Making time and workin' it

Lately I've been finding that the hardest part of being in this Limbo area of my life is managing my changing priorities. I have always considered myself good at managing my time - I'm super organized, I have three calendars, to-do lists organized by days, weeks, months.... But lately I've been having a hard time deciding what should come first.

Of course it's easy to look at the deadlines and work on things in order of due date, but it's just not that simple when there are so many categories of work and so many deadlines to meet. For instance, this week I have a Criminal Justice exam, an internship application due, and a law school application due... not to mention 3 or 4 busy-work assignments in my classes. This particular law school is not one of my top choices, so I've pushed writing the required essays back for far too long now and the internship application requires some re-working of my resume and the writing of the dreaded cover letter... Then there's the last chapter of reading I need to catch up on for my Criminal Justice exam and of course I need to study.... But I have to work an extra day this week to be able to make rent.

As my wonderful professors keep reminding me, there are so few days left until graduation and there are so many things that need to be done! On my list of priorities, job and law school applications come first, period. But all the time spent on researching, planning, writing essays and cover letters, and preparing for interviews is not only time consuming but exhausting. So where is the time and energy for school work? After all, there is no way I am going to let the hard work I have put into my academics fall to the side, but after the torture I put my mind and body through last semester trying to "do it all" I know that I have to maintain a better balance this semester or my post-grad plans are going to include some time in an institution.... Just kidding...

So what's my solution you ask? So far it has been to add a few hours to my day and few more items to the list... I know what your thinking - less sleep and more to do... not much of a solution, huh? Well, I started by recognizing that a lack of sleep is going to get me nowhere. Coming home at night after work and trying to unwind from my day AND finish an essay or homework or meet some other deadline is not going to help me produce my best work. So instead I've decided to go to bed earlier - 10:30 or 11 instead of 1 or 2 am.... HUGE DIFFERENCE! Then, I get up a couple hours earlier. That gives me time to eat a good breakfast and get in the reading or research I need to do for the day before I even have to worry about anything else. I've also committed myself to an exercise routine that boosts my energy in the afternoon so I don't drag through work in the evening and I can even get a few more things done before I go to bed.

Maintaining a balance between work, school, and preparing for life post-grad is tough, but finding a way to work your day instead of letting your day work you can help a lot! So, are you workin' it or gettin' worked?

The day I gave away $5,000...

Last semester, I was part of a class competition in which my team put together a campaign for ExxonMobil. As with every great competition, there was a secret grand-prize for the winning team. One year the winning team took a trip to New York City, another year the winners got round trip airfare to anywhere in the world.... This year, the grand prize was that ExxonMobil would donate $5,000 in our name to the Union Gospel Mission of Tarrant County!

So, this morning part of my team and I had the opportunity to go down to the Union Gospel Mission to see their facilities and present them with $5,000. It was an incredibly humbling experience... My team and I worked so hard on our project last semester and it felt great to win, but being able to take our success and use it to help an organization that helps other people succeed feels even better!

The Union Gospel Mission of Tarrant County is a local Christian organization dedicated to providing a new beginning for the homeless, aiming toward productive independence for each individual. They serve more than 200,000 meals a year and can provide shelter for up to 300 people a night. While they do serve as an emergency shelter for the Fort Worth homeless community, they also offer permanent and semi-permanent housing for individuals and families. The programs and services they provide for their residents and guests are remarkable and I am honored to be able to say I am a part of what they are doing!

Toyota almost does something right...

Just when I thought Toyota was going to completely pass the blame off to the manufacturers of the malfunctioning parts on their accellorators, they finally take a step in the right direction… they apologize. The first think I learned when I began studying Public Relations was that when something goes wrong, the first think a company should do is take responsibility. More often than not, this involves a heartfelt apology. Toyota President Akio Toyoda did express regret in October for the deaths of four people in a California crash related to the accelerator defects. Unfortunately, we did not hear from him again until February 1 as he apologized for “having made customers uneasy” with the recall of  5.6 million cars in the United States alone. 

While I think this public statement of remorse is a step in the right direction for Toyota, I do not think that the communications Toyota has put forth during this crisis have relayed the urgency that their drivers are feeling when they put their families in the car every morning. Toyota’s attitude throughout the last few weeks has been to remain calm, cool, and collected. While they may have been aiming to appear as if they have everything under control, to me they have come off looking rather blasé. And as a brand that has been built on dependability, the last thing you want to portray to your loyal customers is that you don’t think they’re concerns for are important. 

As their problems continue to grow with the announcement of brake issues in their 2010 Prius, the public will be looking for Toyota to be proactive with a solution to the issue. And while their competitors may be seeing blood in the water, I’m rooting for Toyota to be accountable for their mistakes and come up with a solution that reminds us all why they have some of the most loyal drivers around...