Cross More Off Of Your To-Do List! 3 Ways To Make Your Work Day more Productive
Wednesday, January 11, 2012 at 10:57AM 
If you guys are anything like me then you may find tasks that should take you an hour taking up a whole day. Or maybe you find yourself getting distracted by phone calls and the blinking light of a new email on your Blackberry (a flashing light or unopened message to me is like crack, highly dangerous!)
It's sometimes hard to knuckle down and focus, and I personally seem to try and do everything at once. Recently, I've been looking into ways I can make my day more time efficient and get more productive. From my random trials of methods and reading various books on time management, I have found a few key methods that have majorly changed how much I get done.
This blog posts details those for you to put into practice yourself, have more time to do the things you enjoy and ultimately get more ticked off of your to-do list!
Switch Off
I just cannot, cannot leave a message unread. The little red blob that pops up on my mail account whilst I am working means I totally lose focus on whatever I was doing. Must...open...email. MUST! I just can't resist it! The mysterious little envelope that could be from anyone, anywhere.. maybe it's the biggest opportunity of my career staring me in the face and I haven't opened it yet! WHAT COULD I POSSIBLY BE MISSING OUT ON?!
'Groupon deal alert'
Who are we kidding?
People, if you are like me on this one then this is what you have to do.
1. If you use Mail or Outlook, close it down whilst you are working.
2. If you have Gmail or Hotmail open, close the browser window so you can't see notfications of new messages.
3. Turn of all sound alerts connected to new emails.
4. If you have phone email alerts, switch it onto manual fetch.
iPhone - by going to settings, then mail / contacts, then into 'fetch new data'
This means that instead of your phone going off every time you get an email and you trying to half heartedly reply whilst really concentrating on something else, emails will only come through when you tell them to. Don't be scared - you won't forget! You will actually find that when it does pop into your head to check them it will be when you actually have half an hour or so to sit down and reply to them all properly. Just trust me, it works. I haven't found the Blackberry version of this and some people are telling me that it doesn't even exist, so I would suggest just turning your phone off altogether if you have a BB! At least whilst you concentrate on your current task.
5. Turn your phone onto silent so you are not distracted by a text message or phone call. Unless it is something urgent (and 9 times out of 10 what people consider to be 'urgent' really isn't) then taking an hour to finish what you are doing will not cost the earth. Call them back when you're finished.
One last thing, close Facebook and Twitter. You just won't get anything done. You wanna be successful and committed to making things happen? Don't be a slacker. Your social life shouldn't be impacting on your work habits.
*Bonus - Turning off automatic notifications also saves battery life!*
Eliminate Questions
Emails bouncing back and forth must be the ultimate of all time wasting. Arranging dates, times, meetings etc etc with back and forth email discussion is inefficient time management.
Here's what to do. When writing an email that may involve discussion or some questions that may come up, spend a moment to think about those possible questions that may arise. What might the other person come back and ask? Then, answer all of those questions within your email.
Take a look at example A - this is very basic but you will get what I mean..
(From Boss to assistant)
Hi Miranda,
Can you please organise a meeting next week with Nick and Jim about the forthcoming product launch? The only day I can't do is Thursday as I have a dentist appointment. Thanks, Samantha
This email is way too vague and will require a few questions from her assistant before Miranda would even be able to email Nick and Jim to find out their availability. She is going to be emailing Samantha back and forth, which will disrupt Samantha from her tasks and probably get on her nerves.
Now if Samantha had thought about her email and put something a little more like this..
Hi Miranda,
We need to organise a meeting with Nick and Jim next week to discuss our forthcoming product launch. Potential dates that work for me are Monday-Wed or Fri. I can do Monday at 12pm, Tues at 11am, Wednesday anytime or Friday anytime in the afternoon. My preferance would be Monday at Midday. From these dates please find out what works best for them and feel free to go ahead and pen that meeting it. Oh also, can we hold the meeting here please? I need to be close at hand for some other tasks.
Thanks,
Samantha
then she has made it very clear where she wants the meeting to be held and what times she is available. She has also stated her preference so that Miranda can push for that option first.
This email may have taken an extra minute to write, but it has saved Samantha her time and attention being broken in the future from back and forth emails.
*Tip - Check out Doodle.com for easy scheduling of meetings, dinners, events etc!*
Task Blocking
How many times have you got into the 'vibe' or flow of writing a blog post or an essay etc, then to be broken and have to do something completely different such as reply to emails or go and print out some stuff? Getting into the zone and doing all tasks of that style means you will work faster and more effectively.
1 - Set 3 times of the day when you will reply to emails. Because you are in 'email answering mode' you will find it easier to bang though them.
2 - Set a to do list for EACH project, instead of a general to do list. For instance, I work on about 5 different projects at any one time, and each has it's own to-do list. That way it's not all one giant list of never ending tasks. Having a giant list means that if you only cross off a few things it will leave you going home worrying and feeling unproductive. You will end the day on a downer. Grouping To-Do lists by project mean that you can see that each project is having it's tasks crossed off feel a lot better about how productive your day has been and can go home without worry.
3 - If you have similar tasks for different projects, group them together. For instance, I have to write blogs for 3 of my projects. I also have to do social networking for all of them. So instead of working on one project for a whole day and doing a bit of each with an up and down work flow, I group them together. I may do 3 hours of social networking for The Glam Collective, my youth projects and my own website, all in one go. I'm in the zone of that task meaning I can get more done. The next day I may choose to work on all design aspects of my businesses such as making flyers or doing some small changes to my websites. Again, I'm in that mode and things will run a lot, lot faster.
There are loads of ways that you can make your time more efficient, and these are a few to help you get started. Do you have any suggestions of things that you have done to imprive your productivity?
Sarah x
Reader Comments (3)
Love this. Great tips. While I was reading this, a little notification popped up telling me I had a new email and I had to Jedi mind trick myself not to check it!
This was RIDICULOUSLY useful for me, thanks so much! Tips that actually make some sense - I am guilty of nearly all of the things you have mentioned! I have always been freelance and find it incredibly difficult to manage my time properly, thanks for this.
Great advice!
Re the Blackberry, I don't think you can do anything to control the flow of emails, but you can turn the LED off so you aren't a slave to the flashing light (like I am)...