In the 3rd episode our 4 part series on productivity styles we introduce The Conductor. If you’re just starting with this episode, you’ll probably want to jump back to parts 1 and 2 – the Commander and the Contemplator – to get the full picture.Introducing the Conductor:Until we can manage time, we can manage nothing… – Peter F. DruckerGifts & ChallengesAs the Conductor you are passionate about bringing out the best in people and supporting them to shine. You are great at organizing and finishing projects that are clearly outlined by others.As a creative, you are not always great at getting your own work done or making time for your own creative projects. In fact, you often spend more time dreaming about uninterrupted creative time than actually making it happen.As a leader of a business, you work hard to create a work environment that is harmonious, peaceful and free of conflict. Because you are so people focused, you can sometimes put off getting to important tasks and avoid conflicts that are costing you time and money in your business.You tend to put the needs of others before your own which leads to feeling overwhelmed and exhausted, especially as you play catch up with your long to-do list of tasks at the end of an already full day. You fall into bed wondering if you will ever get to that creative project you keep talking about.You benefit from being held accountable by others because you can lack internal discipline or motivation to complete tasks on your own. What’s the fun in working alone? You thrive when you have accountability systems or buddies to be responsible to.Take the Unique Productivity Style QuizOnce You Know Your Productivity Style You Can Learn The Best Way To Become More Productive In Your Creative Business.Take the Quiz today and get your results! Your opportunities for growthTo increase productivity for Conductors, look at your personal boundaries first. If you want to grow and scale your business, you must learn to put your own needs first and step into a leadership role. This can be a tricky change so start small and look at who in your life or business you need to set healthy boundaries with.Set clear personal and professional boundaries around your time.Claim time in your calendar for uninterrupted creative time to work on your passion projects. Use time blocking – one of our favorite toolsSurround yourself with team members or loyal supporters who see your unique brilliance and help keep you on track in your business.Get help in your personal life with details like housekeeping, gardening or shopping so you are free to focus on your business and self-care. This could be as simple as asking a spouse, child or roommate to step up and do more.Create a daily step-by-step strategy for growing your business that is easy to complete and doesn’t overwhelm you.Involve others in the process so that you don’t feel isolated or alone.We have a contest running until the end of April – sign up, give us an honest review on iTunes, and you’ll be entered to win some cool prizes!IN THIS EPISODE YOU’LL LEARN:the unique gifts that a Conductor has for productivity (hint … you make the world go around!)the specific challenges that Conductors encounter (hint … can you say BOUNDARIES?)LINKS AND RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:Gretchen Rubin’s 4 Tendencies quizWe’re having a Contest and you could WIN! Sign up and give us a review, you could enter some great prizes!The Unique Productivity Style quizhttps://youtu.be/4UQJrve9GpQYou can also subscribe to this podcast on our Youtube channel.  TranscriptShow Transcript (3,476 More Words)Minette Riordan: For the conductor in particular, this can flow from one, our need to be of service to others, but it can also flow from issues around self esteem and confidence, not believing that our own work matters, and I would say to you that your work matters. The world needs what it is that you have to offer.Have you ever said to yourself, I don’t have enough time?Brad Dobson: I am so overwhelmed.Minette Riordan: I need more clarity.Brad Dobson: I don’t know how to do this.Minette Riordan: My to do list is miles long.Brad Dobson: I’m exhausted.Minette Riordan: There’s got to be a better way.Brad Dobson: Hi there, I’m Brad.Minette Riordan: And I’m Minette. Not only have we said all these things ourselves, but we’ve heard our community of creative entrepreneurs say them over and over again.Brad Dobson: That’s why we created the Structure and Flow Podcast. I’m structure.Minette Riordan: And I’m flow, and this is the productivity podcast for creative entrepreneurs.Brad Dobson: We believe that doing more and working harder are not the solution to your productivity challenges.Minette Riordan: We believe in more play, more fun, and more profit. Join us as we explore the interplay between structure and flow so that we can bring more grace and ease to your creative business.Brad Dobson: Hi, and welcome to episode 97 of Structure and Flow, the productivity podcast for creative entrepreneurs.Minette Riordan: Not the Path to Profit podcast.Brad Dobson: We were that, we’re proud of that, and we’ve transitioned, and it’s still taking me a while to not say that at the beginning of the episode.Minette Riordan: We’re just being pretty silly over here today. I think this is take 96.Brad Dobson: Something like that. We had some microphone issues, part of which was not having them turned on.Minette Riordan: And some complaints about the fact that he got all dressed up and I’m wearing my hoodie, so-Brad Dobson: Yeah, exactly.Minette Riordan: … I had to take the hoodie off-Brad Dobson: That’s right.Minette Riordan: … and, you know, when you work with your spouse, all kinds of things happen.Brad Dobson: Yes, sexual harassment, in the workplace.Minette Riordan: Especially when we’re standing so close together.Brad Dobson: That’s right, that’s right.Minette Riordan: Okay, ready to focus?Brad Dobson: I’m Brad Dobson, this is my wife, Dr. Minette Riordan.Minette Riordan: Hey, everybody.Brad Dobson: And what are we talking about today?Minette Riordan: We’re … I’m having a frog in my throat, so you tell them, and I’m going to clear my throat.Brad Dobson: We are on to episode number three of unique productivity styles. Today we’re going to talk about the conductor, and I will start with a quote while Minette’s clearing her throat, and this-Minette Riordan: Hey, that rhymed.Brad Dobson: And this is from Peter F. Drucker., “Until we can manage time, we can manage nothing.”Minette Riordan: Until we can manage time, we can manage nothing, and I selected this quote today especially for the conductor, because I think it’s super appropriate for where we’re going. But before we tell everybody about the conductor, I think we want to tell you what the heck are we talking about when we say the conductor.So, if you’re just diving in to the Structure and Flow podcast for the very first time and stumbled across this episode, we have a four-part series on your unique productivity style. We are super passionate about productivity, and this is the third one.In the first one we talked about the commander, which is me.Brad Dobson: That’s her.Minette Riordan: Totally me, so, good at big picture thinking, not always great at implementation, and we need conductor … Or, excuse me, we need our contemplators, but sometimes we drive them crazy. Brad’s the contemplator.Brad Dobson: I’m the contemplator, and there are only good things to say about the contemplator.Minette Riordan: And, if you really believe that, go back and listen to episode number 96. That’s so not true.Brad Dobson: Contemplators are the best people in the world.Minette Riordan: So, each of the four unique productivity styles has their gifts and their challenges. So, if you think you might be the commander, or the contemplator, go back and listen. If you think you might be the creator, then you’ll want to stay tuned and dial in next week for the fourth in our four-part series.So, let’s talk about the awesome, brilliant, beautiful conductor.Brad Dobson: We attract a lot of conductors.Minette Riordan: We do. A lot.Brad Dobson: They’re mentors.Minette Riordan: They are mentors. They’re people people in a really beautiful way. Like, they’re really great at serving people. They’re called to be community builders, and leaders, kind of from behind, in a way where they bring people together. Their incredible gift is helping other people to shine and seeing their own brilliance, but when it comes to productivity this can create a few challenges.Brad Dobson: Definitely. Let’s see, what have we got. They’re too focused on other people and not focused enough on themselves. So, they don’t tend to have boundaries around their own time, they don’t schedule time for themselves.Minette Riordan: It’s so true. I hear over and over again from conductors that I don’t know how to make time for my own projects, and I would say pretty much all of us have passion projects, or hobbies, or things that interest us, or things that we think we might like to create, or build, in the future, and conductors are the ones that struggle the most with making themselves a priority and really claiming time in their own calendars for their work that’s most important.In fact, I did some of this when I first started my publishing company in 2002, gosh, hard to believe it was that long ago. I’m getting old.Brad Dobson: Wow.Minette Riordan: And I gave away a lot of time. I did a lot of volunteering. I joined our local chamber of commerce. I ended up running a few networking groups, and I spent a lot of time serving others to the detriment of growing my business. I didn’t make my own business a priority. Did I get benefit from participating and volunteering in all those groups?Not to mention we had two little kids who were three and one, and I was volunteering in schools and all that kind of stuff. So, I made myself crazy by really tapping into my conductor energy, and I believe that all of us have gifts and strengths that we can flow from each of the four productivity styles. But conductor, our biggest challenge, your biggest challenge, is putting boundaries around your time and really valuing your time.Brad Dobson: Yeah, definitely. I love this other note Minette’s got here about conductors as creatives, and they’re not always great at getting their own work done, or making time for their own creative projects. In fact, you often spend more time dreaming about uninterrupted creative time than actually making it happen. Maybe not that effective.Minette Riordan: And you like that because that’s you, too?Brad Dobson: No, no, no, no, no, no.Minette Riordan: So, I’m thinking about the musician part of you-Brad Dobson: Yeah … maybe some untapped dreams there.Minette Riordan: Some untapped dreams. I think we all have untapped dreams, and we tend to make other things a priority. And for the conductor in particular, this can flow from one, our need to be of service to others, but it can also flow from issues around self esteem and competence, not believing that our own work matters.And I would say to you that your work matters, the world needs what it is that you have to offer, and that the more that you make yourself a priority, and show up to do your most important work, the more you get to be of service to others. I think that so often when we give and over give of our own time, we end up feeling like a completely empty well, and you cannot give from an empty well.Brad Dobson: Moving on, I think conductors also have a problem … One of these problem gift type of things with leadership. They create a wonderful office environment where everything’s harmonious, where they believe everything’s harmonious, and peaceful, and free of conflict, but as anyone who’s an adult that’s listening to this podcast knows, there is no interpersonal stuff without conflict. It just always exists, and a conductor, a mentor, is perhaps more conflict avoidant.Minette Riordan: Yeah, and being conflict avoidant isn’t necessarily a good thing. It actually creates that subterfuge, or underwhelming sense of, I can’t speak up here, right? Like, you try so hard to make everything be peaceful-Brad Dobson: Right, right, right.Minette Riordan: … that you also don’t create freedom for people to speak out and really ask for what they need, or say what’s not working from them.And the other thing that I know about conductors, and as I’m reading what I wrote here it reminds me about what Gretchen Rubin to say about-Brad Dobson: We like Gretchen Rubin.Minette Riordan: We do, in her book, “The Four Tendencies,” and “Better than Before,” are both incredible books, and which type was I in her four tendencies? The O one. What was it? Do you remember what it was called?Brad Dobson: You’ve got me on the spot.Minette Riordan: I have to go back, or it will come to me. It’s no the objectioner, it’s the-Brad Dobson: I was a questioner.Minette Riordan: He’s a questioner, and I’m the one that’s the people pleaser, it’s the conductor part of me. And, so, what benefits you as the conductor the most when it comes to productivity is actually having people around you to hold you accountable, because we tend to get so focused and lost in serving others that we need people around us, and that could be a spouse, a partner, a girlfriend, a parent, to hold you accountable to what you say you want to create.So, when it comes to running a business or starting a weight loss program, right? Whichever direction that you might be going, or running an iron man like Brad’s about to do in just a couple of months, not even a couple of months at this point.Brad Dobson: Yeah, we’re at eight weeks out now.Minette Riordan: Eight weeks out, at the recording of this. So, having accountability partners and support in your life is really important. You need people to mirror back to you when you’re over giving and when you’re wearing yourself out because you’re not making clear boundaries around your time.And it’s hard to do at first. It’s hard to ask for accountability and support. It’s really challenging to stop being the yes person, that every time someone asks you to do something you automatically say yes. So, I would invite you to practice what Maria Shriver just wrote a great article about in Spirituality and Health called the powerful pause. And before you answer someone’s request for aid, or support, or especially for your time, I invite you to pause, take a deep breath, and think about your answer before you speak.Conductors are trained, and internally wired to say yes, and it’s time to practice saying no.Brad Dobson: Oh, that’s going to be a tough one for a lot of people, I think.Minette Riordan: It is really tough. It was tough for me. I think it was one of the things that I learned from running our last business was how not to say yes to everything, and that-Brad Dobson: Right.Minette Riordan: … it was okay. That it didn’t make my selfish, a bad person, or bitchy to say no when someone asked me to volunteer my time.Brad Dobson: So, let’s uplift this a little bit. Don’t forget that as a conductor, as a mentor type, you’re the awesome people that-Minette Riordan: Make the world go round.Brad Dobson: … make the world go round, keep us all together, and don’t forget that, because the other types don’t necessarily have that, or bring that to the table. We talked about the commander who bulldozes through people, or the contemplator who’s off in his head somewhere. You’re the people that are actually bringing the room together with that cohesion, and love, and peace, which is great.Minette Riordan: Yeah, absolutely.Brad Dobson: So …Minette Riordan: Sorry.Brad Dobson: We’re being distracted by our cat.Minette Riordan: She … Like, it’s been super windy here in Santa Barbara, and she just gets so crazy, and it’s spring. I swear she has spring fever, and she’s just meowing non stop. She’s very verbal anyway, but we can hear her in the background, and it’s distracting in the moment.But, so, let’s share, Brad, just quickly, some opportunities for growth when it comes to productivity and the conductor.Brad Dobson: Set clear personal and professional boundaries around your time.Minette Riordan: Yeah.Brad Dobson: Put some thought into that, look at where you’re not doing that, and what can you do, using your calendar, using your interpersonal relationships, just talking with people, how can you set those boundaries?Minette Riordan: That’s such a great one, and it is a practice, it is an art. In fact, I was talking about this with a couple of moms recently at an event. I don’t even remember where I was, and we were sort of talking about that conversation of when you come home from work, and you’re tired if you work outside of your home, and you come home, and you just need 15 minutes to yourself.Oh, it was at my meetup group, that’s where it was.Brad Dobson: Right.Minette Riordan: And we were talking about productivity. And you need some transition time before you’re ready to just dive right back into the family, because it’s so easy, as a conductor … And this is male or female, this is not necessarily men or women, but as the conductor, you literally walk into the house, you put your stuff down, and suddenly the kids are there, the noisy cat is there, the needy spouse is there, and everybody wants your time and attention.Brad Dobson: Wait, needy … Why did you say needy spouse?Minette Riordan: Yeah, I’m the needy spouse?Brad Dobson: You’re talking about somebody else, aren’t you?Minette Riordan: Yeah, no, you’re the needy spouse. I’m the one who needs the transition time. So, don’t be afraid to ask for it, and it’s just a practice. And one of the ways that you could do that is kind of simple and effective, sit in your car for 15 minutes, or-Brad Dobson: That’s hilarious.Minette Riordan: … take a walk up and down the street for 15 minutes before you come in the house, or stop at a park on your way home and give yourself that transition time. This is just … And let everybody know what you’re doing so no one’s worried about you if you’re running late, but it’s just that way of … That mindful pause. The powerful pause to give yourself time to connect.And then the other strategy that Brad and I love to talk about, and we both use and are getting, I think, better at using, is time blocks. And you want to talk about time blocks?Brad Dobson: Yeah, definitely. We’re going to talk about that quite a bit more in a upcoming episode, but-Minette Riordan: Episode number 99.Brad Dobson: … this is a great one for reclaiming your creative time, because you might not necessarily be … You know, like we talked about before, maybe you’re dreaming about your creative time, but you’re not actually taking it. You’re not actually doing it. And, so, it’s fun to think about creative time, I’m good at that, but actually doing it, working your creative muscle, is something that will move you forward in a myriad of different ways.Minette Riordan: Yeah, and conductors, you need to manage your to do lists. Like, you love your to do list more than any of the other three productivity styles, and you’re really good at making long to do lists that completely overwhelm you. So, I would be managing your to do list and make sure that the things on your to do list really matter to you, and they’re getting transferred to your calendar so that they actually happen.And then, the next thing, as you’re working on time blocking and boundaries, you have to ask for support. Conductors are so good at serving others, but you need support as well. So, surround yourself with either a team, if you own a business, or just loyal supporters. That could be a girlfriend, a parent-Brad Dobson: Yeah, involve other people.Minette Riordan: … your kids. Ask for help, right? Ask for people to keep you on track. We talked about accountability earlier. This doesn’t have to be a formal or paid thing. It can be very informal. Create a small mastermind group of three to four people that will support you in staying on track and getting your most important work done.Brad Dobson: Yeah, and I think, finally, big one here is to get help in your personal life with details like housekeeping, or gardening, or, you know, other things that you’re not necessarily interested in doing, whether you can outsource those to a paid thing, or a spouse, or one of your slave laborer children, but get that help, and ask for help. They’ll support you, because they know that that’s all you’re about is supporting them. They’re more than willing to give that back to you.Minette Riordan: It’s so true, and it can feel like a huge stretch to have a housekeeper come in just once a month, but I would invite you to look at your budget and look at how much you’re spending on eating out, or Starbucks, or your people, right? Or, for us, Netflix and Amazon Prime, right? So, we all have these-Brad Dobson: Not talking about that.Minette Riordan: So-Brad Dobson: [inaudible Minette Riordan: I made you choke on your coffee. But, you know, you get to make decisions about where the best use of your time is. I realized I don’t love to garden, right? That it’s not my favorite thing. I love having a beautiful garden, but the weeds were taking over, so we have a gardener come in just to keep everything clean, and it doesn’t cost very much money. You’d be surprised how much help you can get without feeling like you’re going broke.And, so, for the conductor, it’s about setting your priorities and deciding what’s most important and where you want to spend your time, because when, as Peter Drucker says, you manage your time, and you really take back your time, your life will flourish. You will stop feeling so busy and overwhelmed all the time, and you’ll start to feel more productive by zeroing in on where’s the best use of your time in service to yourself and to those that you feel deeply called to serve.Brad Dobson: So, to sum up, conductors, you’re awesome. You-Minette Riordan: You are awesome.Brad Dobson: … make the world go round, and you’re loving. Ask for some help-Minette Riordan: Yeah.Brad Dobson: … and get yourself some creative time, and set some boundaries.Minette Riordan: Absolutely.Brad Dobson: If you’re not a conductor, or maybe not a commander, or a contemplator, next week we’re going to talk about the creators.Minette Riordan: The creator.Brad Dobson: And we all have some creator in ourselves-Minette Riordan: Yeah.Brad Dobson: … but people that are fully engaged as creators are-Minette Riordan: From a productivity perspective.Brad Dobson: From a productivity perspective, they have a whole other set of gifts, and challenges, and things they can work on-Minette Riordan: Yeah.Brad Dobson: … we’re going to talk about that next week.Minette Riordan: And remember to listen to all four, because we’re all a blend, right? We’re all a blend. But if you want to really find out, exactly-Brad Dobson: You can take the quiz yourself.Minette Riordan: Yep.Brad Dobson: It’s at PathToProficAcademy.dom/UPSquiz, UPS like the postal service … Parcel service.Minette Riordan: Parcel service?Brad Dobson: UPS quiz, we’ll-Minette Riordan: UPSquiz.com.Brad Dobson: … have that in the show notes, and go ahead, take it, it’s just a few questions, and I think the results that you see in the report that we have for you will really help you move forward in your productivity unique to your style.Minette Riordan: Yep, absolutely. Great. And again, that’s PathToProfitAcademy.com/UPSquiz, and we’d love your feedback. It’s a new quiz. We’re still working out the kinks, so if it resonates with you, shoot us an email and let us know. We’d love to hear from you.Brad Dobson: Love you guys.Thanks for listening to Structure and Flow, the productivity podcast for creative entrepreneurs. To find out more about this episode and others, go to PathToProfitAcademy.com and click on the podcast link. The post Episode 97: Discover Your Unique Productivity Style Part 3 – The Conductor appeared first on Path to Profit Academy.