How to Un-Dilbert Your Life, Part 3
Use the Incoming Phone Calls worksheet (PDF) for a week to track how much time you’re spending. It will show you how much is spent on high, medium, and low priority calls.
Start any day of the week, don’t change your actions, and jot down about how long you’re on the phone with each caller. See my week (PDF).
At the end of each day, tally the number of calls and voicemails (VM) you received and how long you spent. After the week add up the total.
Assuming all VMs were actually necessary, the “No Message” count is the number of unimportant calls you avoided (unanswered calls that did not result in a VM). So the first step from now on is just don’t answer the phone.
Fortunately, in my group if anyone needs anything they just come see me in person or email. So I’ve dispensed with everything and simply forwarded my work phone straight to Google Voice, set to voicemail.
This system allows call screening/presentation to transcribe VMs to email or SMS which eliminates time spent calling your VM account, entering your PIN and then having to listen to audio, especially when callers are long winded. It’s faster to read or skim your messages.
Any time I get a VM it’s transcribed to my email inbox where I can see and prioritize it.
If you have to answer the phone, use a smart system to screen or forward your calls appropriately. Don’t ignore the boss BUT don’t let him/her monopolize your time either.
Forward your work phone to your Google Voice number, then have Google forward calls to your cell phone number. That way messages will be recorded on Google, transcribed and emailed to you. Messages will be saved in your Google Voice account, and you can also forward the email to others (delegation) or paste into your calendar.
Key Point from Google: “If you don’t respond to a call within 25 seconds (by accepting, sending to voicemail, listening in on voicemail, or accepting and recording the call), Google Voice will send the caller to Google voicemail.”
So make sure the phone you’re forwarding to takes longer than 25 seconds to pick up if you want to use Google voicemail instead of that phone’s VM.
Implement these methods and complete another worksheet in a month. Compare your results.