The classic Gershwin song reminds us each year around this time that it’s “Summertime, and the livin’ is easy.”  While those “fish are jumpin’,” the  pace at work tends to slow down; the office dress code tends to get more casual; bosses, co-workers, and clients disappear on vacation; and most everyone tries to sneak out early on Fridays.

So, you’re thinking: Why not join the club, chillax, and shift into cruise control for the next couple of months?

But instead, what if, this summer, you decided to shift gears and do the opposite!

While everyone else is out getting their second Mister Softee or third iced coffee of the day, why not carpe the diem and take at least some of this downtime to do some of those things that you’ve been putting off all year long? That is, instead of cruising through the summer and then wondering where the time went, why not put the pedal to the metal, and take advantage of these lazy, hazy, days of summer to get ahead.

How? By – in addition to, of course, allowing yourself to take some well-earned and much-needed time off for yourself – you may want to consider dedicating at least a few of those dog days of summer – the period between the Fourth of July and Labor Day – to focus on these four incredibly imporant and impacful career-enhancing activities:

The Time Management Matrix model I mentioned in a previous post (“Start the New Year Off Right with 7 Simple Productivity and Time Management Tips“) demonstrates that we spend most of our time in either Quadrant 1 (Urgent & Important tasks) or Quadrant 3 (Urgent and Unimportant tasks). For good reason, it’s often referred to as “the tyranny of the urgent” because we let external demands and time constraints dictate where and how we spend so much of our time.

But with things slowing down a little and often with fewer Q1 & Q3 fires to put out, summertime just might be the right time to focus on Q2 (Important, but Non-Urgent tasks and projects)…and even allow us to spend some Q4 downtime (Unimportant, and Non-Urgent) on ourselves.

So regarding those four developmental areas I listed earlier, which quadrant do they fit into? Yes, Quadrant 2!

Q2 is where the bigger picture, longer term, strategic, and developmental things happen. So, developing ourselves, developing our relationships, developing our people, and developing our teams are four high-payoff activities that often end up on our Wish List rather than on our To-Do List. Why? Because, by definition, though they are of high importance, they simply are not “urgent”…and it is the urgent and time-sensitive things that tend to command our attention and dictate our calendars, often leaving us with no time, or energy, to spend in the all-important Quadrant 2.

And what about Q4 – the unimportant and non-urgent? Well, we cannot live by work alone! There is definitely a need to recharge and refresh ourselves mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. And summertime is the perfect time to try to carve out some time to do that. After how hard we work throughout most of the year, don’t we owe it to ourselves to take advantage of this downtime…and the beautiful weather? And, though Q4 activities are often categorized as “Time-Wasters and Escapes,” as the saying goes, “Time you enjoy wasting, is not wasted time.”

YOUR SUMMERTIME Q2 & Q4 TO-DO LIST

So, to help you seize the day and develop yourself, your relationships, your people, and/or your team this summer, here are just a few of a potentially unlimited number of possible suggestions that you may wish to consider adding to your summertime To-Do list:

[1] DEVELOP YOURSELF

While racing to get your work done throughout the year, it’s very easy to forget about working on yourself. So make the time and take the time this summer to get organized and to create processes and systems that will help you to be more efficient and effective and productive. Here are just a few suggestions to help you develop yourself this summer:

• Pick out a business book (or non-business book) and read while having a leisurely lunch outdoors somewhere. As President Truman once said, “Leaders are readers.”
• Sign up for a few work-related blogs and e-newsletters and read 3-5 per day (for example, some of my favorites are: Seth Godin’s blog, Harvard Management Tip of the Day, and SmartBrief).
• Take some time everyday to watch a couple of TED Talks (these will not only increase your knowledge, but will also help you to improve your presentation and communication skills).
• Look up a work-related topic on YouTube and watch a few different videos to get diverse perspectives.
• If you'd rather not read the whole book, download the book summaries (e.g., on summary.com or getAbstract) and/or explore other valuable e-learning resources (e.g., Udemy and Lynda.com).
• Learn to speak “the language of your business” by looking up jargon and terminology you’ve heard but that you don’t know the meaning of (e.g., the Investopedia dictionary is a good source for improving your financial industry vocabulary, and there’s always Wikipedia).
• Take some time to de-clutter and organize your workspace (including your computer desktop). I’ve found that a clean desk contributes to a clear mind. 
• Initiate informal conversations with various people in your office to learn more about them and to leverage the wisdom of their experience. (As well as being willing to share yours with them.) As business author Dan Pink says, “Anytime you think you’re the smartest person in the room, you’ve just proved that you’re not." Bill Nye the Science Guy said, "Everybody you will ever meet knows something that you don't." And as philospher Thomas Carlyle (and, later, Emerson) put it, “Every man (*or woman) is my superior in that I may learn from him (*or her).”

[2] DEVELOP YOUR RELATIONSHIPS

Initiatiating conversations with your co-workers will not only increase your knowledge, but will help you to develop and strengthen those relationships. As the saying goes, in the business world it’s not just what you know…but who you know – as well as who wants to know you. And as the best way to be seen as “interesting” is to BE “interested,” seek to ask questions and make an effort to get to know people on a sincere, genuine, and human level. A few ways to build your network and deepen your relationships this summer: 

• Go out to lunch with people in your office. Suggest sitting outside (e.g., at a sidewalk café or in Bryant Park,  Union Square, etc.)  or take a walk around the block (or along the High Line or across the Brooklyn Bridge). This is a great way to exercise your body while exercising your mind and your people skills.
• Reconnect and meet up with old friends and colleagues. Look them up on LinkedIn and/or Facebook to see WHAT they’re doing…and then shoot them a note to find out HOW they’re doing…and ask if they’d like to get together sometime. Last summer I met up with a guy who was my best friend growing up in Queens -- and who I last saw when we were 12 years old. It was really nice to reconnect and a lot of fun to reminisce about old times.
• Speaking of LinkedIn, another way to develop relationships is to join a few LinkedIn discussion groups and dive into the conversation. It’s a great way to enhance your "3 V's": Visibilty, Voice, & Value, helping you to increase your exposure, build your brand, and establish yourself as a subject matter expert and thought-leader in your field. 
• After work, look for opportunities to attend networking events. Often held in the summer at outdoor venues or rooftop bars, it’s a great way to socialize and enjoy the great outdoors while developing your relationships.

[3] DEVELOP YOUR PEOPLE

The biggest objection I get when trying to sell clients on my training services is not “We don’t have the budget,” but “We just don’t have the time.” Unfortunately, the reality is that “NOW” is never a good time. So if you sincerely want to develop your people, you simply have to make the time, and the commitment, to do so. If you truly want to attract, retain, engage, and motivate your people, one of the best ways to do that is to invest in their personal and professional development. And summertime just might be a great time to squeeze in some training, coaching, mentoring, and more:

• Set aside some time to meet informally with each of your people to simply ask, “How’s it going?” Most conversations between bosses and their employees focus on tasks and projects. Or only happen two times a year during formal performance reviews. But this is all about them. Finding out what makes each individual tick will help you to engage and motivate them, and set them up for success. Find out what they want to be coached on, and – whether it’s by you or someone else – get them the coaching and/or mentoring and/or training they need to take their game to the next level.
• Initiate a mentoring program or buddy system that will encourage people to pair up with others in your organization solely for learning and development purposes. This is a great way to increase cross-functional knowledge-sharing and collaboration.
• Create a “learning library” – both online and offline – to provide employees with free access to books, videos, articles, etc. for them to learn what they want, at their own pace. Making this minimal financial investment goes a long way towards creating a learning culture in your organization. And don’t you want your people to be as smart and knowledgeable as they can be?    

Btw, while some managers ask, “What will happen if we invest in developing them and they leave?” the other question to consider is, “What will happen if we DON’T, and they stay?”

[4] DEVELOP YOUR TEAM

Developing each individual in your organization is the first step, but when you develop people to become a more high performing team, you’ll find that as a T.E.A.M. – Together Everyone Achieves More. As I wrote in my post, “Team BONDING Needs To Come Before Team BUILDING,” to build a championship team takes time and attention. Time that you may be able to take advantage of during the summer:

• One of the easiest and most common ways to create a team environment is to bring people together to bond over lunch. Whether they brown bag it or whether you bring in pizza and salads or something else, creating an opportunity for your people to break bread together in a casual setting will help them connect, exchange ideas, and get to know one another better. If you want to be creative and turn it into a learning experience as well, show a TED Talk, share an article beforehand, or start a summer book club to get the conversation going.
• Get out of the office either for an extra-long lunch or allow people to leave just a little bit early to meet up for afterwork drinks at a local rooftop or waterside bar. Social media is one way of connecting; social-izing live, in-person is another.
• Plan a more structured teambuilding offsite event. Whether you facilitate it yourself or bring in an outside expert, it’s a great way to simultaneously develop your people as individuals and collectively as a team.
• One other, random, fun way to help people bond: “T-shirt Fridays.” If if suits your culture, pick a different theme for each Friday and invite people to wear a t-shirt that day that represents “My favorite….blank.” One week is “Wear your favorite band or concert t-shirt (e.g., The Ramones); the next week wear your favorite sports team t-shirt (e.g., Yankees or Mets); favorite vacation t-shirt; favorite superhero or cartoon character; etc. This is a fun, casual, and no-cost way to break down barriers, help people find commonalities, and initiate conversations.

While there are a million more possibilities, I’ll stop here. If you have other ideas, please share them with us!

In closing, as the inspirational magnet on my refrigerator advises: “Do something today that your future self will thank you for.” Which implies that if you do just some of the things listed above, your “September Self” will appreciate and thank your “Summer Self” for setting you up for a successful remainder of the year.

And again, while you’re busily making progress on your Q2 to-do list, remember to also take some Q4 time to reward yourself…especially if or when you hear that hypnotic and mesmerizing Mister Softee theme song calling your name.

The last couple of weeks of December is the perfect time to take stock – not only of whether you’ve been naughty or nice over the past year – but of what you’ve accomplished, and where you need to focus your time, attention, and energy to set yourself up for success in 2016.

To help you do that, it might be useful to conduct the following seven productivity “inventories”:

• Goals inventory
• Personal inventory
• Environmental inventory
• Relationship inventory
• Financial inventory
• Time inventory
• Self-development inventory

For more details on each one, please click here to read my complete post on The Hired Guns website!

I really hate making the bed.

I know it’s such a small and trivial thing, but it’s one of my least favorite things in the world to do. And yet it’s something that has to be done every single day.

So, like other things that people don’t like to do, I often put it off. I’ll do everything else first and save it for last. Or avoid doing it altogether.

But what’s the result of this behavior?

I’m thinking about it. I’m dwelling on it. I’m dreading it. It’s hanging over my head and distracting me as I go about doing other things. And until it’s done I can’t move on with my day, because I know that the only thing worse than having to MAKE the bed is coming home to the sloppy mess of an unmade bed.

So what’s the solution?

Make the bed immediately! Right away. Now. As soon as possible. To start on it before my feet even hit the floor. Before I even have a chance to think about it! And before I know it, the bed is made. So now I can move on to more important things.

So what does this have to do with . . . well . . . anything?

As you kick off the New Year, ask yourself this question:

What are the “unmade beds” in your life?

What are the things on your to-do list that are hanging over your head, the things that are always on your mind? The things you have to do, need to do, or dread doing. The things that you have been putting off for whatever reason? The things that should be done? The things that if you did them would affect other things? The things that would make a difference? The things that are keeping you from doing the things that really matter?

Why do we delay?

It could be because of busyness (or bus-i-ness), distraction, fear, lack of knowledge, lack of skill, lack of understanding, lack of motivation, or any other number of other reasons people procrastinate, including the universal excuse: lack of time.

But we all have the same 24 hours a day, the same 525,600 minutes that everyone else has. Why are some people able to do more with them than others? Is it discipline? Determination? Willpower? The ability to focus? The ability to prioritize? The ability to eliminate distractions? The ability to just Get Things Done? There are a million possible reasons and excuses. But the bottom line is this:

No one wants to HEAR excuses . . . they just want to SEE results.

Look at your list of New Year’s resolutions from January 2014 and compare it to your list for 2015. Is there anything from last year’s list—from 365 days ago—that you haven’t even gotten started on yet? My bet is that there is. The key is to narrow down and prioritize your resolutions, and focus. Too often we make too many commitments. Set too many lofty, ambitious goals. And what happens? We end up getting none of them done. As Henry David Thoreau wrote, “Simplify, simplify.”

I was supposed to write my first book over the past year, but it simply didn’t happen. I have a ton of ideas in my head, and pages and pages of notes in my notebook—and the very best of intentions. But sometimes life just gets in the way of our best-laid plans.

So after I’m done with this blog post, I hereby resolve to finally get working on my book . . . starting . . . right . . . NOW!

But before I do, I better go make the bed.

Pedro: Do you think people will vote for me?
Napoleon Dynamite: Heck yes! I’d vote for you.
Pedro: Like what are my skills?
Napoleon Dynamite: Well, you have a sweet bike. And you’re really good at hooking up with chicks. Plus you’re like the only guy at school who has a mustache.

Unlike Pedro, I don’t have a sweet bike. I can’t grow a mustache. I don’t have nunchuk skills, bow hunting skills, or computer hacking skills. Or Napoleon's awesome dance moves.

But I do have some skills and habits that I use pretty much every day that I’m happy to share in order to help others be more effective and successful.

So click here to go to my Hired Guns blog and learn what those five skills are!

Every year it’s the same thing. We start out the New Year filled with good intentions, high hopes, and a formidable list of life-changing resolutions. And for an indomitable few, those resolutions result in positive changes and personal growth. But for the rest of us, life tends to get in the way.

Before we know it, January is over and February flies by (it’s such a short month!). Then the spring holidays come along. Then it’s summer, and… well, you know the rest. That pledge to “start tomorrow” just leads to the eventual realization that today is yesterday’s tomorrow. So, what can we do about it?

We can start today. For real. Right now.

What we need to do is go from “resolutions” to “real solutions.” And one real-life solution that really works, is easy to do, and can kick-start us into action, is to start reading. And my recommendation is to start your New Year’s reading with any one of the 13 inspirational and motivational books on this list.

My Criteria
There are a million business and self-help books on the shelves, so why these?

Because these are all written for – and about – YOU.

I read an average of 2-3 business books a week on topics ranging from management and leadership to teamwork and innovation. But the books on this list are designed and dedicated to help you become the best “you” you can be. They will help you find your passion, figure out what makes you tick, conquer your fears, and spur you to action. They’ll help you to get focused, become committed, and devise some powerful and innovative ways to help you maximize your Performance, Productivity, and Potential (what I call the “Three Ps”).

Yes, I know you’re busy working. Or looking for work. And you’re exhausted. And it’s so much easier and probably more fun to just settle in on the couch with back-to-back episodes of “Breaking Bad” or “Dexter” on Netflix, or watch the “Gangnam Style” video on YouTube for the bazillionth time. But if you’re really serious about making a change, and taking your career – and your life – to a whole new level this year, think about the potential ROI (Return on Investment) that any one of these $15 books and a few hours of your time could potentially bring.

My List

My 13 for 2013 (in alphabetical order) are:

7 Habits of Highly Effective People, The: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change (Stephen R. Covey)
When people ask, “What’s the ONE book I should read to become more effective and productive?” this timeless classic is the one. At the very least, even if you don’t choose to read the whole book cover-to-cover, everyone should at least know what those seven habits are. (Tip: For your convenience, here they are.)

18 Minutes: Find Your Focus, Master Distraction, and Get the Right Things Done (Peter Bregman)
If time management, prioritization, and personal productivity are a challenge, this new book by my friend, and master storyteller, Peter Bregman, will help you get your life on track and start producing results. (Tip 1: See the Bregman Box on page 118; Tip 2: Watch his TED talks).

Art of Possibility, The: Transforming Professional and Personal Life (Rosamund & Benjamin Zander)
Indescribably brilliant and inspirational storytelling by this husband and wife team. (Tip: Watch his famous TED Talks.)

Element, The: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything (Dr. Ken Robinson)
When who you are and What you do are in alignment and harmony, you are “in your Element.” This book will help you get there. (Tip: This RSA animated video is a true classic.)

How to Win Friends & Influence People (Dale Carnegie)
This, the first-ever “self-help” book, is the one that started it all. Written in 1936, this book has, literally, changed millions of lives worldwide. Now it’s your turn. The title says it all.

Feel the Fear… and Do It Anyway (Susan Jeffers)
In many instances, we are our own worst enemy. If you can use a confidence boost, this bestselling book will do the trick.

Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity (David Allen)
If you are simply looking for a straight-forward, no-frills, systems-based approach to get yourself organized, get yourself moving, and start getting things done, this is the number one book out there on the subject. (Tip: Tons of tools on his GTD website.)

Power of Habit, The: Why We Do What We Do In Life and Business (Charles Duhigg)
Whether trying to break an old habit or start a new one, this book will help you transform yourself into the person you would like to be through gaining a better understanding of how habits work…and what it takes to change them.

Linchpin: Are You Indispensable (Seth Godin)
I absolutely LOVE this book by one of my all-time favorite thought-leaders. In today’s working world, we need to consistently find ways to add value and stand out in a crowd. This brilliant book will inspire you to overcome your “lizard brain” and create your own path to success. (Tip: You MUST subscribe to his daily blog today. I guarantee it will quickly and radically change the way you see the world.)

One Piece of Paper: The Simple Approach to Powerful, Personal Leadership (Mike Figliuolo)
What if you could capture, on a single sheet of paper, your own personal guide to leading yourself, leading the thinking, leading others, and leading a balanced life? This creative and interactive book will help you do just that! (Tip: Subscribe to his excellent Thought Leaders blog. Full/proud disclosure: My “leadership self-awareness” guest post made their 2012 top 10 list!)

ReWork (Jason Fried & David Heinemeier Hansson)
Like Godin’s “Linchpin,” this book cuts through the crap and tells it like it is. Written with humor, attitude, and artistry, these guys really tell it like it is and get you to look at the working world in fresh new ways.

Self-Promotion for Introverts: The Quiet Guide to Getting Ahead (Nancy Ancowitz)
With introverts making up half the population (including myself), this practical and inspirational guidebook by a friend and fellow NYU professor helps and encourages introverts to leverage their strengths and achieve success.

You Don’t Need a Title to Be a Leader: How Anyone, Anywhere, Can Make a Positive Difference (Mark Sanborn)
This quick-and-easy-to-read, 100-page book will encourage and inspire you to step up to leadership – regardless of your role, position, or title. I love this powerful little book and re-read it all the time.

There are a lot of other great resources out there, but this list of personal favorites will give you a running start. So just pick ONE and dive right in. Maybe you even have some of these books already piled up on your nightstand gathering dust, or sitting on your bookshelf like a trophy. But BUYING the book with the best of intentions – as so many people do – is not enough. You need to actually READ it. And don’t just skim through it: DEVOUR it! Interact with it. Absorb it. Make it your own. Here are a just a few ways how:

• ·         Highlight things you find interesting with a neon highlighter
• ·         Underline things you find interesting with a red pen
• ·         Make notes in the margins when you’re reminded of something
• ·         Use post-it notes to mark the pages you want to go back to later

Find a blank page in the front or back and write down a list of Action Items – things you are actually going to DO! As I have people do at the end of every one of my workshops, think in terms of “Insights, Actions, & Outcomes”: What did you take away (Insights); What are you going to do (Actions); and what results do you expect to achieve (Outcomes), if you actually make the commitment and follow through.

It’s a new year. A great time to wipe the slate clean and start fresh. So if you’re really serious — I mean REALLY serious — about turning your New Year’s “resolutions” into “real solutions,” I hope that you will pick up just one of these books, and let it be the spark that ignites your passion, and helps you to light the world on fire in 2013.