I hate grading. It’s boring, it involves some wearying judgment calls, it’s sometimes depressing…

As one of my mentors said (wisely), “We teach for free and get paid to grade.”

I just stumbled upon this one weird trick that helped me plow through a lot of grading very quickly. Instead of grading in my office (where there are all sorts of books and things to distract me) or at home (where there are three kids to distract me), I went into a conference room. And not just any conference room. I went in a little before 2:00 PM, saw a sign that said “RESERVED 3-4 PM” and thought “challenge accepted.”

That constraint motivated me to get the job done quickly.

According to Parkinson’s Law, “work expands to fill the time available for its completion.” By putting myself in a conference room that a colleague would be taking over soon, I was able to put a hard(er) constraint on the time available for this particular work’s completion and get it finished quickly.