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How to deal with impossible deadlines at work

Nothing creates dread in the workplace like tight deadlines, but when well managed they are rarely as impossible as they might seem.

· workplace

Accept that it’s got to go

do the best you can

Stay cool under pressure

stay calm

Flag problems early

make any encountered problem known to your manager

Set fake deadlines for others

it encourages people to get started on their work

Break a deadline into milestones

beak the project up into a series of smaller milestones

Stay organised

tools such as Slack and Asana provide a central dashboard for communication

Work in a bubble

check email in the morning and before you leave at night activating an ‘out of office’ email response for clients or colleagues

Set a soft deadline

establish target finish times that are at least a day out from the real deadline

Establish a realistic timeline

work backwards from the deadline and map out what you’re going to do and when.