Meet Bob Patterson, author of WorkloadMaster
Bob Patterson has been a time management trainer, coach and consultant since 2000 specializing in helping busy professionals be more organized, effective and focused.
As a former executive in the wireless telecommunications industry, Bob spends much of his time working with managers, entrepreneurs and professionals in rapidly changing environments.
WorkloadMaster.com is where he shares information, tips, techniques and tools to help you save time and use it more effectively. Articles include organization strategies, case studies and his unique reviews and comments. WorkloadMaster is also the home of our premium online training programs including Master Your Workload with Outlook.
The WorkloadMaster blog (which is free to all) is updated regularly with techniques and strategies to help you build and reinforce time management, organization and planning skills. You’ll also find reviews and articles about leveraging technology to make your life easier. For easy browsing use the Categories tool in the sidebar of Home Page.
Contact Information
E-mail: bob at workloadmaster.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/bobpattersonweb
Our Services
Online Training – Master Your Workload with Outlook (Group and corporate discount pricing is available – contact us for a quote)
Live Online Training – Live instructor led small-group sessions of Master Your Workload with Outlook
Private Webinars – Scheduled for work teams and organizations to provide additional training and content to supplement online training
In-House Workshops – Master Your Workload with Outlook instructor led training. Three two-hour modules are customized and delivered based upon the client’s needs.
On-site Coaching – We work with you one-on-one at your office to help you implement a personal workflow system based upon your work style and job function.
On-going Coaching – To help reinforce and refine your personal workflow system or take your online training to the next level.
A Note From Bob
Hi my name is Bob Patterson. I’m just like you. Not too long ago I was a busy manager…very busy.
After I was appointed senior manager of a small struggling wireless communications company I was totally overwhelmed.
Probably like you I was working too many hours. It seemed impossible to get caught up. I was coming home each night exhausted, feeling as if I didn’t get anything accomplished. Needless to say it was very frustrating.
At home I was too tired to do much else and I often did more work there. Which means I wasn’t spending much time my family.
Then, almost by accident I got down to basics and it made all the difference.
Back to Basics Make a Difference
I met someone who convinced me to attend his time management workshop. I thought I had it together because I owned a cool electronic gadget to keep me organized. Well it didn’t.
I took the class and learned some very basic techniques that enabled me to control my own time and work. This enabled me to identify and stay focused on the very important things.
I then made sure the managers were also trained in how to manage their own work and reinforced that training through my own coaching and personal actions. Once they understood the basics they were dynamite.
My management team was inexperienced, most had never attended college. But together we turned around a struggling company. We even had to take one divisions through the bankruptcy process; which we did successfully.
The Boston based, Harvard educated private equity group who owned the company were impressed and thrilled with the results when they finally sold the company.
We did it by maintaining good control of our own personal work and having a few (very few) clear objectives that we focused on daily. These key targets drove our decision making and prioritization of our own heavy workload. It also enabled us to have fewer meetings and the ones we did have were focused and short.
After this experience, throughout my career in management I always made it one of my priorities to make sure that my team members could 1)manage their own work, 2)have a clear understanding and could articulate their key objectives and 2)be good at communicating with everyone they worked with.
Solid Fundamentals Are Your Edge
Without having a solid foundation in these three areas it is almost impossible to be successful as a manager…long term. This is true in anything…just ask Bill Belichick. In case you’re not a fan of American football, he’s the coach of the New England Patriots. As a Clevelander, I hate to use him as an example, but he’s one of the most successful coaches in the history of the game. Bill is successful because he places so much emphasis on making sure his players are strong in the very foundational skills of the game. This is true in business too.
Back to my story. Fast forward a few years… after selling the company I wound up as a manger with major telecommunications company. Over time I was ready for a new challenge.
Then the gentleman who trained me years earlier appeared again advising me that he was retiring. After many discussions and much soul searching I eventually bought his business.
That was almost ten years ago. Since then I have been teaching and coaching these fundamental skills to hundreds of managers and professionals. And I’ve learned a lot about how people work, learn and think. As a techno geek myself I saw an opportunity to use the new Web 2.0 technology to teach these skills conveniently (and more affordably) to busy mangers around the globe.
Over the years I’ve come to realize that few companies provide training and resources in the fundamental skills, but all of them expect you have them(whether they realize it or not). So it’s up to you to develop yourself…and it should be.
The purpose of this web site and my podcast is to provide you with tips, techniques, reviews and resources in these four key areas:
Number 1 – First and foremost you must be able to manage yourself. Call it time management, workload management, self management…whatever. If you can’t manage yourself, how can you manage others?
Number 2 – What’s your purpose? Why do you work here? What are you trying to accomplish? Most people are very unclear about this and have a difficult time articulating it. We will help you indentify and quantify…a few key objectives or targets. Then keep those targets in sight at all times…every day so that you can focus your limited time, energy and resources on achieving them.
Number 3 – I want to help you become a powerful communicator. People are very complicated and messy creatures. To be a great manager it’s vital to understand where the other person is coming from and to craft you message accordingly.
Number 4 – To help you leverage technology to make your life easier. ..because with technology sometimes it’s just the opposite. Besides, I’m a geek
You can expect all of our blog posts, podcast (On Target), resources and premium content (Master Your Workload with Outlook) will deal with one of these broad categories. My vision is to help you become strong in these fundamental skills so that you will be successful as a manager and in life.
So I encourage you to subscribe or at least check in often for some valuable content.
I also encourage you to keep in touch. If there is something you want to learn more about, if you have any questions and especially successes and ideas to share please do so. You can do this by leaving a comment on one of our posts or the comments page.