Am I in the wrong sort of job?

January 3, 2010 11:39 AM

Has anyone "cured" a bad procrastination habit by taking a new job that has strict deadlines -- i.e., one that leaves you with really no way to procrastinate while managing to keep your job?

I've noticed that my current job and my couple previous ones have or had laid-back, lenient bosses; long-term or vague deadlines; and cycles of work that were longer than daily or weekly.

I've been thinking, maybe I just need to find a job where that isn't the case? (I've tried LOTS of other ways to deal with procrastination, and nothing works.) I have an interview later this week for a job that fits the criteria...

posted by trillian to Work & Money (24 answers total)

Yes. I was involved with farming, where if I didn't feed the animals or water the crops everything would die and it would be all my fault. Yeah, it's good motivation. I also had success with a computer job where if I didn't finish websites I would not have money for food and would also have been subject to large amounts of shame, that worked too. In the future I plan to have more jobs like that. Procrastination happens when I have a job without deadlines and without clear consequences for not doing work.
posted by melissam at 11:44 AM on January 3, 2010

Yes, this is pretty much the reason I became a journalist - because I wanted to write, but knew I wouldn't write at all unless a big scary news editor was standing over me with a big stick telling me I had to file copy every day. It worked, in as much as I now research and write about 1,500 words every day, because there's no choice.

Unfortunately, it hasn't carried over into the rest of my life, where I'm just as much of a procrastinator as I ever was (as you can tell from the fact I'm commenting on AskMe while a big groaning pile of paperwork sits on the counter behind me).

Also, having a big scary person waving a metaphorical stick over you gets kind of stressful after a while. Every single day I long for a laid-back, lenient boss, so maybe the grass on the other side is always greener. And in some workplaces, including mine (and no doubt as a farmer, too) the only way of hitting constant, compulsory deadlines is by doing a lot of unpaid overtime.
posted by penguin pie at 11:56 AM on January 3, 2010 [3 favorites]

For a while I had a column in a small weekly newspaper - this wasn't a full-time job, but I needed the supplemental income pretty badly and if I didn't make the deadline I didn't get paid. I made every deadline for the 18 months or so that I wrote the column; granted, I wasn't usually early, but I was never late. That concrete deadline kept me in line! Now I'm a teacher and no one really looks over my shoulder to make sure I'm getting papers graded in a timely fashion, and my procrastination is back (with the exception of doing lesson plans - there's a strict deadline for that, and I always get them done). I say, go for the strict deadline position!
posted by katie at 12:00 PM on January 3, 2010

I'm a procrastinator and took a job in advertising which had pretty strict deadlines if you don't get the materials to the publication/media by the deadline the show will go on, but not with your ad. I liked the deadlines and structure. And I'd work on ways to optimize the production schedule to give me more...time...to...procrastinate. Because it wasn't my boss driving the deadlines I didn't feel that out of control. But when working for people cracking the whip I usually freeze up and my productivity suffers.

But like penguin pie says about their experience in journalism, it never carried over to the rest of my life. And when I found myself in jobs that weren't so regulated I slipped back to my old ways. But what I do even in a lax environment where there's not a boss cracking a whip is set deadlines and stick to them. I seem like a rockstar to the boss for showing initiative and not needing to be micromanaged.

I would not look for your job to be your cure for procrastination.
posted by birdherder at 12:07 PM on January 3, 2010

Becoming an editor definitely cured me of a general tendency to blow deadlines or to leave everything to the last minute at work. As an editor, meeting small deadlines along the way of any project (in order to meet the big final delivery deadline) becomes essentially the only effective way to function, since there are so many stages (review, design, proofreading, printing, etc.) and people involved. Blowing a deadline at any stage can mean jeopardizing the project and/or forcing someone else in the chain of events to "eat" the time you've blown. So I've basically become the Queen of Deadlines because the guilt of screwing over my coworkers inspired me to become ruthlessly efficient (and, consequently, pretty intolerant of about 90% of people's excuses for blowing deadlines of their own).

Echoing some other comments, though, I don't know that I've become all that ruthlessly efficient in my personal life as a result of my professional turnaround. I'm a little more organized overall (and have discovered the joy of making to-do lists) but generally my own personal projects with their own (vague) deadlines tend to remain unfinished. Alas.
posted by scody at 12:17 PM on January 3, 2010

I've done this. It's a way to get yourself to create more than you otherwise would, perhaps, but not a sure route to happiness.
posted by limeonaire at 12:27 PM on January 3, 2010

You know, your strategy does seem to work for some procrastinating people. But just to note that the learning curve on this seems to be stressful for a procrastinating people, depending on how they approach the experience of working in a job that has bright light deadlines.

I think when it works, from a professional standpoint, I think the procrastinating person has to recognize that there is both an external and internal shift that needs to happen.

That is, having a 'deadlines' person breathing down your neck doesn't necessarily change a procrastinating person's work style in the long term without conscious and consistent effort. If you weren't an early starter around a project before, you might not think to become one unless you actively make an effort. What's more likely to happen is that you are going to stay up the night (or two nights) before with your special friend coffee/pepsi/red bull, and knock out whatever the project/paper is. Which means there might still be the guilt of not doing it earlier, the stress of waiting until the last minute, the berating that comes from beating yourself up for not doing it earlier, and a little bit of extra exhaustion, because you just got off of your eating/sleeping cycle to get something done.

Also, know that for some people like myself, where there are some deadlines that I have to hold my staff accountable to, working with procrastinating people who imagine that I will be their drill sergeant and keep them in check (without any change on their part), is one of the few things that raises up my 'I have contempt for your behavior' flag.

So I think it can work, as long as work wise, you use your deadline person to inspire you - and you get it done because you respect them and your colleagues who will be put out if you don't hand off your part in time.

This beats the alternative: imagining that somehow that the deadline person will keep you 'in line', by being disappointed/angry/stern/whatever with you when you blow the deadline. (unless of course, they're into that - and some people really are, and that's not a bad thing).

Because there is a chance that over time, the deadline person will view the additional work they have to do to 'keep you in-line' as a performance issue, and let you go.

Good luck in your interview!
posted by anitanita at 1:04 PM on January 3, 2010 [1 favorite]

penguin pie's experience is similar to mine: the deadlines mean you get your work done -- and sometimes prodigious amounts of it -- but they don't pass over into your everyday life. You still end up with mountains of chores undone (possibly more, because you're so wiped from work).

On top of that, it's not really a great way to life your life unless you're one of the few who thrive on it. There's a reason there's so much alcoholism in journalism.

So, yeah, if you take the job, you'll get lots of work done at the office. But is that what you want? If you just want to stop procrastinating in real life, start creating some real-life deadlines. Invite good but not terribly close friends over regularly if you want to tidy the house more, etc.
posted by bonaldi at 1:04 PM on January 3, 2010

The military is good for this, I hear.
posted by Jairus at 1:06 PM on January 3, 2010

I'm a horrible procrastinator, but I'm well known for getting stuff done before deadlines at work, so yea, it can work.
posted by 5_13_23_42_69_666 at 1:10 PM on January 3, 2010

This sort of worked for me. I went to being the world's laziest and procrastinatiest magazine admin (I consider this the era in which I was basically commenting on MetaFilter for a living) to being a freelance writer. I was so desperate to prove my worth to my new editor and to keep a steady stream of assignments flowing that I completely converted. I woke at an early-ish hour and got to work, every day. In fact I often forgot to take days off.

Part of what helped was that I was literally dangling over the abyss, financially. As in, if I don't make these phone calls or write this article, I won't be able to invoice for it, and if it's late my editor will be unimpressed and stop giving me work. Also, knowing that my name and mine alone would be attached to the final product was a huge incentive to turn in quality work.

While I'm hardly what you would call a new man, this really was a turning point in my long term work ethic. I think you need to have a fairly healthy self-esteem and a realistic appraisal of your abilities to make this work, otherwise you may bog down or despair. But really, I can't work unless there is some sort of (figurative) gun to my head, and now I pretty much only choose to work in situations that will put one there.
posted by hermitosis at 1:38 PM on January 3, 2010

I guess it didn't cure me of the habit when I'm not at work, but it certainly made for a far happier work situation.
posted by citron at 2:06 PM on January 3, 2010

I'm that guy, was in your position, and somewhat unknowingly took that job. I do get more done because the structure forces it, but I'm constantly worn out by it. Neither way is good but this one is more acutely bad for me. It has not helped me in the rest of my life, not yet, not in terms of results. If it has taught me anything, however, I suppose it has been to stop when I have something that works well enough rather than keep pushing for perfection. In the interest of hitting deadlines, it forces me to be a little more practical and to be a little more comfortable with less than stellar performance. So far that lesson is only theoretical, but I'm hoping it sinks in and becomes something applicable.

But that's just one data point. There are so many variables and unknowns from person to person and setting to setting - I think the only way you will know is to try. Stay loose, give it a shot, adapt to the degree you can, and win or lose you'll learn something about yourself. Nothing's permanent and you can get out of it down the road if you need to.

A book on that topic that I've been procrastinating finishing is called The Now Habit. It offered unexpected insight into the real roots of procrastination.
posted by kookoobirdz at 2:20 PM on January 3, 2010

To put it another way, if you got up for school every morning only because your mother yelled at you, did that make you any good at getting up in the morning or timekeeping? Same principle here.
posted by bonaldi at 2:24 PM on January 3, 2010 [1 favorite]

By inclination, I'm a terrible procrastinator. I currently have a job doing very collaborative work on very short (one day to one week) deadlines, and I find it almost impossible to procrastinate. There's always a task available to work on, and there's always someone who wants to work on it with me, so getting to work is less effort than procrastinating would be.

But I think the key here is not really about having strict deadlines. I've had strict deadlines before and flown happily past them. The key is having short deadlines, well-defined work, and an environment that encourages good work habits. Without this, strict deadlines would just be a recipe for disaster.
posted by moss at 2:29 PM on January 3, 2010 [1 favorite]

I agree that this can sound like a good idea. However, I'm the person who has to crack the whip over a procrastinator. And when the procrastinator misses deadlines, I have to scramble to do their work myself or, worse, tell others to do it. This is not fun.

So I'd suggest that you look for a deadline-intensive job only if you just need the threat of a whip-cracking and only if you really feel bad if others end up doing your work for you.

Otherwise, you could end up being excluded from important projects, or lose the job entirely.
posted by PatoPata at 2:34 PM on January 3, 2010

Which means there might still be the guilt of not doing it earlier, the stress of waiting until the last minute, the berating that comes from beating yourself up for not doing it earlier, and a little bit of extra exhaustion, because you just got off of your eating/sleeping cycle to get something done.

The above has also been my experience, with the additional guilt of doing a half-assed job just to get something done in time.
posted by SuperSquirrel at 2:41 PM on January 3, 2010

Another journalist/procrastinator here. I met the deadlines at work but pretty much had a heart attack several times a day doing it. Unlike other posters, for me, it did carry over into my personal life, in a few different ways, some good, some not so good.

Pre-journalism my procrastinatory tendencies were epic. I failed two theses at uni (one of them in my journalism MA, even) because I put off starting / finishing projects so excessively. I had a string of unpaid bills / unfinished business and a very messy life full of loose ends that I just never got around to tying up.

When I got to working in newsrooms tho, I met deadline. Not because I was scared of my chief of staff (tho I was) but because I wanted to do well at the job so, so badly that I allowed myself no room for failure. At all. That meant doing whatever I had to to make a deadline. If I had to wake at 3am to write a story to make deadline, I did it. If I had to make fifty calls, in my own time, after work, to get the source I needed to file a story, I'd do it. Whatever it took, no matter how ridiculous and over the top and unreasonable. Also, I needed to be organised to keep on top of a ridiculous amount of work - stories, photographs, clippings, contacts, press releases, diary items, interviews. So I made a system for keeping myself and my notes and stuff organised, and pretty much stuck to it. (Imperfectly, but well enough to get by.) So I made deadline. I still did things at the last minute. The difference was, I guess, rather than putting things off indefinitely, there was a very definite point where it had to be done, and it was done.

On the downside, the stress of doing this was extreme. There was a pretty high price to pay in terms of having a life/sleep/eating outside of the newsroom. I worked unpaid overtime every single day, on just about every day off and on quite a bit of my holidays as well.

However, proving to myself that I could actually meet deadlines did break a significant mental roadblock for me. Now that I no longer work as a journalist I don't stress about procrastination nearly as much as I used to pre-journalism. I still catch myself tending toward putting off the unpleasant, or being a bit of a perfectionist, but I nip it in the bud and, more often than not, just do whatever it is I'm shirking. My bills are paid, or on a schedule to be paid, all my stuff is organised, I keep a daily to do list and have a notebook that I use for brain dumps and catching random thoughts. I'm not Ms Super Organised or anything, but I do OK.
posted by t0astie at 7:14 PM on January 3, 2010

And by ''OK'' I mean ''much better than pre-journalism'' as far as procrastination goes. YMMV, obviously.
posted by t0astie at 7:18 PM on January 3, 2010

Funny, I was just thinking about this very thing on the train this morning. I was trying to figure out why I hate my current job as a therapist in a senior center so much and why it's making me unhappy in a way that permeates every area of my life, and I realized that it's because I do NOTHING all day but sit in my office waiting for the unlikely event that some elderly Italian man will suddenly defy years of macho conditioning and decide he wants to talk about his feelings; since I'm a natural procrastinator and extraordinarily lazy, it's a little surprising that I'm not happy doing nothing. My boss is constantly on my case for forgetting to do paperwork, but I'm so inert all day that I have trouble flicking my activity switch to "on" when I need to do so.

A couple of years ago, I had several jobs as an editor with very intense deadlines and a lot of people depending on me, and I loved it. I loved going to work every day, the time flew by, and I didn't have a second to even think about procrastinating. Considering my natural tendencies, I was shocked to learn that I was able (and preferred) to work in that sort of environment. It became clear to me that my procrastination is usually a sign of unhappiness. Now I just need to figure out how to get out of this job and into a more difficult one.
posted by coffeeflavored at 7:18 AM on January 4, 2010 [2 favorites]

I transitioned from a job with long undefinable deadlines that made me crazy, to my current position, which I love. I still procrastinate, but my main tasks have short, defined deadlines. They are also for clients, which is really motivating for me. I'm not scared (mostly) of being shamed or berated, instead I sincerely want to meet or exceed their expectations.

I want the rest of my career to include this aspect of quick response / client service because it is very satisfying to me. I still need to kick myself in the but to work on my long term projects - but no one is perfect!

I also had a lot of fear around the transition that I wouldn't be any better at managing my work. I was wrong, this different environment really made a difference for me.
posted by Gor-ella at 7:54 AM on January 4, 2010

Has anyone "cured" a bad procrastination habit by taking a new job that has strict deadlines -- i.e., one that leaves you with really no way to procrastinate while managing to keep your job?

No. I have tried this. The saying "if you need something done, give it to the busiest guy you know" doesn't actually work this way. You become busy because you're good at it, you don't get good at by taking on more work. You can get some locally good results, but it's very stressful.

You basically have to look at your life and realize that it's not worth it. All the stress about your job, missing deadlines, broken promises, health problems, missed potential, year after year, after year. I got sick of that life. It's a constant struggle. The struggle to not get distracted gets stressful, too. I have to tell myself "no" sometimes hundreds of times an hour. But it's still better than the stress I have when I don't do my work.

I finally got myself to a psychiatrist, and am taking meds for ADHD. They help, but it hasn't been the "night and day" that some people describe. I'm not saying you should, but for me it just so that I was willing to try ANYTHING. Because that life is no life at all.

So you may or may not have ADHD, or whatever--but if it's an option for you seeing some sort of professional can certainly be a first step towards making things better. Even the act of *trying* to solve this big huge problem in your life helps, as you feel like you're making progress in trying something new. And if you're like me, you can only imagine how much happier and easier and more fulfilling life would be if you could just get things done reliably.

So please, do something. I've seen how life can get better, and even the incremental improvement I'm seeing is enough to make me an evangelist. I hate to see people go what I was going through. And then you can pick any damn job you want, because you want it, and not because it'll "cure" you. And, you can be sure you'll kick ass at it, too.
posted by RikiTikiTavi at 5:51 PM on January 4, 2010

Gah. Forgot to mention, feel free to meMail. Good luck.
posted by RikiTikiTavi at 5:51 PM on January 4, 2010

Response by poster: Belated thank you to all! Too many good ones to mark as best answer!
posted by trillian at 3:13 PM on January 10, 2010