How Women BIZ Experiencess Are Getting Productivity Wrong Female owners must use the concept of "fruitfulness" to maximize their impact.
By Joanna Martin Edited by Bill Schulz
Opinions expressed by BIZ Experiences contributors are their own.
The trouble with BIZ Experiencesial women and productivity?
We're too damn good at it.
This state of hyper-vigilance, multi-tasking, and juggling responsibilities across multiple areas is a symptom of what I call "Superwoman Syndrome." A form of advanced competence that really can be a curse.
Across the pond, the government reports that "females outperform males in the main measures of attainment across the United Kingdom, make up a greater share of higher education students (57%) and have a higher level of qualification among 19-64 year olds."
Trouble is, when we focus only on maximizing our output, we can inadvertently sow the seeds for a loss of our boldest creative potential.
In 2020, "Mental Health UK" reported that "almost one in four (23%) women workers in the UK are currently struggling to manage feelings of stress and pressure at work."
Maybe our ability to be productive isn't helping us as much as it could when it comes to our long-term impact?
Enhancing our impact doesn't only mean avoiding burnout.
It's finding a new way to approach how we use our time - and what we consider success.
Related: Women Founders Need Radical Self-Care. Here's How To Make It Happen.
Here's what we need instead
Instead of productivity, female BIZ Experiencess need to start thinking in terms of our fruitfulness. This is the approach I use in my work and that the women leaders I coach have found makes the biggest difference to their impact.
It starts with paying attention to our natural cycles, and noticing how our unique flow rolls.
You might have hours, days or weeks when your output drops.
In the past, you might have panicked about not being productive enough. No more!
Because by embracing your rhythms instead of resisting them, you'll also allow yourself to experience peaks where your impact far surpasses anything you could imagine in that old linear model.
When we shift to looking at our work through this lens, we naturally begin to consider not how efficiently we use our time but how well we use our energy.
Using this approach, the most impactful leaders I know often find themselves radically rewriting the rules.
It can be revelatory to realize that taking a week off work just before a big deadline might have a greater effect on your results than hundreds of hours arriving earlier and staying later.
But when you develop your ability to discern your needs, it can be astonishing to see how much a focus on productivity has held us back.
How often have you forced yourself to focus on details when your energy that day was more about the big vision? Or measured your progress against arbitrary markers rather than trusting your ability to take extraordinary leaps when you need to?
These are the hallmarks of an old way of working that, frankly, has had its day.
Related: Why Rest Is The Secret To BIZ Experiencesial Success
Learn to innovate your impact
I won't pretend it's easy to buck the trend of decades of leadership and a lifetime of cultural messaging.
Respecting your natural cycles, trusting your intuition and asking for what you need are not skills most of us were taught.
But in a time when our highest-qualified, most talented women can still find themselves exhausted and burnt out?
It's time we gave it a try.
Related: The Motherhood Recession
Where do we begin?
Imagine if, when you planned your week, you focused not on how much you could get done but on how you could give yourself optimum energy on any given day. So you could really take back control.
Think about the last time you actually were more fruitful, not productive, but truly effective:
When you had time with the family and you were 100% connected.
Or came to an important meeting feeling rested, energized and full of ideas.
Or needed to blast through a bunch of admin and were laser-focused.
It's not about time management, it's about energy management.
Rather than having a linear perspective, it's time we discovered the true power of our cyclical natures.
Doesn't that feel different?
