Between last semester and the start of this semester I’ve had countless family emergencies and other unexpected life altering events. In the space of a few months my family has experienced hospitalizations, multiple broken bones, deaths, and other crises.
In today’s post I want to share some tips for staying (mostly) on top of work during unexpected and unsettling times. And hopefully offer you some grace for when you might not be living up to unrealistic expectations during difficult times.
Prioritize family when the unexpected occurs.
You may not need to hear this, but I’ve seen many people agonize over work duties when emergencies arise.
Remember your employer is not family.
Make sure you prioritize your family, even your extended family. They need you when emergencies happen. It doesn’t feel good to say, but you’re replaceable at work – especially in the short term. Someone at work can pick up some of your essential duties if needed.
If you’ve already decided that you’ll prioritize your family, then making the changes needed to be available for your family will come easier to you. You won’t need to decide what to do, just how to make it happen.
In my case, each time one of those unexpected family events came up, I had to determine ways to meet the needs of my family. So instead of figuring out how to fit my family’s needs around my work, I decided which work I could fit around my family’s needs.
During student advising and registration last semester I had to take my children for their last visit with a very close loved one. I value my students’ needs for timely advising so they can register for needed classes; however, I never considered showing up for those scheduled advising meetings because I’d already decided that my priority was my family.
Even though I had multiple appointments scheduled, I did not hesitate to take care of my family first. I emailed students to let them know I wasn’t available and I asked a colleague to meet with the students who did not want to wait until I was available for a meeting. My students’ needs could be met and my family’s needs could be my priority.
Accept Adjustments to Expectations
Once you realize that you’ll need to prioritize family and it’s going to take more time and thought than usual, accept the inevitable adjustments to expectations, yours and those of others.
If you need to travel across the country to be with a family member, then you can’t be on campus holding office hours. If you’re supporting a spouse through the demise of a parent, you likely won’t have the bandwidth to complete the high leverage work that requires focus and and concentration for extended periods of time. Accepting that you can’t do it all relieves some of the guilt and pressure you will likely have when you can’t meet the original expectations you set for yourself.
It is easier to decide which adjustments need to be made, when you accept that you’ll need to make adjustments. You can’t possible do everything that needs doing. Realize you’ll need to make tweaks to what you’re able to accomplish – working hours, ability to do high leverage/thinking work, and so forth.
I am not implying that you completely ignore work responsibilities — unless it’s that type of situation, and in that case, see the final point below.
Student Needs
In some cases you’ll need to adjust how you meet the expectations – virtual office hours and increased access to other communication tools (like Campuswire, BAND, or Slack) when you can’t be on campus for office hours. It could also mean meeting some of your classes via zoom instead of the scheduled in person format for a week or so.
Scholarship
Last fall, I choose to work on just one scholarly project. I did not have the bandwidth for more than one project because the fall semester that kept throwing unexpected emergencies my way.
I’m a tenured faculty member; I understand the privilege of my position to decided to put projects on hold. This was an easier decision for me than it would be for my colleagues and readers who are on the tenure-track time crunch. However, the reality is that in times of crisis you have to narrow your focus.
The reality is: In times of crisis you have to narrow your focus.
It helps me, instead of deciding what to put on hold, to decide what will get my focus and energy. Deciding what gets the focus helps ease the guilt that I inevitably feel when I have to cut back on projects.
Focus on Minimal Viable Product
Take advice from the business world to produce a minimal viable product when unexpected challenges arise.
When you’re in crisis mode, you need to let go of perfection and your high expectations for every. single. project. As one of my sage mentors, Cathy Mazak told me, “your good quality is likely very high quality; so, you can feel good about doing ‘good enough work’ and not have to strive for excellent in every area at the same time.” – That’s a loose paraphrase.
The bottom line is this: Some things aren’t worth the extra effort to make them excellent.
Your application for promotion and tenure? Absolutely worth the extra effort for excellence.
The university required report for student learning in general education courses, your “good enough” effort is very likely good enough. Possibly some people will disagree with me here, but reappointment, tenure, and promotion decisions rarely hinge on service to the institution. “Good enough” is high quality and sufficient.
During difficult times, we’re no longer aiming for perfection or doing excellent work for all aspects of our jobs. We are just trying to keep up with the competing demands of the emergency and our work.
We’re aiming to give our best to our family. Work gets leftovers during difficult times.
Textbooks turn to holding pattern
Several years ago a colleague and I decided to replace the textbook we had been using with more current articles and some of our own content. We planned to eventually turn into a new textbook for the course.
Then life took a turn, my mother was diagnosed with cancer and my colleague’s life partner passed away.
Instead of redesigning an entire course and building new content each week as we’d planned, we moved forward with the viable option of reusing the previous version of the course with minimal tweaks while I rotated hospice care duties and she grieved a significant loss.
Another minimal viable product practice I’ve embraced is limiting the time I prep for class sessions. I butt my prep-time up against the class session. For courses I have taught previously, I allot myself 30 minutes for each class session. I often spend only 15-20 minutes prepping.
Lean on Systems & Processes
In other areas of the blog you’ve read about some of the systems and processes I’ve implemented. Those help me at all times during the semester and they are especially helpful during times of unexpected events.
Templates Reduce Workload
Leaning on these systems helps to reduce cognitive overload and overwhelm. When I follow the steps I’ve already created to design weekly lesson plans for students, I don’t have to start from a blank page. I can focus on getting the minimal viable planning guide to them so they can do the work needed to be prepared for class.
I use the powerpoint template I’ve designed in its most basic form. This is another example of how the system and process, supports me in supporting students, but I do not need to create everything from scratch.
Streamline Where you Keep tasks
Systems don’t just help me when I’m preparing for class sessions. When I teach multiple courses in one semester, it used to be hard to keep up with what needed grading when. Now that I use Clickup to store all of my grading tasks, I don’t have to open the LMS to figure out what needs grading. I go straight to Clickup to see everything that needs grading in one glance. Then I match my energy level to the to-be-graded-items to determine what to grade first.
Routines
I continue to do do my daily startup routine and my weekly planning session, even if in shorter formats, to make sure I’m hitting the most important tasks and projects around my family members, who are the ultimate most important.
During times of crisis the weekly plans you made are likely to be completely overwritten by the daily essentials.
That is ok!
During times of crisis the weekly plans you made are likely to be completely overwritten by the daily essentials. That is ok! If the most important thing today is to go visit a loved one being moved to hospice – then that’s what you need to do. That changes the original plans for the day.
Because you’ve got systems and processes for reviewing and prioritizing your work, you know you haven’t lost the information. When things settle back down, you will have records of what you had planned to do. In that case you can determine if it still needs to be done.
Don’t Plan on Doing it All
As a final reminder, don’t plan to do it all during these stressful, unexpected times.
Talk with your department chair (or other supervisor) and human resources. Depending on the nature of the crisis you may need adjustments to your work schedule and duties. You may need to teach remotely for an extended time during the semester. Or, you may need to be completely off work for days, weeks, or months without those duties piling up waiting for you when you return.
I know this is difficult. I don’t like to put extra work on my co-workers any more than the next faculty member. However, the times that I’ve tried to do it all left me feeling that I was failing everyone – family, co-workers, and students.
At this stage of my career, I realize that it is better for everyone in the end when I communicate extenuating circumstances through the channels that can assist me in relieving some of the burden.