How to Meet Your Deadlines :: Process Essays

How to Meet Your Deadlines It's a gorgeous fall day and my mind is drifting like a dinghy on the lake. But I'm inside my house watching the clock tick away, hoping to pull together this essay before the deadline arrives. If you're like me, deadlines drive you crazy, but they also keep you driven. Chances are, you've spent countless nights awake, fretting over an upcoming deadline, even ones that are easy to meet. The Pressure Cooker So how can you handle the pressure -- real and imagined -- of deadlines? And what should you do if it looks like you're going to miss one? Here are a few tips on handling the dreaded D-word. Always meet your deadlines. There's simply no excuse, short of calamity not to. As Cameron Foote writes in "The Business Side of Creativity": "You're very raison d'etre is to do for others what they cannot or will not do for themselves. When you accept an assignment, the client expects you to be competent, professional, and most of all a fanatic about meeting his or her deadlines." Treat deadlines with the respect they deserve. Woody Allen once said, "eighty percent of life is just showing up." You'll be amazed and how much return business you can earn simply by being on time. Negotiate longer lead times. Deadlines are like money, they aren't easily renegotiated. Even if you think you can meet the proposed deadline with little problem, it's best to win yourself a little extra time during the initial negotiation. Extra time acts as insurance should a work or personal emergency arise or if the job becomes inexplicably complex. The slack can also come in handy if you need to accommodate a rush job, particularly one with extra dollars attached. Ask for an extra day or week or month, whatever is appropriate to the work you do and the scope of the project. Whenever you start talking to a client about a deadline, think about your kids, significant other, or beloved hobby, and silently ask yourself: Is this deadline going to prevent me from spending time with the people or activities I love? If nothing more, this ploy gives you the incentive to ask for that extra week or two. Break up chores into manageable pieces. Perhaps the problem is not the deadline, so much as the sheer size of a project you face. One way to battle this daunting specter is by creating a Gantt chart to break the project into smaller chunks.