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October 1, 2025 39 mins

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Most professionals don’t need more hours in the day—they need better systems.

In this episode of MarketPulse: Pros and Pioneers, we sit down with productivity coach and speaker Hayley Watts, whose work has transformed how teams and individuals overcome overwhelm and make meetings meaningful again. With a background in charity leadership and high-stress work environments, Hayley understands burnout firsthand—and she's here to share how she turned that chaos into clarity.

You’ll learn what’s really causing your stress (spoiler: it’s not your inbox), why most meetings are a waste of time, and how to take control of your calendar with confidence. Hayley breaks down simple mindset shifts and actionable strategies to help you feel more in control of your day. If you're constantly chasing your to-do list but never catching it, this episode is for you.

We also dive into how work cultures can evolve, the unseen costs of poor collaboration, and how asking better questions could unlock better performance across your team.

Watch now, and walk away with real tools to reclaim your time and protect your energy.

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Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Paul (00:00):
Do you feel like there's never enough time in the day?

(00:03):
Hayley Watts productivity coachand author of How to Fix
Meetings shares on today'sepisode how business owners can
work smarter, not harder.
Hayley's a productivity coach,speaker and author who
specializes in helpingoverwhelmed business owners and
teams regain control of theirtime and workload.
As the founder of Inspireful anda productivity ninja with Think

(00:27):
Productive, Hayley has workedwith organizations of all sizes,
from small business owners tolarge corporate teams, helping
them improve focus, efficiency,and wellbeing.
She's the author of How to FixMeetings, a book that challenges
the way businesses approach timemanagement and productivity.
And Hayley passion lies inhelping people create habits

(00:47):
that make work and life feeleasier without adding to the
overwhelm.
Hayley is, that's one of myfavorite bios so far of season
two.
I love it.
Welcome to the show.

Hayley (00:58):
Hi, welcome.
Thank you for having me.

Paul (01:00):
No it's genuinely a pleasure.
It's genuinely pleasure.
Before we dive too deeply intowhat you do right now, I wonder
if we can kind of rewind time alittle bit and just come back to
the early part of your careerwhere you I'm gonna, I'm gonna
guess something before we starttalking this, and I, we can find
out whether I'm right or not,I'm gonna guess that you were
put into high pressureenvironments and learned to

(01:21):
survive the hard And want toteach other people how to
survive without having to gothrough that painful process
because it feels very similar tohow I do things, but I don't
wanna teach people how to do it.
Sorry, everyone.
So if we think back to the, tothis, the beginning of your
career, then what was your firstjob Hayley Kaley.

Hayley (01:38):
Oh, my first, what I think of as my first proper job
was working in a student unionwith students who wanted to
volunteer out in the localcommunity.
That involved some elements oftraining.
We did training around likepresentation skills.
Assertiveness, all those kind oftransferable type skills.
But it got me really interestedin volunteering and volunteer

(02:00):
management.
So my early career was in thatkind of space.
And when I'm doing managementtraining now, I often say the
first people I managed were allvolunteers.
And if you mess that up, theyjust leave.
And you don't see them again.
So I had to get good at itpretty quickly.
And then I became this a fewjobs in, I became the CEO of a
charity that supported otherorganizations who were involved

(02:22):
in volunteers.
So I did a lot of managementtraining.
But actually that job was quitestressful.
It was quite overwhelming,Anybody who's worked in the
charity sector will know,there's not enough money.
organisation so people paid tobe a member of the organisations
There's a certain amount ofperceived expectations.
Like I, I thought theexpectations were quite high and

(02:44):
wanted to meet and exceed those.
But it did mean that doing.
Everything.
Like in a small organisation Iused to describe my job
sometimes as I do all the jobsother people don't want to do or
that we don't have funding for.
So e everything from hr,marketing, fundraising and doing
the actual job and deliveringthe work as well as managing a

(03:04):
team of people.
And that's how I came across allthis productivity stuff, because
I was really stressed, I wasoverwhelmed and I went back to
my.
I had a conversation with myteam of managers and they were
managing different projects inthe organisation and I said to
them like, what would you do ifyour project was the best
example in the country of theproject that you're working on?

(03:26):
What would be different?
What would be happening?
And they came up with the mostfantastic ideas.
Then my next question is whyaren't we doing these things?
And they were all like, oh,we'll just spend all this time
in email and responding toemails.
And that's takes up most of myday.
So we got think productive tocome in and did some email
training with us, it genuinelychanged my life.

(03:48):
I felt so much less stressed andoverwhelmed by all the incoming
communication, and then I waslike, I need to learn more about
this productivity and habitsstuff because if it's made this
much difference just looking atemail, what if I could apply
some of this logic to all theother aspects of my job?
And do you know what?
I'll be honest, if somebodywould've said, Hayley, you just
need to be a bit more organisedI would've been really rude to

(04:10):
them because I was like, I'm,I've got a list.
I'm organized, I'm on it.
I've got a timetable, I've got aplan.
But the plan never actuallyhappened,

Paul (04:16):
Because it wasn't a realistic plan, right?

Hayley (04:18):
but it wasn't a realistic plan.
But I didn't have good habitsand techniques, good stratagies
To actually execute the plan,spreading myself too thinly,
which is classic for me.
and I know that sometimes I getback into that space.
But now I know how to get out ofit because you don't know what
you don't know, right?
There were a lot of things Ididn't know were things that I
needed to learn and know about.

(04:40):
So yeah, you're right.
I was in a very, and a lot, Isay a high pressure environment.
That pressure mainly came fromme.
When I'm coaching people now,often I find like the
expectations that people have ofthemselves are this high.
And the expectations they haveof everybody else are much more
reasonable and realisticsomewhere down here.
So a lot of the coaching that Ido is around helping people to

(05:02):
realign those things

Paul (05:04):
start

Hayley (05:04):
thinking about what they can do to be more effective.

Paul (05:08):
Why do you think it was and obviously using yourself as
an example, if you think back towhen you started doing that, why
did you feel like it as a CEO ofthat organization, you felt it
was your responsibility to pickup all the loose ends?
what is it a personality thing?
Is it something inside you or isit just a, an accountability
thing that needs doing?

Hayley (05:26):
Good question.
And I dunno, because I thinkeverybody thinks they're normal,
right?
And as I said to my 12-year-old,nobody's normal.
There's no such thing.
that's just an invented concept.
But I think it's partly I wantedto protect my team, right?
They have a high workloadalready.
they've got a lot of work to do.
I don't wanna be asking them todo stuff that isn't really part
of their job.
And there was an element of,it's a small organisation so

(05:48):
everybody's willing to muck in.
they were a great team, theywere really good people, but
there were some things that wejust didn't have.
in an ideal world, we would'vehad a fundraiser who's
responsible for fundraising, Ireally didn't enjoy fundraising
particularly filling in all thegrant and application forms.
Like paperwork is not my thing.
I went into that field and thefield that I'm in now, to help

(06:10):
people and to make a differencein the world.
It didn't feel like filling in aform was doing that, but equally
to keep somebody employed and intheir job and growing the
organisation that's what Ineeded to do.
And there were a lot of thingslike that.
I took over an organisation Iremember my first day the chair
took me out for lunch and shewas like, it's great that you
are here, but actually we'veonly got enough money to last

(06:31):
another six months and we'rereally in dire straits and it
really needs sorting out.
And the team are unhappy andthis is dysfunctional and
problems.
I was like, okay.
And I'm thinking, what have Iwalked into but I stayed there
for nine years and theorganisation's still going now.
something right!

Paul (06:48):
Sometimes we respond best when the right kind of
pressure's applied, right?
And I think if some things aretoo easy, we don't see the
challenge in them and we want,we naturally, a lot of us want
to drive towards leaving alegacy behind.
And I guess that's the nicething about working in that kind
of charity and not-for-profitsector, is there's that real
feeling of we're achievingsomething together.
And I love purpose-drivenbusinesses and organizations.

(07:11):
Talk to me then about being aCEO because that, again, brings
its own mental challenges ofone, ultimately the bus, the
organization's relying on you tolead the way out, but also
because you are alone at the topright?
It's quite lonely there.

Hayley (07:27):
That's hard.
Yeah, that was hard.
And I was quite lucky in that Iwas working in Central London
and most London boroughs had anequivalent organization doing
similar kind of work.
And I created a network amongthose other CEOs and we had some
regular, very informal kind ofcatchups, and we did some kind

(07:51):
of more formal coaching of eachother and.
Action learning getting that,getting together as a group was
amazing.
that was my support networkreally.
And I could pick up the phone toany of those people and go, this
has happened.
What do I do?
as well as the kind of morestrategic thinking.

(08:13):
we deliberately created a spacefor us to think more
strategically and help andsupport each other with that,
which was really important.
And that's one of the thingsthat I found really valuable.
I.
So when I'm doing managementtraining with businesses now, I
often encourage them to havethat kind of peer learning space
as well as just a training dayor a series of workshops to give

(08:36):
people those skills to be ableto help and support each other.
When I stop working with thatbusiness and to create that.
Supportive environment for eachother.
I think very often ourtendencies as helpful human
beings, somebody comes to youwith a problem and you wanna
give them advice and tell'emwhat to do.

(08:57):
But actually as a coach, Ifirmly believe like people are
the experts in their own lives,right?
Somebody could come along andsay to me, oh, you should do
this, and this in yourorganisation But I know the
people, I know the context, Iknow the background.
And no amount of explaining thatto somebody else is gonna help
move things forward.
so those kind of peer learningenvironments I think are really

(09:19):
important and valuable.

Paul (09:21):
So I'm curious then, so you went down a path of.
Figuring out how to be moreproductive and efficient for
yourself, for your own survivaland for your own to reduce your
overwhelm, your mental health,all the rest of the things that
come with being able to survive.
Why did you then decide that youneeded to help other people do
the same thing?
Because a lot of people wouldnot.
Not in a selfish sense, but alot of people would take that,

(09:43):
be very happy with it, and thenmove on and be quite successful
doing what they're doing.
Why did you decide to pivot andhelp others?

Hayley (09:50):
I guess my job was about helping others, or at least
that's how I, yeah it very muchwas.
That's how I saw it.
That's been doing that for nineyears and that felt like it's
kind of time to move on.
also, I had a 2-year-old at thetime that I finished in that
role, I've been doing that jobfor quite a long time before I
went on maternity leave.
The chair of the organisation atthe time was like, when you come

(10:11):
back, whatever you need in termsof flexibility, you can have
what you need.
Like we'll make it work whichwas an amazing and very generous
offer.
I'm going back 10, 12 years now,so working from home was unusual
and I worked from home two daysa week before I went on
maternity leave.
'cause it was my thinking time.
I could get more stuff done whenI wasn't in the office.

(10:33):
and then I was looking for likemy next, step in my career type
job and I just couldn't get theflexibility that I needed to
have a 2-year-old at home, apartner who worked shifts,
including like proper nightshifts, working overnight, and
making the childcare and thecosts stack up.
It just didn't work.
And I applied for a job that waslike a couple of pay grades down

(10:56):
from the next job that I reallywanted.
They offered me the job, notwith any of the flexibility that
I wanted.
And I was like, do you knowwhat?
it's time to branch out on myown and.
Graham, who is the founder atThink Productive, had approached
me a year or two before.
In fact, I remember meeting himin a coffee shop.
I was very heavily pregnant.

(11:17):
I was literally waddling to thestation going, oh, pleased I
don't have to come on the trainevery day anymore.
And he explained how hisbusiness worked in terms of, all
of our productivity ninjas areself-employed.
I was like, I'm not leaving myproper full-time job to come and
be self-employed and maybe getsome work.
Maybe not.
Um, and I wish I'd have done itsooner.
It was like so much the bestthing that I've ever done.

(11:40):
And then, fast forward, I'vebeen doing that, what I do now
for 10 years.
And one of my friends said tome, oh yeah, I'm feeling really
stressed.
I'm feeling really overwhelmed.
I was like, eh, that's what Ihelp people with.
and she's yeah, but you do thatfor businesses in Corporations
and charities and statutorysector organisations you don't
do that for like self-employedme Working at my kitchen table,

(12:02):
I was like, maybe I should.
So in the last couple of yearsI've been doing a lot more of
that kind of work.
In addition to the stuff withbusinesses, because I do helping
people.
I don't like seeing peoplestruggle.
And when I was in that position,I didn't know that there was a
different way of doing things.
I thought I was quite organisedand I really wasn't.

(12:22):
was probably looking back quitechaotic in how I work and
sometimes I get back into thatplace, but the difference is
I've got the skills now to knowthat I'm doing that.
I recognise it and I know whatto do to make the changes.
And I think that can be the hardthing for a lot of people
working on their own.
They haven't got anyone to beaccountable to.

Paul (12:40):
Yep.

Hayley (12:41):
it's easy to just spend the day getting in emails and
social media and respondingrather than being proactive.
I.

Paul (12:51):
I think that's, do you know what I so many of the, not
just solo entrepreneurs, Iguess, but entrepreneurs in
general anybody who gravitatestowards running their own
business I find that a lot of'emhave neurodiversity of some way,
shape, or form, right?
Like I am.
Quite on, and I talk about it alot on this show, right?
We've had some amazing guests onthe show who've gone from prison

(13:13):
to running their own$10 milliona year business.
We've had Guinness World recordholders who used to be addicts
and all sorts of stuff allthrough neurodiversity.
But I do think that'sparticularly challenging when
you are neurodiverse becausecertainly for an ADHD angle,
like for me, if a client handsme some work to be done and I

(13:33):
feel like I have to get it offmy desk there.
And then, I really hate leavingthings overnight.
And I've gotten older, I'vegotten better at managing that
kind of expectation of myself.
this doesn't need to be donetoday.
Look at your diary for tomorrow.
Tomorrow's gonna be a decentday.
And whilst we can't count onthat whole diary of staying

(13:54):
free, or could a chunk of it inthe morning's gonna be free.
We don't need to stay up till 11o'clock tonight, Paul.
But what's your advice tobusiness owners who are out
there, who are perhaps feelinglike things are normal, but
noticing the signs of burnout?
They don't really want to talkto just anyone about things.
How can they self-diagnose whenthey need to do something about

(14:17):
it, I guess is what I'm seeing.

Hayley (14:19):
Oh, great question.
I like that you're asking mequestions.
I've not been asked before.
I think it's that when you'refinding it hard to switch off,
When you are in a place whereyou're like, it's constantly on
your mind and it's worrying you,I.
you don't wanna get to the pointwhere you're having sleepless
nights about it, if that's whereyou're at, that's like
definitely a point, but aninability to switch off and say,

(14:39):
it's the end of the day, andthen it's still on your mind and
you're spending your time withyour family and your friends
maybe checking your email orit's just you're thinking, oh, I
didn't do that thing I wassupposed to do today.
That feeling of there's just toomuch.
I would just wanna pauseeverybody else.
I can catch up.
But the world doesn't work likethat, right?
We can't pause everybody else sothat we can catch up.

(14:59):
And sometimes, the first thingpeople need to do is just take a
break.
Whether that's go for a walk orjust take 10 minutes away from
your desk and breathe.
A lot of us don't do thatenough, Stuck at our desk.
So I think when you are feelingthat sense of there's just too
much, I'm never gonna get ontrack.
I can't focus, I can'tconcentrate.

(15:20):
I was speaking to a client a fewweeks ago and she was like, oh,
I spent the whole week like justprocrastinating and I've got
this really important deadline.
There's this thing here I needto do and I'm not doing it.
Why am I not doing it?
and it's that, that's your.
Your resistance to that task.
And then there'll come a pointwhere the deadline arrives and
then you work on it and you nailit and it's to the exclusion of

(15:41):
all else.
And that's when you are in thezone, right?
You can focus, you canconcentrate'cause you know you
have to do it.
But actually you could have donea little bit, little and often a
few weeks before and thatdeadline focuses the mind, it
creates, you said earlier it'sthe good, the right amount of
pressure.
But

Paul (15:59):
if you work Urgency.

Hayley (16:00):
like that all the time, it's just exhausting and it's
gonna need to feeling burnt out.

Paul (16:05):
Yeah, I think.

(16:42):
I learned a lot of myproductivity management skills
in retail, right?
Because there's, there is no twoYou either sink or swim and I, I
try and carry a lot of thoselessons with me into what I do
now.
And I always used to have partof my day to your point, I
escape from the retailenvironment for a while.
Where I could not, it wasn'talways possible every day, but,

(17:04):
I remember the last store that Iworked at was in Richmond, in
North Yorkshire, and there was abeautiful park right beside the
store and there was aweatherspoons at the bottom of
the street, not gonna lie.
So my paperwork used to get donein the weatherspoons

Hayley (17:15):
yeah.

Paul (17:16):
enjoy a meal whilst I was doing work.
Which frustrated the hell outtamy employees'cause they couldn't
do the same thing.
But also I was bearing the bruntof the force of everything from
above and shielding them at thesame time I earned it.
Like it was a very tough,demanding job, but I think a lot
of us have learned copingmechanisms as we've gone through
life and I think.

(17:36):
To your point, we start to feellike our coping mechanisms are
enough and everybody goesthrough this and

Hayley (17:42):
Yes.

Paul (17:42):
i dont need to change.
I just need to work that littlebit harder.
Or I'll get a break today orsomething will go my way this
week or the other.
The other one I really gets mefrustrated is I need to get my
jobs list done.
Jobs list, never ever done.
You are, you're kiddingyourself.

Hayley (18:00):
when you gonna give up

Paul (18:01):
Where?
Where I have a jobs list for DIYin the house that we're working
through, and I'm like, might getthat done, but I guarantee the
moment I empty it, there'll besomething else added on the
bottom.
My wife's trying to fill it upas fast as I can.
Edit it.
I can cross stuff off.
She got wrong the other day forcrossing something off that was
mine.
I was like, no, I did that.
Why did you cross that off?
That was my dopamine hit.

Hayley (18:21):
Yeah.
When I do talks to big groupsI'll ask people to put their
hands up.
so who's got a, who, a to-dolist and most of the room will
put their hands up.
your hands up if you've putsomething on the list that
you've done already.
'cause it feels nice to tick itoff.
And people look around andrealise that people are still
keeping their hands up andthat's a really good indicator
that.
You, you're feeling like you'renot progressing'cause you wanna

(18:43):
tick stuff off.
So your brain, you get thatdopamine hit and you're like,
I'm making progress.
you're right on your list.
Make tea.
Yes, I've made tea.
Great.
I can tick that off.
And it feels good.

Paul (18:53):
Yeah.

Hayley (18:54):
some people talk about eating the frog first thing.
Some people like doing that,doing the most unpleasant task
first.
And quite a few ADHDers thatI've worked with ah that doesn't
work for me.
I'm the same.
I like to see that I'vephysically done something.
for me, like emptying thedishwasher before I hopped onto
our call this morning, I waslike, I've achieved something.

(19:14):
I can see the difference.
So I could have ticked somethingoff my list and there will be
some mornings where I choose todo that.
But for me, just seeing aphysical difference makes me
feel like I'm making progress.
It gives me that little dopaminehere and I'm like, I'm on it, a
dishwasher, resented.
We're all good.
crack on.
So different people workdifferently and it's a case of

(19:35):
finding what kind of motivatesyou and gets you started.

Paul (19:39):
And I think that's the key.
That's definitely the key iswhat works for you.
'cause what works for meprobably won't work for you.
It might work for some people.
It won't work for everyone.
And we've all got our own uniqueweird things that we do.
And I own weird.
I love being weird.
I told my son long before Irealised I was ADHD I was like
I'm weird.
I'm good with it.
I'm just not normal.

(19:59):
I don't wanna be normal.
And neither should anyone elseif I don't think we're all weird
in our own ways.
So you wrote the book, how toFix Meetings Then I'm curious,
how do we fix meetings?
Because I'd love to fix them.

Hayley (20:11):
And I think this is, yeah I'm really intrigued by
meetings and meetings culture,because I've been to some
brilliant meetings like that CEOrole that I had involved a lot
of interagency work and workingwith other people.
And a lot of my meetings werewith the local authority, and
some of those meetings were.
Not fun, not a good use ofpeople's time, didn't really

(20:32):
feel like they achieved all thatmuch.
some of those meetings wereamazing and changed the world.
And I was really interested in,what makes these things
different?
So again, think productive,delivered some training for me
and my team around meetings.
And it's different to email,right?
You sort your inbox out, you'vegot the skills, you've made some
progress, and you just, it'ssome daily habits to.

(20:54):
Keep and maintain that, but it'srelatively easy once you've you,
once you've identified what youneed to do.
But with meetings, you have todo something different each time
because each meeting isdifferent.
And if it's not different,you've got a problem.
The one-to-one clients that Iwork with, people who are
self-employed, they generallysay they want more meetings,
'cause a meeting means aconversation with a client or a
prospective client.

(21:15):
But for people working inorganisations they tend to say,
I'm back to back.
I've got so many meetings.
When am I gonna do the work?
And a lot of people are tellingme, actually I'm doing the work
in the evenings and theweekends.
Again.
that's not sustainable, that'snot gonna work.
We fix it by firstly, havingless meetings.
If you are in one of thoseorganisations and you're feeling

(21:36):
like I'm overloaded, I've gotmeetings all day, every day, we,
which of the meetings that arereally helpful and help move
your goals forward?
And very often when I go into anorganisation it turns out that a
lot of their meetings areupdates.
We're just updating each otheron what we're doing, and the
managers will often say, butisn't it nice for people to

(21:56):
connect and meet, although it'sonline or in person?
I'm like, oh yeah, but you cando that in other ways.
You could go out for lunch.
You can sit and have a coffeetogether on Zoom or Teams if
you're having a meeting and youare mandating that people need
to be there it's just foreverybody to go around the room
and give an update.
There are other ways.
that we can do that, that aregonna be more effective.

(22:17):
And do you know what?
People don't really digest stuffin a meeting and come up with
problems,

Paul (22:22):
solutions

Hayley (22:23):
to problems.

Paul (22:24):
Yeah.

Hayley (22:25):
if somebody shares their update and says, and this is
what I'm stuck on before themeeting, then people can have to
think about how they can helpthem get unstuck and use the
meeting to solve problems, tomove things forward, rather than
to just share information.
And a lot of people will say,oh, it's a meeting.
It could have been an email.
It's about getting that balance.
We want to collaborate with eachother.
We want to be able to buildrelationships with individuals

(22:48):
and as teams.
And I had a client a few weeksago who said, my boss has said
I've got to go to thesemeetings, but these meetings
represent 25% of my week I don'tfind them useful.
It's okay, that's tricky.
And the reason her manager wasmandating that she was there is

(23:08):
I want the team to feelconnected.
But for her, it had the oppositeeffect because she was sat in
the meeting, feeling wasn't agood use of time and it wasn't
valuable.
So then she ends up, it's anonline meeting, so she ends up
doing something else, and ifeverybody's got their cameras
turned off or they're doingsomething else, there's a
question around do we reallyneed to be there?
Is that meeting serving itspurpose?

(23:30):
And one of the things I cameacross in when I was writing the
book was stats on you.
If you.
Ask everybody after a meetinghow useful it was.
The person who's convened themeeting or the person chairing
the meeting, they will alwaysthink it's really useful other
people less how do we changethings to make it that everybody

(23:50):
felt that was a good use oftheir time?
And if it's not, let's cancelit.
meeting shorter.
Let's not have them, let's havethem less often.
And if we're missing thatcollaboration, let's replace
that with some more meaningfulcollaboration where people are
helping each other out.
They're moving stuff forward,rather than just sitting in a
room updating people on what itis that they've done.

Paul (24:08):
As both an introvert and an ADHDer I can see all let's
have a meeting.
Let's have a meeting to discusswhat we're gonna have in the
meeting next week.
I always, what we're gonna do,or the best one was in retail
when you'd have a conferencecall, right?
Conference call is Wednesday at11:00 AM.

(24:30):
just before dinner when my rushhour's on and I need to change
staff over and I need, you wantme to?
Everybody?
Why do I, can you not?
I've got an area manager whovisits my store twice a week.
Why can I not have that from himwhen he arrives or her when they
arrive in store?
Why?
And you, but if you saidanything on the meeting you

(24:50):
could hear, you could feelpeople like shopping.
Take a breath.
Ooh, we said something.
We are here to listen.
Not to, like it, it was just ina public announcement.
just send it in an email then.
Come on guys.

Hayley (25:01):
yeah and I don't like writing.
I, I.
I I've written a book, but Idon't enjoy writing.
I would much rather stand infront of a few hundred people in
a room and talk and have peopleask questions and make it a bit
more interactive than writingthat email.
I'd rather be on a call, butactually that's not valuable.

(25:23):
So what I could do is just do alittle recording that's okay,
this is my five minute update.
I don't need to write anything.
I could put it in an infographicon Canva if I wanted to get
people to maybe engage with it abit more.
And I can say, this is thevideo.
It's gonna take you five minutesto watch it.
You can watch it in your owntime.
You don't need to watch it.
You could just listen to it.
So now someone can do that whilethey're washing up or just say,

(25:46):
ah, okay, I'm tidying up mydesk.
Let me listen to that messagefrom Hayley while I'm doing
that.
I'm not generally advocate ofmultitasking, but that feels
like a bit of an exception.
we don't always have to writeeverything.
People receive so many emails.
They're probably not on top ofthem.
They probably haven't read themall.
They probably just skim throughthings like put the headline at
the top.
I think you really want peopleto know.

(26:08):
And then the information and thedetail further down for those.
And how you wanna deliver themessage, rather than just go,
let's get everyone together.
And then I can tell them,

Paul (26:15):
Yeah.

Hayley (26:16):
that me and Georgia's less prepared.
You haven't gotta do as muchplanning and prep.
Whereas if someone's had theyget the information a few days
before, they're gonna think ofmuch better quality questions to
actually ask.
When they do see you, they'regonna think, how does that
update that Paul just shared?
How does that affect my job?
How does that affect what I'mdoing day to day?

(26:37):
And the quality of thequestions, particularly from the
introverts, is gonna be muchbetter.
think the world of work is oftendesigned for people who are
highly extroverted and a lot ofpeople are not highly
extroverted, so we need to thinkof better ways that are gonna
work for everyone rather thanjust catering to the loudest.

Paul (26:55):
Yeah I think you've made a really good point there as well
around how we all consume.
Information and we wronglyassume that face-to-face is a
great way to relay information.
As, as a great example, we'll doa shopping list every week.
And I know it's coming tonight.
My, we do shopping on a Fridaymorning.
My wife is gonna do a thing shedoes every week.
Sam, if you're editing this, I'msorry, but this is true.

(27:17):
We've talked about it manytimes.
'cause she does do the editingfor the podcast.
And she will read out that list.
As I'm stood in the fridge, I'mlooking in the fridge for
something to eat and she'll go,right here's what's on the list.
Is there anything that we need?
And she'll reel this list off.
And honestly, it goes in one earand out the other.
'cause I haven't heard a thingon that list.
I don't, I can't process a listlike that.
I just can't do it.

(27:37):
And every week I go over and Itake the list out of her hands
and I read the list and I go,

Hayley (27:42):
okay.
Yeah.

Paul (27:44):
So let's now have a look in the fridge.
And I can compare the list withwhat's in the fridge as well,
right?
Like I can go, all Yeah.
She has got that on the list.
Yeah, she has.
'cause I could pro, I've got aterrible memory, like short term
memory's terrible, ADHD out thewindow.
So that for me is important.
But if I listen to a podcast,for example, ironically,

(28:04):
although I work in video Iconsume audio much better than I
do written or by video.
I like reading, but when I read,I like to read fiction.
don't very often get that timeanymore with two kids.
I like to read fiction where Idon't have to remember anything.
It's all emotions.
It's storyline.
That's great.
If it's something I need toremember in the ear unless it's

(28:27):
something I need to rememberthere, and then, in which case I
need to read it, it just has tohappen.
So I think it's really importantfor business owners, for
executive leaders, forcorporations to consider that.
Yeah, your team don't all absorbthe information the same way.
I think that's super critical.
If you wanna have effectivemeetings, especially

Hayley (28:45):
they don't absorb it in the same way, but also not the
same speed.

Paul (28:48):
yeah.

Hayley (28:48):
Like I, I used to be a school governor and when figures
were being presented in themeeting, it, I was like, if I
can sit and look at the figuresbefore the meeting, I'm gonna
have questions about thosenumbers.
That was my job in that role wasto ask questions

Paul (29:01):
Well, that's why they didn't give you them, or she'll
have questions.
Oh.

Hayley (29:05):
Yeah.
And that's literally the role ofa school governor is to question
stuff and to make decisions.
And you can't make gooddecisions unless you've answered
the information.
And for me, processing thenumbers takes a lot longer.
I like stories, if someone givesme a story and says, this is how
it's playing out, that'shelpful.
My brain digests that reallyquickly, so I.

(29:27):
For me, like you, I love readingfiction.
I get through fiction at a rateof knots, but if I'm reading
something that's nonfiction andI need to remember it, I
literally do a little mind mapand I note down the things and
that means I'm interacting withthe content in a different way.
So giving people, if you'regiving people information.
We need to think about how we'redoing that in a way that they

(29:48):
can absorb it.
I did some dyslexia awarenesstraining couple of years ago.
Percentof the population aredyslexic.
That's huge.
I hadn't realised how prevalentthat was.
and even if you don't know thatsomebody is dyslexic, let's just
assume that if you've got a teamof 10 people, somebody probably
is somebody else.
Probably is and doesn't reallyknow it.

(30:10):
So just, recognising that.
People work in different waysand let's give them the option
to work in a way that works forthem rather than that one size
fits all kind of model.

Paul (30:22):
I think.
It's ins.
Instead of blaming them for notbeing able to follow your
instructions or information,make sure that they're able to
understand it in their own wayso that they can give you a
hundred percent results.
And once you've done that with ateam, I think you've gotta go
through that experience ofdealing with that properly to
see the outcomes so that you canreally get behind why you should

(30:44):
be doing it in the first place,sadly.

Hayley (30:45):
Yeah,

Paul (30:46):
a lot of people just go through life blaming their
employees or their coworkers forjust being, not, for being
stupid.
Why are you so stupid and notbeing well?
'cause you're not giving themthe information they need and
the way they need it.
It's very simple.

Hayley (30:59):
some personality styles will.
Not take any action unlessthey've understood the reasons
they need that opportunity toask questions.
So one of the things I train onis Gretchen Rubin's, four
Tendencies.
I'm a licensee for her habit,her model around habits, and
what inspires people to takeaction.
for some people it's having theopportunity to ask questions

(31:22):
'cause they're not gonna doanything until they are fully on
board and understand the reasonswhy.
when I'm, yeah.
I live with one of those people.
There are a lot of questions andwhen I'm doing that session with
a team and I start talking aboutthis personality type of being a
questioner, and it's only a verysmall aspect of personality, so
I say personality type, butthat's not technically correct.

(31:45):
I guess when I talk about peoplebeing a questioner and having
like lots of questions aboutsomething, but when they've
understood the answers thatwill, you know.
Get'em into a place of takingaction.
People look around the room andthey look at the questions.
They go, that's you.
And then somebody will be like,yeah, I know that's me.

Paul (32:02):
We on it.

Hayley (32:02):
And try and ask more questions.
I'm a coach.
I like asking questions.
I've found.
People asking me questions ismuch more helpful than people
telling me what to do.
'cause I can think it throughfor myself.
But I'm not a questioner.
It's not my natural defaultsetting.
Somebody who is a questionerwill keep going with the
questions and have a lot morewhereas I'm like, if somebody

(32:22):
tells me to do something, yeah,I'll do that.
I'm Much more of a peoplepleaser, which is not
necessarily a positive thing atthe time.
So yeah, that giving people thatopportunity to.
something a bit deeper and a bitfurther sometimes means that for
a lot of people, that meansthey're more likely to do it.
They're more likely to respondand take action.
Whereas if they haven't reallyfully understood you might

(32:45):
think, I've explained, but likethey're gonna have more
questions.
You haven't explainedeverything.

Paul (32:49):
Yeah, they're gonna find the one thing that you didn't
explain and that's gonna reallyannoy them.
So it's interesting what yousaid there.
So I'm a, I'm a questionerunless I get it and if I get it,
I become a people pleaser.

Hayley (33:00):
Yeah.

Paul (33:01):
I'm either really on board and I'll get it done better than
anybody else will ever get itdone.
Or I will drag my heels untilyou answer all my questions and
I will not do it even at thethreat of losing my job.
It's as simple as that.
I used to, I, I joke, but for 15years I pretty much had my name
on the naughty seat at the topof the stairs in our head
office, right?
Paul's gonna be back there insix months time because he just

(33:22):
can't do what he's asked.
Because you can't tell me why Ishould be doing it.
I'm not gonna do it without,like I refuse.
I am a rebel.

Hayley (33:31):
A good thing, right?
You need questioners in yourteam because they will stop you
going off in com, completely thewrong direction.
'cause they'll ask really goodand relevant questions.
And I know some people in ourteam will say, oh, it's really
frustrating when that person, wewanna end the meeting and
they've still got morequestions.
And it's everybody else can go,don't need the answers to these
questions.

(33:52):
having a question in your teamreally helps you to focus on.
whats important, what's gonnamove the dial because those
people are seeing things in aslightly different way if we all
saw things through this in thesame way, we wouldn't be see
seeing the full picture.

Paul (34:07):
Yep

Hayley (34:07):
So

Paul (34:08):
Yep.

Hayley (34:08):
questions on our team are really valuable.
They'll be missing you on thatnaughty step.

Paul (34:12):
They are indeed.
They are indeed.
Took my naughty step with me, Ithink.
So as we draw this episode to aclose, a couple of questions
that I'd like to ask youropinion on Hayley.
in terms of almost, it doesn'tmatter whether you're a small
business owner or a largebusiness owner, but what's one
common mistake that you seepeople making in how they

(34:33):
approach their workload andproductivity and what can they
do to resolve that?
What's your biggest bug bear?

Hayley (34:38):
I think very often when I ask people what their
priorities are, they'll give mea long list.
Like I've got like these 10things, my priority.
And I'm like, if you've got 10priorities, you haven't got any
priorities.
Like what is the, what are thethree things that you're gonna
focus on this week?
So I run a Monday morning a callfor people who are maybe feeling
a bit stuck and overwhelmed, andwe do a bit of.

(34:59):
Planning for the week.
It's a 45 minute call.
I ask them different questionseach week.
Some of the questions are thesame, some of them are
different.
But one of the regular questionseach week is like, what are your
top three priorities?
I actually get people to write'em down and I go on my
whiteboard next to my desk so Ican see them every day when I
sit down and work on thosepriorities before anything else.

(35:19):
But in doing that, I also willask people, okay, you've got
your top three priorities.
What are you not gonna do thisweek?
So that you are just making areally conscious choice.
Okay, isn't getting my, gonnaget my energy and attention this
week, and that allows me tofocus on these things over here.
Maybe once every 4, 5, 6 weeks,I might challenge people and
say, is there something that'sjust been on that list every

(35:41):
week?
week you've said you're notgonna do

Paul (35:44):
Yep.

Hayley (35:44):
week, maybe that's because it's not important and
it's not impactful.
We can get rid of that.
We can let that go.
That on a good ideas list ofthings to come back to in the
future when we've got moreresources, when we've sorted out
our other priorities and we'remaybe looking for some new ones.
It's something to delegate, ifit's editing your podcast, then
may maybe they need to work withsomebody else to do that.

(36:06):
so really thinking about whatare the patterns and the trends
you're seeing in that.
And are you moving the dial onyour priorities?
Like very often, somebody.
Might put on their to-do listmarketing, like that's my
priority for the week, butthat's massive.
you

Paul (36:23):
Yeah.

Hayley (36:23):
people working on that and then still probably go, oh,
we could do a 21st person.
What's the next action is whatyou should be putting on your
list.

Paul (36:31):
Yeah.

Hayley (36:32):
top tips would be to have like your overall top three
priorities for the week be clearon what your next action is in
relation to each of those.
if I'm watching you dosomething, what am I seeing you
do?
Is that sending an email tosomeone, is that looking at your
website and rereading the texton the homepage and making a few

(36:52):
tweaks, what does that actuallyinvolve doing?
What's that next step?
And that makes you, it's so mucheasier when your brain comes to
look at your list to go, that'sreally specific.
I know what to do with that.
Let me crack on with it.
And then you tick things offmore often, which feels good,
makes you wanna do more stuff.

Paul (37:09):
I can feel procrastination rearing its head at the moment
at the thought of rereading myhomepage website.
Text.
Yeah, that's,

Hayley (37:16):
need to do that.
That's

Paul (37:17):
I need somebody else to do that for me at some point.
We'll, getting there, we'regetting there.
Hill, it's been fabulous to chatthis morning.
I think we could have probablygone for another couple of hours
easily.
I know everyone at home willhave found that incredibly
useful.
Not just in, in the advice thatyou've given at the end, but
like that, that grounding ofwhere you came from how you got
where you are and why I think isincredibly powerful for people

(37:38):
who are.
I see I meet so many people whoare stuck in their job and they
can see elements of what theywant to do with their life, but
they're just not quitecourageous enough at that moment
to take that leap.
And it's lovely to meet somebodywho's gone.
Do you know what?
I was really good at doing thisfor so long, but actually what I
enjoy doing was this.
And that's what I do now.
And you can see the passion inyou.

(37:58):
It's lovely.

Hayley (37:59):
I love it.

Paul (37:59):
So congratulations on, on, on being who you are, I guess.
And thank you for being amazingguest here.
It's been a, it's been a genuinepleasure

Hayley (38:08):
Oh yeah.
Pleasure to be on the show.
Thanks very much.

Paul (38:11):
and thank you everyone who's watching along at home or
listening along, if you'relistening on the audio site.
Please do remember, give us asubscribe and if you feel brave
enough, just a few words or astar rate in review on whatever
audio directory you're listeningon, Spotify or Apple or wherever
you are, that'd be massivelyappreciated, and I will see you
next week on Marketpulse Prosand Pioneers.
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