Work Problems Worksheet: 10 Evidence-Based Coaching Practices

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Work Problems Worksheet, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Practices that may help

1. Apply three good things to work contexts specifically
   Use the exercise to rewire what you notice about your work day — contribution, competence, and collaboration.
   Three Good Things: The Evidence-Based Gratitude Practice
2. Use a challenging beliefs worksheet to work a stuck point completely
   The CPT challenging beliefs worksheet is a structured, written process for examining one stuck point at a time.
   Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT): Unsticking the Meanings That Maintain PTSD
3. Bring a proposed solution when you bring a problem
   Describe the problem and your recommended path before asking for a decision.
   Managing Up: Practical Skills for Working with Your Boss
4. Name frustrations without shame
   Frustrations are not weaknesses — they’re a mismatch signal that the team can act on.
   The 6 Types of Working Genius (Patrick Lencioni)
5. Use a 15-minute end-of-day planning buffer to close the day’s loops
   Before leaving work, take 15 minutes to list tomorrow’s priorities and explicitly close today’s open loops.
   The Zeigarnik Effect: How Unfinished Tasks Occupy Your Mind
6. Thought records
   A structured worksheet that captures situation, thought, emotion, evidence, and a balanced response.
   Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Made Practical
7. Audit which constraints are real and which are assumed
   List every constraint you’re working under, then test each one for whether it is actually fixed.
   Problem Reframing: Solving the Right Problem First
8. The Worked Examples Effect: Learn Faster by Studying Solutions First
   The worked examples effect is a well-replicated finding in instructional science: novice learners acquire skills faster and more deeply when they study fully solved examples before attempting independent problem-solving. The mechanism is cognitive load — unsupported problem-solving by novices consumes working memory on search rather than on understanding, so little schema formation occurs. Worked examples redirect that capacity toward learning.
9. Protect Q2 time with scheduled blocks
   Schedule your most important non-urgent work in your calendar before the week begins — treat it as an appointment.
   The Eisenhower Matrix and Delegation
10. Save admin tasks for your cognitive trough
    Assign low-cognition administrative tasks to the time of day when your focus is naturally lowest.
    Task Batching: Grouping Similar Work to Cut Switching Costs

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

• I could list ten things that went wrong at work today without blinking but I’d struggle to name one that went right→
• When I try to untangle one of these convictions in my head it just spins→
• I keep dropping problems on my boss’s desk and waiting for them to tell me what to do, and I can feel it reads as me not owning my work→
• There’s a part of my work that quietly wrecks me, but admitting it feels like confessing I’m not good enough, so I just grit my teeth and say nothing→
• I leave work but work never leaves me→

Describe your situation in your own words to search the complete practice library.