processing email back to zero. So, when they learn this, they're not saying, oh, this time block is for calling prospects, or this time block is for writing my new book, or this time block is for that. No. We don't do that. That's why that's different. The way we set the system up, the task list drives their day. Now, if they do happen to have something that's going to take an hour or two, whether it's writing a new book or doing performance appraisals for their team, we will talk about how to handle that. We do have the occasional time block with a specific intent, but it's the minimum, it’s not the norm. And yes, you're right. You don't want to steamroll over that, if you feel like your day is going to be turned upside down and change, and then you're like, well, I got to toss that out the window. That's why we approach it differently, because we don't want that to happen. So, generally, that time block is left for the person to decide at that moment, how will I use it? And we know they're going to use it, but they're not locked in with what it is.

Thank you. So, I'm thinking of, again, just the typical coaching client or typical human. I'm including myself in these questions, right? I want to protect the innocents that are our coaching clients. What we find in coaching often, and I see this in human nature, gosh, I saw it with my kids and I'm guilty of it at times, which is Leslie, just the slightest bit of ambiguity in what I've committed to could take away the accountability that I have to myself if I don't actually do the thing. And so, when I hear you say, well, we time block, but it might not need to be a specific task, that one task that's like number seven on my list, the thing that I kind of don't want to do, you know, if it's not specific in my schedule to do it at that time, it feels like it would be easier to just go, ah, just do it tomorrow, you know, type of thing. So, talk me through that. Coach me through that. What does the system do to help avoid that problem?

Sure. Well, we're talking now about task management. This is the heartbeat of the system, and it's the heartbeat of your day. It is the driver of your progress and your achievement. So, when my clients learn the Taskology task list, it literally is filled up with everything that you need to do, have to do, want to do, even dream of doing. Not all in one day, but all in one system. So, think of it as an inventory, everything that's on your plate right now, no matter where it came from, no matter what source it came from, or when you plan to do it. So, when you build a list like this, it could be anywhere from 30 to 150 tasks that are on my client's task list.

Sure.

But they're not all planned for today, this week, or even this month. They go out, you know? So, they've got it off their mind. If they say, well, I don't need to follow up with Joe until February 1, well, great, it's safe. It's there. You don't have to think about it anymore, and you won't lose it on a post it note either in November. So, that's one thing. The other thing is, is there's a limit to how many tasks you can plan in a day. You know when people use a legal pad or a notebook or a steno pad, and they just write everything that comes out of their brain, and they just brain dump, right? And then my clients will tell me, well, oh, I was trying to do all this today, and I say, well, you know that that's not realistic, and we're going to fix that, because you need to really identify the key tasks that are the best use of your time today. And now that you've got clarity, because you see the whole inventory, immediately you're comparing and contrasting, and you're going, okay, this I have to do today or this week, and this is going to have to wait until next week sometime, or even next month, but it's only because you have that clarity, you have 100% awareness. And that's one of the challenges that professionals are facing today, is that they're kind of flying blind.

Oh yeah.

Because they've got things in the email inbox, they've got things on voicemail and text, they've got tasks are coming from meetings, from hallway conversations, they've got papers and files on their desk as reminders of things to do, and when they create a to do list on paper, that becomes yet another source, because they build it up, and now you got to check that too. So, what they end up doing is kind of planning and prioritizing in their head, because they're trying to remember the most important thing that they saw at each of those sources. So, then they've got the tools. They've got the legal pad, big pad, little pad, spiral pad, note pad, post it note, whiteboard, Excel spreadsheet, Word doc. You name it, they've got it.

Yes, I got I'm taking our notes on a legal pad.

Right. And sometimes people have multiple legal pads. Multiple. So, now it's even harder to keep track of things to do. So, when we pull all of that away from their sources. No more tools. The post it notes go away. Everything. The whiteboard gets erased. The Excel spreadsheet goes away. The word document goes away. All the pads the desk gets cleared. I do it all virtually. I'm just talking people through it. Now they've got the inventory. I call it Mission Control. Now they've got Mission Control. Now they're making smart decisions about how to spend their time, because they can't do 20 things today.

Yep.

So, then, because the list is a lot smaller than you would imagine. And here's the best part. We're designing a task for easy, achievable action. This is one of the challenges that people have. You look at the planner or the legal pad, people are putting all kinds of things on these tools. Big things, little things, projects, multi-step tasks, little tasks, ideas, you name it. It's a grab bag, a jumble of things on that legal pad. So, you can imagine, someone looks at that pad and they kind of back off from the things that are big.

I've had this experience, yes.

They will think, I don’t know where to start with this. I'm not sure. I can't even wrap my brain around this morning. I need more coffee. Or, oh, I need Mary for that, but she's not here today, so, let me skip to the next thing. Or, wow, I'm not sure where to begin on that, so I’m gonna look for something small and achievable, right? With Taskology, every task is small and achievable. There's a way we do that, that we teach our clients, so that when you get to that list and you go, yep, this is what I said I wanted to do today, you're not gonna kick the can down the road. Now, if your day changes and priorities shift, and they always do, you're always going to have the flexibility to reprioritize, like all the time. You're going to do it all the time, but it's not procrastinating, it's reprioritizing. It's oh, something new just came in, and this is hotter than this, so, I'm going to put this on Friday, and I'm going to do this instead, but I'm making a smart decision, because I have all the facts.

Part of what I'm hearing from you is, well, gosh, there's a lot there, but just focusing in on one element of it about the big task, the smaller tasks, the ones that I might want to put off, it sounds like you have a system to chunk things down in a way where everything is smaller bites, even if it fits into a bigger thing, and so, that way I'm less likely to go, ugh, I don't want to do that right now, or that's going to take two hours. I only have 20 minutes. That’s quite compelling.

 

Yes, yeah, everything is a first action step or a next action step to keep something moving forward. And yes, it's designed to be a certain way.

Emily P Freeman, I don't know if you know that author, but she wrote a book called The Next Right Thing, and this idea coordinates very good with this particular book, which is oftentimes, you know, and it happens to all of us, we just get overwhelmed in a particular day, or there's a decision in front of us that's like, it's a bear, right? And it's just overtaking us, and it's a wonderful book, and I highly, highly recommend it, but the big idea of the book is all we can focus on is the very next thing. The very next right step. If we can do that, well, then it allows us to get to the next right thing and the next right thing. Now we've got momentum, as opposed to, like, this whole thing. So, it sounds very hand in hand with what you're saying.

It does. I will have to look it up.

Talk with me about email. My partner at Rewire, Steve Scanlon, who co-hosts the show from time to time, he does a zero-inbox policy for himself. Boy, I strive for that. Not very successful. Talk us through that. What is Leslie's, you know, top three or top five suggestions, just for people? We're going to drive them towards you, for sure, but, if somebody were to listen to this and they could say, golly, I can do that one thing that she talked about, or I can do those two things, and it would help me today with my emails, what kind of big hits would you put out there?

Well, first, I'd want to explain to everyone why an empty inbox is important. Because, you know, there's two camps out there. There's the I keep everything in the inbox, or I want to get to nothing, or I am at nothing, you know? And I want to tell the people out there that if you're trying to hold on to everything and just rely on the search, you're actually losing time and productivity, and you're delaying progress on things because it's too easy for things to slip through the cracks or fall off the screen, and you're going to miss out on tasks, follow ups, opportunities, events, questions, connections, conversations, information, you name it. You just made it harder on yourself when you hold on to that many. Nothing is best managed while it's still sitting in the inbox. So, I want to tell everybody, get it out of there, because you need to have streamlined systems for all the reference information that you'd like to keep track of. You know, that means making sure that when you use your E Document Library, whether that's the hard drive or, you know, OneDrive or Dropbox or whatever you're using, make sure that it's categorized and that you it's streamlined and you can find things in there, you know?

Yeah.

Or if you're still using paper in your industry or in your job, make sure that what you reach for in your file drawers is easy to find. Make sure you're using your contact system, you know? Everybody's got one, but not everybody uses it.

True.

So, this is why when email is always last in our system. Like our system is A to Z, step by step, it goes in one order and one order only and it really probably bugs everybody, that email is always last, but there's a reason for that. You have to have these systems in place first, because everything that comes in email really must go someplace else for the best management of that information or that task. So, reference information is all the stuff that you want to refer to in the future. That's information. But tasks should only have one location, and so, that's why we have the Taskology task list. One central digital complete place, the inventory, so that when you're ready to pull a task out of email or a follow up, you've got a place to put it. So, what I want to tell people is you've got to have a central digital task list somewhere. Try to get away from paper. I know that's not even an email discussion, but you see how they're connected.

I do.

You can't plan and prioritize on paper. Paper is a tool, not a system. So, you really want to find that one digital tool that you can load it up. So, that's one thing. Another thing is, if you've got hundreds or 1000s of emails in the inbox, and I have seen upwards of 100,000, you know, we don't go through all those, so, I don't want you to either. The truth is it just doesn't need to be in the inbox anymore. So, an easy, quick step for people is to set up a folder on the left side of the screen, and if you have, five years’ worth of emails, get them out of there. You know, all the way up until where we are now in 2024 and right now we're headed into the October, November, December, Q4, so, if I were working with a client right now, just like this morning, when I got a client to zero and loving it, we would take the first half of 2024 out of there too and get it in that one folder. So, it might be called 2018 to 2023 or 2024 emails, you know,? Whatever, however many years. Just get it out of there. Because what's happening is, when you search the inbox, you're just making it that much longer and harder to find what you're looking for, because it's got to sift through all that stuff. Get it out, you know? So, that's one thing. I'm not telling you to delete it. Just get it out of the inbox, because the inbox really is supposed to be for new things. New information that needs your time and attention. So, everything else is just clouding your vision. So, get them out of there. We only go through the last three months. Just letting you know. So, that's where all the fodder is for our conversations and lessons and discussions. That's where the hot stuff is. That's where the hot tasks are, right? So, that's what we use. We don't pay attention to the other 100,000.

Well, what I found is you're just not going to need that anymore, anyways. I mean, I know I'm generalizing, but for the most part, so, let me repeat that, because even listening to that, I'm like, oh, I could do that. Create a folder, just like any other email folder, and put, you know, like you said, 2018 or wherever, your inbox starts, through June of 2024 let's say that's the label of that folder. Put everything in there, then it's much more manageable. Like your bite size example that you gave earlier, it's much more manageable to go, okay, the last three months, for instance, or whatever it is. Well, I could probably spend a few hours and go through that, and now I've got nothing in there. Me even repeating that back to you, Leslie, I just feel so good at the prospect of that potentially happening.

Well good. Yeah. The idea is there's two things that hold people up from managing email exceptionally. The one is deciding how useful something is to you. Do I need it? Do I not need it? Like, how useful is it to you? So, people can struggle sometimes with that very first question. I don't know if I need this. So, I talk people through. I turn everybody into a decision making ninja, and want them to understand you have the power of choice here. You get to decide. Do you want to keep this or not? And let's think about seriously how useful this is to you, whether now or in the future. So, that's hold up number one, typically. Most of my clients are pretty clear on what they need and what they don't need, and sometimes they need to talk through it. But when they say, well, Leslie, I know I need it, but I don't know where to put it, that's hold up number two. That's why we go back to systems, one for your tasks and all the reference systems for all the different kinds of information that you need to hold on to, right? So, those are the hold ups. When you get to that last three months’ worth of email, it's decision making from there, because if you've got the systems that you need, if you have places to put, things that are ship shape, you're good. Now start making decisions. Let go of things you don't need, use, want or love anymore. It's out of here if it doesn't have a use. And then you're going to find tasks, you're going to find follow ups, you're going to find reading, you're going to find invitations to events, you know, all kinds of things, and these are the things that I talk through with my clients, so they know exactly what to do with every single thing that comes in email.

Yeah. I asked you for a few quick hits, if you will, and I wrote a couple down, and so, that's good. Is there anything else on email that you're like, yeah, your listeners should know this today?

Flagging email or marking it as unread so it stays bold in the inbox, all of those tactics are not serving you. And you may already know that, and you may already sense that, and go, I need a better way. There is a better way. So, just remember, you've got to get your system set up. You've got to have places to put these things, because managing them where it comes in is not going to help you. It's going to hold you back. And I just can't emphasize enough that you really must have a workable task list, digital, and you've got to have all your other systems in great shape. You know, I know that takes some time to do.

It does.

And just remember, don't make everything a folder. You know, definitely don't put tasks in a folder, because that's going to trip you up too. Don't put reading in a folder. You know, reading is one of those things that people really want to put in a folder, but be careful, because it's easy for it to just sit there, gather dust.

Get lost. Yeah.

And you're then you're not getting the value out of it.

Yeah.

So, I tell my clients to leave it in the inbox, because when they get to zero, then those couple of emails are just kind of staring them in the face, and they're reminding them, read me and do it within the next five business days. If you don't, then think about letting it go.

What's an acceptable- this is such an unanswerable question, but what's an acceptable amount of emails in my inbox?

Zero. No, you know what? People come to me all the time, or I meet them out in the world and networking wherever, and they are so proud. They're like, I only have 20 emails in my inbox. And I go, that's great. I'm glad you don't have 1000s.

Yeah.

Guess what? Those last 20 they're all reminders of things to do and there's two things you can never ever do in the inbox that you can do on a suitable task list, and that is, plan and prioritize your task. Can’t do it. You don't even know what the tasks are, that's the problem. So, what happens is, people end up rereading emails they've already seen and couldn't do anything with them. You have to remind yourself, why did I flag this? Why did I leave this here? What was this about? Oh, right, okay, I don't want to do that today. Let me go to the next one. And you might do that. You might do that like five times. Do you know much time that's costing people? That's what I want people to know.

The practicality of everything that you're saying today is so, good. I was hoping for this, and you've already exceeded expectations, Leslie. Is there anything that I haven't asked you? You know, you've been gracious in answering the questions that I've asked, but you're the expert. If we just go off script, is there anything that you'd like to talk about, or is there something under this umbrella of productivity that we haven't talked about yet, that you feel like our listeners should hear?

Yes, I do. That's a great question and thank you for asking it. I can think of one thing that is important for everybody to know. The listeners out there, and my clients and your clients, you guys are all great at what you do. We all have our area of expertise. We bring our talent, our education, our background, our experience, to the table, and when it comes to your workday though, you really want to spend your time using your expertise, but there are two parts to the work day, and I don't think people realize this, which is why I'm here to shout it from the rooftops. And that is, there's another part of your workday that is possibly holding you back. It's called workload management. It's how you're working. So, how you're working today really matters. It matters because how you're working is just as important as doing the work itself, except that how you're working is like the operating system that should be running quietly and smoothly in the background per day, but for most folks, it's not working that way. So, it's how am I going to get through all these emails? How am I going to get time? How am I going to prioritize all of this? How am I going to remember all of this? How am I going to get through my day? And that “how” is like a ball and chain that's holding people back, and it's literally stealing time from the part of your day that you really want to be working on what you do best. So, I really want everybody to know that while you might look at all those stacks of paper and files on your desk and say, I know where everything is, or I'm okay with my legal pads and my planners, I really want you to understand you're actually losing time and productivity in places that you didn't know, and it's holding you back. So, if you're really, really serious about reaching your targets, reaching your goals, gaining more personal time, spending more time with your family, having more sleep, less stress, more time for health and fitness, whatever, vacations, understand that it can be drawn all the way back to your workday, in how you're working, because of how you're working isn't working, you might be spinning your wheels. You might know it. You might not know the extent of it. But just understand that time and productivity are hiding in the processes in your day, in task management, email management and information management.

Yeah, well, and that's where I was going to go. I mean, again, the practicality of what we've talked about, and I have written notes, and I almost feel like I need to apologize for my yellow pad here, but, like, I want to focus on you, but I got to take these notes too. And you know, we'll have a script to all of this, but I needed to take out some of the juice that was being squeezed out there, Leslie. So good. I have a feeling people are going to want to reach out to you, and I will preface this by saying, I've been to your website, it's very friendly, it's very easy. Listeners, there's all kinds of free tools on there. There are things that Leslie will send out once a week to you, productivity tip of the week, there are all kinds of neat things on there. But I have a feeling people are going to want to want to reach out to you, especially when this episode drops. It's going to be towards the end of 2024 people start to think about next year and getting a clean slate and getting the inbox down to zero. So, the timing of the dropping of this episode might be very, very good. But if people want to reach out to you, which I think they will, what's the what's the best way for people to do that?


Well, they could visit ProductiveDay.com, or simply email me at Leslie@ProductiveDay.com I'm always here. And I think if they visit the website, they'll see the free resources, but I want to point out that there's a really fun quiz on the home page. That's one of our best resources. And it's not just taking kind of an assessment. It's really a diagnostic quiz called what's your number one productivity blind spot? And what's fun about it is that on the other side of filling that out, I think it's maybe eight questions, you'll find out if you're a giver, a marker, a jumper or a detective, and it's really fun. You'll get your own unique results report, and then a little while after that, you'll get another special report that takes a deeper dive into your particular blind spot, and we'll talk a little bit about what it is, why it's holding you back, and what to do about it, to fix it. So, really love the quiz that's there, but then also, the smart steps. The productive day smart steps are a 52 week audio series, just short little two to four minute audios that I've done that will give you tips and strategies straight from Taskology every week in your inbox. So, that's our 52-week series that I encourage people to sign up for. I think we do have one other special report on the home page, and you're welcome to download that as well. I think that's the seven surprising secrets to saving time. So, we have those resources for you on ProductiveDay.com.

Oh, so, good. So, good. Well, Leslie, you brought it the way that I thought you would, and then some, so, thank you for that. I can't wait to dig in on my own productivity, just based on this conversation. So, thank you for that. I did sign up for the 52-week deal, and I'm excited to get the tips that you send out. Thank you so much for your expertise, thank you for doing what you're doing, for the leadership across the country, making us all more productive than we can be, relying on our own devices and yeah, just thank you so much for your time and expertise today.

Thank you for having me on the show, Jason. It was great to have a conversation with you today.


Gosh, did I enjoy that interview with Leslie Shreve from Productive Day, creator of Taskology. I took away so many insights, but what she had to say about, I just even liked the way that she broke down productivity into three specific categories: task, time and email, and how they all kind of fit together. But I like how she has a way of breaking things down into actionable, bite sized things so that we don't look at a task and go, ah, I’m just gonna put that off. She's got a plan for that. And then she creates from her clients, she creates decision making ninjas. I thought that was cool. And it'll be interesting to see what the final show name is that we titled this, but I'm thinking about what's on her homepage there is really asking a question for the title of this episode, which is, what's your number one productivity blind spot? And she does have a quiz right on her home page about that. I signed up for the 52-week audio productivity tips, and I'm excited to dig into that. So, all kinds of insights. Very tangible. I'm thinking about my email very differently at this point. But as we say at the end of every episode of The Insight Interviews, it doesn't much matter what me as the host, what my insights were, but what really matters is what insights did you have?

 

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Thanks for reading. If you got any value at all from this episode, a little nugget all the way up to some big, huge insight, please do us a solid by subscribing, recommending, rating, and reviewing us on Apple Podcast, Spotify, or Google. That stuff matters to us, and it allows us to continue interviewing more awesome people.



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