Productivity?

I realized something about feeling productive today. Turns out, I can get easily get a false sense of productivity and feel content about it.

For example, cleaning out my inbox makes me feel very productive. This morning I had 112 emails in my Inbox. Now I have zero. Sounds pretty cool, right? Well, check out the numbers in my To Do folders:

- Hawaii to Load: 2
- Ft. Wayne to Load: 15
- to do real: 26
- ASAP: 10
- CONTENTdm after break: 4
- BYU to do: 12
- FH Collection metadata: 0 (yay!)
- to delete: 2
- TFs - Ft. Wayne: 11
- Serials: 2
- Missing pages: 1
- [name of coworker] problems: 21
- [name of other coworker] - black magic: 3

No, I didn't put all those in today... but still! So much to do! But I feel so productive because 112 emails are now of of my sight. (Ironically, as I write this, I just got an email.)

Another example. If I have some big project that I need done, and I have someone else do it for me, I feel very productive. This big project that really needs to get done and has been weighing on my shoulders is finally getting done! I'm so cool and productive! Well, that's dumb, because the only thing I did was get it set up, train someone else how to do it, and delegate it out.

So, despite the fact that I have not been very productive today, I feel productive today. I am knowingly deceiving myself.