In my recent survey of nurse educators, one of the most common themes that faculty struggle with is spinning too many platters and not having enough time to get everything done.In today’s blog, I am not going to promise 3 simple steps to develop better time management. I want to go deeperto get to the heart in how you set priorities so that you readily recognize and make time for what is most important in life so that you achieve proper BALANCE between the ongoing urgent and what is most important in life.Faculty Speak!There is no doubt that nurse educators and students live continually under the pressure of too many urgent things to do. In my survey of nurse educators, these are the comments that capture the essence of what so many are currently struggling with:. Time. No time. Time to make the changes. Time management/balance between classroom & clinical obligations.
The phrase 'tyranny of the urgent' has been thrown around in time management circles, so I thought this book was about time management. It is for two pages, then it's all religious stuff. I'll save you the two bucks: You end up getting pulled away from what's important because of all the less important but urgent things that come up. The tyranny of the urgent. In the 1960s, Charles Hummel published a little booklet called Tyranny of the Urgent, and it quickly became a business classic. In it, Hummel argues that there is a regular tension between things that are urgent and things that are important—and far too often, the urgent wins.
Having enough time. Time or lack of it. Time to grade clinical papers. Keeping up with everything. TIME to complete everythingDid you notice a common theme? Did you see yourself in any of these responses?
It appears that time and lack of it is a common problem that most of us struggle with including myself! My StoryIn clinical practice, your work is left behind when the shift is over. When I began working as a nurse educator, I quickly realized the work never leaves you! There are numerous urgent things that continually call and need to be done. Emails to respond to, paperwork to grade, or presentations to develop or re-work.Though I was a full-time assistant professor during the week, I continued to work clinically in my Baylor weekend position every Friday and Saturday night. I was working 60+ hours a week and though I loved what I was doing in both education and clinical practice, I was a man in motion with the urgent dictating my schedule.By the end of the school year, I was physically, emotionally, and spiritually drained. I was a slave to the tyranny of the urgent.
Tyranny of the UrgentIn the classic article by Charles Hummel in 1967 , Hummel insightfully addressed that there is a constant tension in our life between the URGENT and the IMPORTANT.Hummel uses an example from the life of Christ to illustrate his point:“ The demand of the ill and maimed caused Him to miss supper and to work so late that His disciples thought He was beside Himself. One day after a strenuous teaching session, Jesus and His disciples went out in a boat. Even a storm didn’t awaken Him. What a picture of exhaustion.Yet his life was never feverish.
He had time for people. He could spend hours talking to one person, such as the. His life showed a wonderful balance, a sense of timing.”The trap that many of us fall into is that what is most important in our life (taking time to cultivate relationships) does NOT insist on being done immediately.But the URGENT things or never ending tasks demand our immediate attention and action right now. Without even realizing it, we become slaves to the TYRANNY of the URGENT. By choosing the urgent, we can begin to neglect what is most important in our life.So instead of focusing on not enough time or how busy your schedule is as a student or educator, reflect and see if you may be a slave to the urgent and then take some practical steps to break free! Breaking FreePursuing What’s ImportantAs I thought about the contrast between the urgent and the important, I thought about my and how as nurse educators we must filter NEED to know from NICE to know content for our students.In the same way, consider looking at everything in your schedule globally to see the big picture.
The urgent tasks that are continually pressing in are NICE to do, but the most important things in your life are the NEED to do and must become the priority you center every urgent task around.For me, the most important things in my life are RELATIONSHIPS. As a Christian, my relationship with God is my first priority. My wife, five children, and now two grandchildren follow closely. My work in clinical practice and with KeithRN is third. Life is ShortAs I have gotten older, I have observed that the URGENT tasks will always be present in one form or another, but the things that are most IMPORTANT may not.Four of my five children have left our home and we now have essentially an empty nest. In the past two years one of my closest friends suddenly died of a massive MI, and another has stage IV small cell lung cancer.
The old Joni Mitchell song got it right, “You don’t know what you got til it’s gone.”What about you? What is most important to you? Are you consistently making time for it in your busy schedule? I would encourage you to make this a priority and schedule time for it.This will provide needed BALANCE so that you live a life with no regrets in the midst of an ongoing busy schedule as a student or educator.I am a classic Type AAA who is driven to perform and consumed by the urgent!
Therefore this blog is really written and directed to me as I have made the choice over the years to sacrifice the most important things for the urgent that could have waited.I am thankful for the gift that each new day represents and the clean slate that it offers. I am determined to learn from my past, finish strong, and live for what really matters in life.Anyone else willing to join me?
Comment Question:What are the most urgent things in your schedule that are keeping you from the most important?What do you plan to do differently to make first things first? Updates from KeithRN!. I have completed the first 4 chapters of Teaching to Transform:Practical Strategies for Class & Clinical. Chapter 1: Who Pays the Price When a Nurse Fails to Think like a Nurse?. Chapter 2: The Real Reason for the NCLEX® Decline. Part I: A New Way to Conceptualize Nursing Education. Chapter 3: Foundation: The “Art” of Nursing.
Chapter 4: The Walls: Applied SciencesGeared for nurse educators, it will provide practical tools to make transformation possible! I hope to complete sometime in August.I need your help!If you are interested to preview my initial draft with your feedback and input, please contact me at! I am the lead faculty for the Leadership course in the final semester of the nursing program. I also developed and deliver up to 22 times per year, an Interprofessional Preceptor Workshop – teaching Healthcare professionals how to work with students effectively in a preceptored relationship. My husband is a pastor and so I have many responsibilities as a pastor’s wife. I am a careprovider for elderly mom (85), who lives with my husband and me.
As a Christian, I acknowledge how important it is for me to rise above the constant bickering and complaining around me at work, and recognize that I have been placed where I am for such a time as this. My life is full – my husband is on the pastoral team at church, my aging parents live with my husband and me, and this summer, the last two of our three children will be married and I will have an empty nest. God has grabbed my attention with your blog – I have truly neglected relationships in the race to get everything done. I realize I need to first solidify my relationship with Christ, and ensure I seek Him first thing in the morning (not my BlackBerry). If I am on track with the ‘Giver of all good things’, the rest of the puzzle pieces will fit into His plan for my life. I have been exhausted to the point of falling asleep at my computer in the evening or feeling like I haven’t slept at all when the alarm goes in the morning. I need to ensure I regularly get enough sleep (and not give that up just to get more things done).
I also need to take inventory of what I can actually accomplish (and not to think of myself ‘more highly than I ought to’ meaning, that there are others who are equally equipped). I also need to carefully evaluate the ‘need to know’ and ‘nice to know’ and encourages students to develop their own passionate spirit of inquiry. That is a lot to ponder! I agree with you completely, however, what exactly have you decided is “nice” in your life and “need” in your life.
You didn’t give us concrete examples. Do you need to teach, do you need to keep clinical experience going, do you need to write a book and blog? What have you let go of? I choose to let go of clinical experience.
I know that it is debated as to the need for educators to stay in touch with the clinical side and therefore work outside of their full time faculty requirements. Honestly, many do because they also need the extra money since academia pays so poorly compared to the clinical side. If we require faculty to also maintain independent clinical experience aren’t we again telling educators that you need to do it ALL.
I personally can’t find time between classroom instruction, simulation instruction, clinical instruction, grading papers and tests, committee work, curriculum revision, and family (husband and two boys 15 and 12) to work a shift or two in a hospital setting and frankly I don’t want to.I think this conversation needs real attention. We need to hear from nurse educator leaders, such as yourself, and yes you are a leader, about the exact choices they make to get it all to work out.
I also appreciate your Christian view point that,first and foremost pray about it and make sure it is God’s work; however, an individual can pray about it all they want but action still eventually needs to be taken to simplify one’s life. FYI, I love your blog, you inspire me, and all your topics are right on target.
I actively seek to transform nursing education, I use your case studies, and I am often one of the only faculty at my institution who is willing to go outside the box and try something new and different. Thanks again. You ask some great questions Connie, and I will do my best to be more concrete with examples from my life. I did not go into specifics because the NEED to do and NICE to do will vary for each of us depending on what is on our platter. You cannot do it allsomething has to give in your schedule because we all have 24 hours and must be a steward of this time. To make time for what is most important in my life as well as being sensitive to the season I am in right now, I have made the choice for the past year NOT to work as a nurse educator and let go of this in my schedule.
I continue to work almost full-time in clinical practice and am using the time that I would have committed to teaching in a program, to create resources and write my blog to serve the needs of nurse educators such as yourself through KeithRN. It is essential for each of us to recognize the season we are in with life, set PRIORITIES that are consistent with what is important to you but most importantly pursue what you feel God is leading you to do.
Cleaned out the top drawer of my night stand this weekend. Ran across a favorite ponytail holder, writing pen and gift card to a local boutique that I thought I’d lost long ago. It was just like Christmas all over again.And I also found this:It’s a tiny little pamphlet given to me by an older woman in the faith nearly a decade ago.
Written in 1967, each of its short pages is packed with a jolt of practical wisdom that is just as poignant in this century as it was in the last.Check out the statement that I underlined on page 5:That’s the first line (among many) that I highlighted – a reminder that everything is not nearly as critical as it seems to be at first. The discerning must prayerfully consider how they can maximize the gifts God has given them and the time in which He has allotted for them to be used.Jesus did it. Or He didn’t.There were so many demands placed on Him by others who either wanted Him to demonstrate His power or from some who were trying to exploit it. And most of those man-delegated opportunities He refused to indulge. Not because He wasn’t compassionate or aware but because He was on assignment. So, instead of being swayed by the whims and requests of the masses, He diligently asked the Father what His assignment for Him was, and then He stuck to the plan and only did those things.Not everything.Just the assigned things.
The divinely delegated things.After only three years of ministry, Jesus could confidently say that He had completed the work that the Father had given Him to do (John 17:4) and it was only possible because He hadn’t fallen prey to the tryanny of the urgent.What are some of the “urgent” things that most easily sway you from your main priorities? Take a few moments to leave a comment listing some creative ways that we can discipline ourselves to stay on task to our God-given mandates today?You are fiercely loved,Priscilla.