Order and Focus through Gmail Cleanup

A few days ago I noticed, again, that my unread count in Gmail is far greater than I would like. Noting that the count was only for my Inbox, not including the unread mails in the Social, Promotions and the other tabs I was using I knew the situation was much worse. Still, this was not the main problem. the main problem was that I was starring important To-Do items and then letting them slip as they were pushed to oblivion by new, unread mails. I needed to get Gmail to sort my mails in another order. I wanted my starred items on top. So I went into Settings and figured out a way to do it.

Here's how my Inbox is set up now:

• First I have all items with "Calendar" label - I set up a rule to have all the auto-reminders from Google's Calendar directed automatically to that label without staying in my Inbox more that an instant. This is a tiny list as I delete anything's that in the past.
• Next I have my starred list - this should be kept under 10 items at all times. If I go over 10 it means I must kick something off it by taking care of it immediately.
• Then comes the unread list - this is currently still too long but I'm working on trimming it. I've already filed away quite a lot of the unread clutter using labels and deleted a lot too. I'm hoping to get it under 10 at all times as well.
• Last is the rest of my inbox.

This order led me to admit I am getting far too much mails I really don't need. When I used the tabs method those mails didn't bother me. I'd go in to the non-Inbox tabs and run wholesale delete jobs 2-3 times a week and thought nothing of it. This new order made me start unsubscribing and cleaning up my act.

To clean up my unread list I have started reading all those blog posts and updates I have kept in order to read "later". It seems I've accumulated quite a few of "Dr. Lisa" Lang's blog posts, so now I am reading through them ad loving them, of course. The funny thing is Dr. Lisa talks a lot (and I do mean A LOT) about focus, and with the way I was running my mailbox that's the one thing I didn't have....

So, if you aren't subscribed to the Science of Business blog or the Velocity Scheduling System blog I highly recommend you subscribe to them. If you have any good tips for Inbox control - please share with us by commenting on this post.

The perfectionist's honey trap

Lately I've been watching old episodes of Cake Boss on YouTube. I'm enjoying it because I like cake decorations (I've already fessed up to that), and the show is funny and genuine. For those who have no clue what I'm talking about, Cake Boss is a TLC reality TV show following day-to-day life in Carlo's Bakery, a Hobolen NJ landmark establishment. Of course I also look at the situations from a Theory of Constraints point of view. Seems to me, although it could be just editing, that Dr. Lisa Lang, over at Science of Business, with their Velocity job shop scheduling system and maybe some Critical Chain Project Management skills could come in pretty handy for them. I'd also get his sisters, who run their store, to read "Isn't It Obvious" to get some new ideas about retail and expansion. But, that's not my subject for this post.

The reason I'm bringing this up is the fact that Buddy Valastro, the "Cake Boss" himself, is a self professed "perfectionist". After I brought up the subject of perfectionism Vs. satisficing is my last post, and following some reactions on LinkedIn groups, I started thinking if I can use Buddy as a test case (with all due respect, of course).

First off the bat, before I even dive in, I realize that one man's optimizing can be another's satisficing or it may not even make the bar. So, if you go back to my original Satisficing post, both of my cakes would have met with the inside of the Carlo's bakery trash can. My best is not good enough for them and that's fine. Optimizing and satisficing are subjective and maybe even personal. I write maybe because when your job's on the line the fact that you, subjectively, feel you've done good enough is just not that relevant.

Buddy's a pro, he's really good at what he does and he wants everything to be perfect. This leads, at least on the TV screen, to stress, outbursts, rework, hurt feelings and fear. It also creates a self enforcing loop (remember loops?) in which each time Buddy and his team step up to a challenge, delivering perfect cakes that are bigger, wilder and more impossible, someone (Buddy, his family or a client) comes up with an even harder challenge. Is this necessarily negative? I don't know. There are clearly positive implications, staying ahead of the competition and being interesting enough for your own reality TV show, to name a couple. Then there are clearly negative implications as these projects amplify and generate a lot of the stress, outbursts and stuff I already mentioned (and, yes, I know this can all be just editing).

I think this clearly showcases the honey trap of the perfectionist. Perfectionists always strive for more, for better. While they drive themselves and those around them nuts, they can also come through with amazing results. After all, being the best means doing something that has never been done before, otherwise it can't be The best with a capital T. Think about Nadia Comăneci's 1976 Olympic performance. She scored perfect 10s for her performance then, the first female to ever score a perfect 10 (the score watch did not have the 10.00 option as it was considered impossible). Had this exact performance been repeated now - would it be hard enough, impressive enough to justify the perfect score? Not at all, the bar has been raised. So, the more you strive to deliver, the higher the bar for best and perfect become, not just from you but from anybody delivering these types of outputs. So, to stay the best you have to do more and then even more. It's a never ending cycle, with all the positive and negative implications. Is it worth it? in the Olympics? Sure, in the business world? Maybe not.

I have an idea on how to break the loop with help from the customers themselves. It needs some thinking, but if you want me to work on it - press the Like +1 button and I'll know.