Wayne J Mak

When you're managed by a supervisor, the divisions of labor are quite clear.  With the case of a manager and a programmer, one person worries about timelines, business objectives etc. while the other person thinks about implementation.  These divisions become murky however when you work alone.  When you are both manager and implementer, you're forced to take on both roles.   

In my opinion, the key to successfully managing yourself lies in taking on ONLY one role at a time.  While implementing, don't begin brainstorming or rethinking ideas.  Keep business objectives in mind while implementing, but the management phase should have turned most of these business objectives into actions.  If you don't this, you may end up in the constant cycle of second guessing yourself while coding, wasting time context switching and not getting anything done.  Instead, spend time before you begin implementing playing the role of manager and spec'ing what you're building.  Implemention should mainly be about how to technically get from point A to point B. 

Assuming a single role at a time is critical in not just programming but in any discipline with diverse tasks.  If you organize events, you must separate the time you spend actively networking and the time you spend figuring out logistics for venue, time and other details.  Treat yourself as multiple people.  Solidify ideas at an administrative level, and change them only if there's a glaringly obvious reason during implementation. 

It's important to note here that being agile with this methodology of one role at a time means deciding on shorter term goals and meeting them quickly during implementation stage.  This way, you're able to get to the next administrative cycle fast enough to be adaptive.  There will even be times when you need to play multiple roles simultaneously to make a rapid change.  Just keep in mind it wouldn't be effective in the long term. 

In my own life, I've started ensuring that I play one manageable role at a time and I've noticed that it's helped me stay on task enormously and finish things.

The ability to delegate within oneself is critical for getting things done and eventually for figuring out how to delegate tasks to others.