[PODCAST 246]: What to Do When a Project “Balloons”

Learn | Do | Become

Do you ever start a little project and think it will be “no big deal”? And then it balloons, and pretty soon you’re in way over your head?

Today’s podcast will walk through specific steps we can take to tame the chaos and bring “calm” back to our lives.

First, WHY do projects balloon? Here are at least 3 reasons:

• As you start working, you realize there was way more involved than you knew.
  • For example, this scenario reminds me of Boston’s big dig when they wanted to put more roads underground to create additional green park space. It turned out that all the pipes and wires were underground, but they were like spaghetti. It all had to be sorted out before any roads could be created and it went WAY over budget.
• The domino effect happens–where errors or challenges end up creating more work.
  • This reminds me of the movie “The Money Pit” and the scene where the bathtub falls through the ceiling–creating a new project of needing to fix the ceiling.
• More ideas or opportunities come into play.
  • “As long as we are already traveling to [this city], why don’t we also plan a gathering with all our old friends? Oh! And one has a birthday–let’s do a bigger surprise party with everyone we ever knew!”

We can’t control everything (and that’s okay!), but here are a few ideas to help if you’re in a situation like this:

(1) Prioritize simplicity and create “buffer.”

It’s tempting to schedule ourselves to the minute and leave no extra space or bandwidth between our commitments. But things usually take longer than we think. My rule of thumb is to plan 1/3 of what I think I can do. Then I have options to fill in open time, if there is any. But I usually feel ahead of the game.

For example, we recently completed a full revamp of our STEP program. We had a ton more ideas we could have implemented, but we went for the minimum viable product. A lot of those “extras” went on our Someday Projects List and we were able to create an amazing, concise STEP program that has been perfect for our STEP community.

(2) Divide your “ballooning” projects into a series of smaller projects, listed by priority. Utilize the Next in Line and Someday Projects Lists.

Imagine a giant balloon that represents a HUGE project you have in your mind and heart. Now imagine that we take this giant balloon and break it up into 6 smaller ones. A project is multiple steps with a beginning and an end. Typically, they can be segmented into sub-projects.

2 of those projects might end up on your “Current” list and you’ll focus on them this month. 3 of the projects will go to your “Next in Line” list, and the remaining one will go to the “Someday” list. You’ll still be able to make progress on this HUGE, original project, but it is more manageable now. You might realize that some sub-projects aren’t actually necessary at all, saving yourself some time in the process!

And if the project can’t be divided up?

(3) Take other “Current Projects” off this month’s list to make room for this ballooning project.

We don’t recommend holding onto other projects in the hopes that you can do them all. We recommend having a maximum of 8 projects on your list each month.

This really helps me to delegate, delay, or delete projects once I hit my cap.

I imagine an elevator with maximum space for 8 balloons/projects:

Let’s say you’re holding onto your 8 balloons/projects in the elevator (shown in the image above) and one starts growing. Your space begins to run out in the elevator.

If you leave everything as is, something is going to pop. (And this means that “the ball will be dropped” on one or more of your projects.)

To fix this issue, you simply need to take a few balloons out and put them in your “Next in Line” basket. Sure, it might feel discouraging to leave a few behind, but you know that they’ll be safe and sound in that basket until your next trip up the elevator.

The unexpected happens–sometimes for the better! I encourage you to use your discernment on what you decide to do, but then adjust your workload as needed. Remember that you are human!

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