【中英双语】优化时间，告别加班

Stop Work Overload By Setting These Boundaries

by Elizabeth Grace Saunders

Why is it that when your friends, your significant other, and especially your mom tell you, You need to stop working so much! — you hesitate? On the one hand, you know they have a point. It’s unsustainable to pull 12- to 14-hour days on a consistent basis, and you feel burnt-out and cranky. But when it comes to actually setting boundaries, you stall and tell yourself and others, “It’s just a busy time. It will get better soon…”

当你的朋友、爱人，尤其是妈妈不厌其烦地叮嘱你，“不要工作那么卖力”时，你会踌躇一下。这是为什么？一方面，你明白他们说得有理。每天连续工作12到14小时是不行的，这让你疲惫不堪，情绪暴躁。可一旦面临需要设定工作时限时，你就会跟自己和亲友们搪塞说，“只是最近比较忙而已，情况很快就会好转的……”

But, it doesn’t. And you find yourself wedged between the fact that you can’t seem to get everything done and the feeling that maybe the problem isn’t the situation — it’s you. You feel guilty that everyone else seems to complete everything, but you can’t. You worry that if you ask for help or say, “No,” to anything that everyone will discover you’re an imposter who doesn’t add enough value.

事实上，情况不会好转。当意识到你可能没办法搞定全部工作，而问题的根源似乎是你时，你会左右为难。一方面，看到别人似乎都能完成自己的任务，你充满负罪感；另一方面，你担心，如果自己求助于人或一味拒绝任何请求，别人就会认为你推卸工作，是个没有能力创造价值的蠢货。

Although those fears are understandable, they aren’t necessary valid. As a time coach, I’ve found that one of the biggest keys to achieving balance is to start objectively evaluating the fact-based aspects of your schedule, rather than letting a vague sense of fear drive your decisions. No matter how valuable a team member you may be, no one can fit 100 hours of work into 40 hours a week, or even 60 hours. You can start to make changes once you have confidence that the expectations of yourself and others really are unreasonable and that you can set boundaries in a respectful, constructive manner.

尽管这些恐惧可以理解，但这实在没必要。作为一名时间管理培训师，我发现，平衡工作与生活的关键是，基于现实客观地评估你的日程安排，而不是用一种模糊的恐惧感支配你的决定。不论你在团队中多重要，没人能把100小时的工作压缩到一周40小时或60小时内完成。一旦确信自我和外界强加于你的预期不合理，你就可以着手做出改变。

Here are five steps to gain that confidence, which you can apply on an individual level or a group level if you have responsibility for managing the expectations of your team:

以下，我列出五个步骤，帮助你一步步找回自信。这些点子对于个人与团队都适用，尤其是当你负责管理团队预期时。

Step 1: Develop a Time Budget

第一步：制定时间预算 

People who manage their finances well follow a few consistent principles. For one, they spend only what they have, so they avoid unnecessary debt and the corresponding stress and cost. They also make sure that they allocate their money correctly, so that they have sufficient funds for everything they need to buy. Finally, they cut costs where they can, without a significant negative impact, and make sure to put money into investments where they have a good probability of a return. The same principles apply with effective time investment. To have a clear sense of what you can reasonably handle, you should start out by calculating how many hours you have to “spend” each week. If you tend toward over-allocating time toward work, you can do the calculations in reverse. For example:

通常，理财高手会采用几项原则。比如，他们只花手头的钱，避免不必要的欠债，以及随之而来的压力与花销；他们会尽量合理分配金钱，从而留有足够的资金购买所需；他们在无负面影响的前提下，尽可能削减开销，并购买高回报率的投资产品。同样的原则也适用于有效率的时间投资。要想了解自己究竟能处理多少事情，你首先应当计算自己每周有多少时间可以用来“花费”。如果你倾向于在工作上多分配一些时间，那么可以采取反向计算法。例如： 

Hours/Day to Work=24-(Number of Hours of Sleep)-(Commute)-(Personal Commitments)-(Exercise)-(Self Care)

　　每天用于工作的时间＝24－睡觉时间－上下班时间－私生活时间－锻炼时间－自我保养时间

By “personal commitments,” I’m referring to items in your schedule that are an essential part of you feeling fulfilled. These vary from person to person but could include family time, volunteer responsibilities, social activities, or personal passions like playing the piano. Also, eating, showering, and getting ready fall under “self care.” Once you have a sense of your daily time budget, you can calculate your weekly time budget by adding up the totals for each day. For some people, each day will look similar. For others, their personal commitments create large variations in their day-to-day time budget.

我所说的“私生活”是指，日程中能让你产生自我满足感的部分，它对你而言至关重要。每个人的私生活各不相同，可以是家庭聚会、志愿服务、社区活动或弹钢琴之类的个人爱好。“自我保养”则包括吃东西、洗澡以及梳妆打扮等。一旦你了解了自己每天的时间预算，就可以计算出自己一周的时间预算。对于某些人来说，每天做的事情差不多。但对于另一些人而言，他们每天私人时间的安排大不相同。 

Once you understand the size of your time budget, then you can evaluate the different time costs during your workday. For example, you have “maintenance” activities like answering e-mail or planning, “execution” activities like attending meetings or completing a report, and “development” activities like networking or marketing. I recommend making a list of all the different elements of your workday and then either writing down an initial time estimate or percentage for each one. For instance, 20% of my workday consists of answering e-mail, 50% of project work, and 30% of development activities.

一旦你认识到自己的时间预算额，就可以着手估算每天各种事项的时间量。比如，你要做些“维护类”的事项，如回复邮件或制定计划；“执行类”的事项，如开会或完成报告；“开发类”的事项，如开拓市场或人际网。我的建议是，列出每天不同的活动事项，然后写下预计要花的时间或所占的时间比例。举个例子，我每天工作时可能用20％的时间回邮件，50％的时间做项目，另外30％的时间进行开发类活动。 

Make sure to not only consider the cost for a particular item but also the associated costs. For instance, a one-hour meeting could come with the related expenses of 15 minutes of travel time each way, 30 minutes of prep, and 15 minutes of follow up. That means that the total expense comes to 2.25 hours. So if you work a 9-hour day and want to spend no more than 50% of your time in meetings, then that limits you to an average of two meetings per day and ten meetings per week.

注意，你不光要考虑每项活动所花费的时间，还要考虑衍生的时间花销。比如，一个时长1小时的会议可能往返的路上要花去30分钟时间，还要花30分钟做准备，15分钟做跟进。这就意味着花在这个会议上的总时长是2小时15分。因此，如果你每天有9小时的工作时间预算，并且不希望利用多于50％的时间开会，那么，你每天平均可以出席2次这样的会议，每周最多只能参加10个这样的会议。

Step 2: Make Cuts Where You Can

第二步：能省就省

After developing a time budget, you’ll typically find that you really did expect more of yourself than you could possibly fit into the hours in a day. But that doesn’t mean it’s time to go running to your manager yet. Instead, you need to take a very careful look at how you spend your time and cut where you can, first.

 在制定出时间预算之后，你通常会发现，在时间允许的情况下完成的工作量远少于预期的量。但这不代表你应立即找主管诉苦。你需要认真审视自己的时间安排，并尽可能节约时间。

One of the readers of my book took this advice to heart when she faced a major time crunch at work. Instead of trying to fight the reality of her time budget, she took this action:

 我的一位读者深受时间紧张之苦，于是用心学习了这项原则。她并未向上司抱怨工作量太大，时间不够用，而是采取了如下措施：

“I was (once again) up against way too many competing projects with the same deadline and then trying to juggle other on-going & long-term projects too, which was causing lots of stress! So, I thought about what was causing the stress and tried to tackle things I had control of without just defaulting to working a lot of overtime. For example, I contacted one of the project managers with the longer-term project to see if it was possible to ‘pause’ my effort on his project over a two-week period, and he agreed with some negotiations. So that was about 24 hours saved over the two weeks. Then I attacked a few other aspects of the problem by recruiting some more part-time help from another department, adjusting the scope of one project, gaining an extension on another project, etc., etc. Instead of feeling overwhelmed and a victim of the circumstances, I felt SO powerful!”

 “我一再接手截止时间相同的项目，但手头上还有其他正在进行以及长期要做的项目。于是我不得不试着协调不同项目的工作时间，这让我压力很大！于是，我开始思考是什么原因造成压力，然后在不一味加班的情况下，着手处理可控范围之内的事情。比如说，我联系了一位负责长期项目的项目经理，询问有没有可能把我的工作内容暂缓两个星期。稍事谈判后他同意了，这就为我接下来的两周节省出24个小时。然后我通过雇用一些其他部门的兼职人员、调整项目范围或者为另一个项目争取延期等方法攻克了其他一些难题。我并没有感觉自己是个不堪重负的可怜人，而是觉得自己如此厉害！”

You may need to take such extreme measures in times of work crisis, or you may take more subtle measures, such as taking yourself out of nonessential meetings, asking your colleagues to review items with you during one-on-one meetings instead of sending you 50 e-mails throughout the week, stepping off of a committee, turning off your e-mail pop-up, or spending less time on items where spending more time to get them perfect doesn’t add value. Challenge your assumptions on what you should do and how long you should spend on different activities. If possible, only commit to putting tasks on your weekly to-do list if you have space to fit them into your schedule.

 工作危机临头，你或许需要采取一些极端手段，但也可以采取一些更微妙的措施，譬如从不重要的会议中脱身；和你的同事在一对一面谈中商议事情，而不是一周发50多封邮件讨论它们；从某个委员会卸职；关闭邮箱的弹出提醒功能，或在即便追求完美也不会添加价值的事情上减少时间投入。你需要思考自己该做什么，该花多长时间做不同的事情，并时常审视这些预期是否合理。如果有可能，你应该在每周的待办事项上只添加你能应付得来的任务。

Step 3: Compare Expected Versus Actual

第三步：对比事实与预期

Once you’ve started to come to terms with the fact that time is limited and you’ve taken advantage of the quick wins, you’ll need to further refine your estimates to compare expected versus actual time allotments. For instance, maybe you think that e-mail should only take one hour out of your day. But when you actually look at the time you spend, you find that it always takes two. (Any sort of tracking will do, but if you want to be precise, tools like RescueTime can help you to know exactly how you spend time on your computer.) When faced with the reality of the situation, you’ll need to see if you can take time-cutting measures like writing more succinct responses, using tools like TypeIt4Me or asking for different e-mail strategies at work. If none of those reduce the time allocation, then instead of fighting the reality, you’ll need to increase your budget in that area.

 一旦你接受了时间有限这一事实，并充分利用了快速见效的方法，你还需要对比实际与预期的时间分配情况，进一步完善预估。比如说，你最初认为回邮件只需占用一天中一个小时的时间，但当回顾实际用时时，你发现自己用了两个小时。（你可以通过多种方式监测时间花费。如果你想做到精确，可以利用RescueTime之类的应用程序帮你记录在电脑上每项活动所花的时间。）在面对这样的现实时，你需要评估自己是否可以写更简短的邮件，利用TypeIt4Me等应用程序，或采取其他写电邮的攻略，节约工作时间。如果以上措施均不能达到节约时间的效果，那么与其与现实抗争，你不如增加这方面的时间预算。

Using the 80/20 rule can also help you make everything fit within your time budget. But this will require you to more fully embrace the facts that you can’t do everything and you can’t please everyone. For instance, as you start to look at the value from different activities, you may find that declining meetings that people would like you to attend, but that keep you from your highest priority tasks, is the correct answer. Or you may discover that you need to spend less time than you might have thought to make the correct amount of impact. For example, showing up for 30-45 minutes at your company happy hour may have almost as much impact as staying for two hours. By cutting out earlier, you can have time to invest an hour in exercise or finishing a proposal, which will have a dramatic return on the time investment. Although some of these choices may make people uncomfortable — especially you — the short-term discomfort caused by changing your natural default response will have a big pay-off in the long term.

 “二八法则”（人们用来完成重要任务的时间仅占所有时间的20％ ——译者注）也可以帮助你在预算内安排所有任务。但是要想利用这一法则，你需要完全接受一个现实，那就是你不能完成所有事情，也不能取悦每一个人。举个例子，当你衡量每项任务的价值时，你可能会发现，婉拒人们希望你出席的会议，以便腾出时间完成优先度更高的任务是明智之举。你还会发现，你只利用了比预期少的时间就获得了同样的影响力。打个比方，出席30到45分钟的同事聚餐活动可能与待上2小时所获得的影响力相仿。早点离席的话，你就可以投入一小时的时间锻炼身体或完成一项提案，从而在时间投资上获得惊人的回报。尽管你做出的某些选择会使他人尤其是你自己感到不舒服，但改变常规所带来的短期不适可以带来巨大的长期收益。

Step 4: Ask For Direction

第四步：寻求帮助

If you’ve followed the above three steps and still can’t seem to accomplish everything you need to do, it’s time to take courage and ask for help. You can do so in a clear, objective way as outlined below. But before you do, bolster your confidence by looking over the facts of your time budget once more and reminding yourself that you have no reason to feel guilty or like a failure. No one can do the impossible, so the fact that you’re over your time budget isn’t a judgment about you, but a sign that you need to adjust your overall environment.

 如果你采用以上三个步骤，仍不能完成计划内的事情，那么是时候向他人求助了。你可以采取以下清晰、具体的步骤。但在你这样做之前，千万别因为自责或感觉很失败而失去自信。没有人可以完成不可能完成的任务，因此，当你的时间预算透支时，不要担心会被人评判能力不足，而要把它看作你需要调整自己环境的信号。

Here’s how to approach time budget negotiations with your manager and/or people who try to put more items into your schedule:

 面对你的上司或者想要给你加更多项目的人，以下是如何针对时间预算进行讨价还价的方法：

Gather Your Facts: Have a concise list of projects and a rough estimate of how long the various tasks take you to do. (If you’ve followed the above three steps, you should already have this on hand.)

 收集事实：通过一个简明扼要的单子，列举手头的项目以及每项花费的时间。如果你采取了以上三个步骤，那么你应该已有单子在手。

Develop a Visual: This could look as simple as printing out your weekly calendar after having filled in both meetings and times for tasks, or as complex as displaying a full-scale project plan. The form matters less than the goal of showing the incongruence between the available time and the requested activities.

 视觉展现：这一项可以和打印填满了会议和任务时间的周历一样简单，或者和展示出整体的项目计划一样复杂。采取什么格式并不重要，目标是显示出可用时间和工作量的不一致性。

Present the Information: Instead of seeing this as a battle between you and the people desiring work from you, approach these expectations negotiations as strategic sessions where you are working together to maximize the value you can contribute. Maybe a task could be demoted in priority, be delegated, or be simplified so that you can have more time to focus on the highest priority tasks. When done in this manner, asking for direction with setting priorities doesn’t have to come across as disrespectful or insubordinate, but as a joint effort to work within the reality of your time limitations.

 战略协商：与其把协调工作的谈判当作一场战斗，不如把它当作战略性对话，争取最大化地贡献你的价值。或许你可以降低某项任务的优先级，或委托他人来做，要么就简化它，以便节省时间来应付优先度更高的任务。要想战略性地解决问题，你应该向他人请教如何设定工作的优先级。这样，你就不会显得不尊重他人或不服从指令，而是和他人共同努力，解决时间局促的难题。

Step 5: Keep Rebalancing

第五步：反复平衡

Due to the dynamic nature of life and work, you can’t simply set your schedule and then leave it for the next 10 years. Typically on a daily or weekly (or at the very least a monthly) basis, you will need to balance and rebalance your schedule. This means that if you had an under-allocation of time toward a particular activity one week, like processing e-mail, you will need to spend more time on it the following week. Or maybe one week you need to completely focus on presentation prep, so the next week you catch up on meetings. The realistic goal is to have the correct allocation of time within your workweek — and between your work and non-work time — average out correctly.

 生活与工作充满了变数，因此你不能简单地设定你的日程表，然后期望一劳永逸地用它十年。通常情况下，你需要每天或者每周（最长每个月）重新衡量和制定你的时间表。也就是说，如果某一周你为某一项活动分配的时间不足，比如说处理邮件这项，那么下周你就可以在这一项上多分配一些时间。或者，可能有一周你需要全身心投入到准备报告上，那么下一周你就可以补开一些会议。真实可行的目标是在你的工作周内（包括工作时间和非工作时间）对时间进行恰当分配，并取得平衡。

As a final word of encouragement — and warning — practicing what I’ve outlined will not only leave you healthier and happier, but also more humble. When you start to embrace your limits, you’ll need to admit that you aren’t perfect and can’t do everything, especially all at once. If you have always been the go-to perfectionist on the team, this adjustment in your behavior could leave you feeling a bit at a loss in terms of your identity. You’ll need to redefine who you are such as “the person who remains calm and delivers on-time, quality work” instead of “the stressed-out team member who meets ridiculously short deadlines and never says, No.” This transition will take time but will ultimately empower you to enjoy the journey and make life more pleasant for those around you too.

 最后，我想鼓励并警告大家一下，实践我所列出的步骤不仅会让你更健康快乐，更会让你变得谦逊。当你开始接受自己能力有限的事实时，你就不得不承认自己是不完美的，无法兼顾所有事情。如果你永远是队伍里那个万事不求人的完美主义者，那么这些行为上的调整或许会令你对于自己的身份感到有些迷茫。你需要重新定义自我，做“时刻保持冷静，同时能按时、高质量地完成任务的人”，而不是“经常神经紧张，能在短得离谱的时间内完成任务，而且从不说‘不’的队员”。这样的转变是需要时间的，但最终它会使你更享受事业之旅，并让你周围的人感到快乐。

(译/康欣叶     校/陈圆妮 方颖)

伊丽莎白·格雷斯·桑德斯是时间管理培训师、《高效时间管理的三个秘诀》（The 3 Secrets to Effective Time Investment: How to Achieve More Success With Less Stress）一书的作者，也是Real Life E Time Coaching & Training公司创始人。