3 Strategies for Staying Punctual and Professional - by Robert Curtiss

We live in a world where schedules conflict, where some auditions and appointments are tightly scheduled back to back, and though you may have plenty of time in your own schedule, the people who you are meeting, interviewing, or auditioning for may have little wiggle room to fit you in. Occasional lateness is undesirable but understandable—we all have been late some time in our lives, perhaps because of some last-minute snafu or bad traffic—and it is usually easily forgiven and forgotten by all involved. Chronic lateness, however, undermines your professionalism.

Here are a few strategies for being on time:

1. Leave 30 minutes early for every appointment, or add 15–30 minutes to your expected travel time. This means that if you ordinarily would leave home 15 minutes before your appointment, leave 30–45 minutes early. This will most likely get you there early; you can use the time to prepare yourself. If you run into delays on your route, hopefully the extra travel time will be sufficient to keep you on time.

2. Organize your life so you are not scrambling for misplaced items moments before leaving for the day. Keep a datebook calendar handy, and write down your daily schedule (of course, you have to actually look at it for this to be useful). There are smartphone apps for this.

3. It may be helpful to have an “audition survival bag” that you keep packed and ready to go. This could be a knapsack, purse, or briefcase. Here is a list of suggested items to keep in your bag: headshots and résumés, business cards, sheet music, a MetroCard, paper and a pen, makeup, a hairbrush, bottled water, breath mints, and an energy bar, and hide $10 or $20 inside just in case. This way you only have to remember your keys, cell phone, audition material, and any other audition/business needs, grab your audition bag, and out the door you go.

I hope these strategies help keep you on time and prepared for your appointments. If you still end up being late, by all means, acknowledge it and apologize for keeping them waiting. Break a leg!

****************************************************

Check out what other Expertd are saying! Backstage Experts

3 Steps to Getting Out of Your Own Way

“If you always do what you always did, you’ll always get what you always got.”  

This is one of my favorite slogans, and it really is true. There is a famous saying that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.

Think about it. Human beings are creatures of habit, and even though we may be unhappy in our particular circumstances and say we want something different, we are usually more comfortable with our familiar habits in our familiar surroundings, however miserable they may be, than we are about changing any of those same habits and surroundings!

It takes strength and determination, and insight into our own behavior, to actually change what is holding us back. Here is a helpful series of steps to guide you.

Step 1: Identify what it is you want that you are not getting. This is the easiest part!

Step 2: Recognize which patterns of your behavior may be impeding you from attaining your goal. Ask yourself: What do I do that sabotages myself from achieving what I want? As a simple example, let’s say it is consistently sleeping late, or procrastinating.

Step 3: Modify the problematic behavior. Sometimes the issue just needs a simple modification that you can do on your own (for the above examples, you could go to bed earlier and buy an alarm clock, or you could make a schedule to complete tasks and avoid procrastination), and sometimes the issue is more deeply ingrained in your psyche so that you may require additional assistance from family and friends, and perhaps from a psychotherapist, who is trained to help you with these kinds of challenges.

You have the power to get out of your own way and change your life! Good luck on your journey!

**********************

Check out what other Experts are saying! Backstage Experts