Tips For Being More Productive at Work

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Large organizations are prone to unproductive work. Because with more people, comes more gossip. Gossiping & socializing, taking breaks every now and then,focusing on personal work during office hours- one may think, these habits hamper an organization’s productive output.

Really?

Take another look.

“When you are unable to finish projects in the specified time, who misses out on the appreciation? When you are unable to bring in new clients, who misses out on the bonus? When you end your day completely exhausted, but have to take your incomplete work all the way to your home, who loses out on the family time?”

So, one thing is clear for sure-, Procrastination are more Gossiping & Socializing problematic to the employees, than to the organization.

That said, stating that ‘procrastination is a problem’ sounds so clichéd. The real question is, how do you get rid of it?

After-all, it is your only hurdle to success. Not only will the steps given here help you get rid of procrastination, they’ll help you achieve hyper-productive levels of achievement, every single day.

  1. Have a schedule, and follow it no matter what.This is probably the biggest problem when it comes to performing at one’s natural best. People tend to take up work when the deadlines get closer. Whereas, the ideal way is pretty different.

Schedule your routine, and prioritize your work. The things most important for you, should be done in the hour when you feel highly energetic.

For example,

If you think a particular project has to be tallied and you’re a morning person, getting it done in the earliest hours of your day will be your priority. If you’ve to pay the electricity bills, it might wait until the end of the day, when you’re done with justifying your other priorities.

When prioritizing work, remember,

there are four fundamentals of classifying the nature of the task:

Urgent and Important,

Urgent but not important,

Important but not Urgent,

Neither Important nor Urgent.

Classification is significant here: 

When you classify your tasks for the day into these rubrics you’ll end up with a specific priority list which will help you decide the sequence of your tasks and also help you get a picture of how are you performing on your set goals.

When you start your day, you should know exactly what will you be doing in the day, and should also be aware of ‘when’ will you get it done. Simple as that!

Lastly, never ever break your routine. Put this on your highest priority!

  1. Keep a check on your health.

Your body is your temple.

All the efforts you make for your work are a result of your body’s fitness levels. And after doing all this, your body deserves its own share of care.

Your fitness levels are directly proportional to your productivity, and to keep them up, take the following steps:

  1. Have a minimum of 6 hours of sleep, daily.
  2. Don’t leave home without having your breakfast.
  3. Eat light, but nutritious.
  4. Exercise daily.
  5. Grooming habits like shaving, cutting your nails, getting a haircut- should have a specified day.
  6. As aging occurs, visit the doctor for full-body checkups, more often.
  7. Try getting up before the sunrise, and hit the bed before 12.
  8. Take power naps, when exhausted.
  9. Stay hydrated.

Mind well, you are the athlete of your work. And your productivity depends entirely on your fitness levels. When at the epitome of your health, you’ll also reach the epitome of your productivity.

  1. Stop multi-tasking.

Imagine this: You’re supposed to walk on a marked straight line. Try walking over it just like that; you’ll find it extremely easy. Now take up a stack of 6 books in your right hand, your open laptop in the other hand, and a jug filled with water on your head, alongside your kid sitting on your thigh as you try to walk on one leg. Now try walking down the same line.

Difficult?

You can’t even imagine reaching there, even if you are performing at your best.

Why?

The act of balancing

Because there is already so much in your hands and on your head to be balanced, how will you manage to balance your own self!

That is the case with multitasking. When you finish up all your work, while working simultaneously on everything, you do feel proud.

Do some math, and calculate if you had taken one task at a time and would’ve concentrated on the quality as you do the tasks, you might take slightly more than your existing time, but you’ll end up with better quality of your results.

Quality exceeds quantity (many a time)

When will your boss be happier? When you bring a list of a handful of small clients within 2-3 hours of the assignment or When you bring some huge clients, maybe global, after 2-3 weeks of the assignment? You know the exact answer.

And, that is why quality exceeds quantity in terms of significance. And to attain quality, one needs concentration, which isn’t possible when multitasking.

  1. Make a ‘Not To Do’ List.

As weird as it sounds, the work which wastes your time holds higher significance than your productive hours.

Because what you do in your unproductive hours, has a direct effect on your productive hours.

Energy Time Eaters:

People are habituated with the concept of making ‘To Do Lists’, but they often miss out upon the little energy eaters which surface during their work, affecting their productivity: that gossiping colleague, that relative who calls in your office hours, that card game which you like playing online in the office, that Facebook update you receive every now and then, going for a ‘smoking’ break, and many such other things.

Tasks like these, eat up your time and energy and should get a ‘no-no’ from you, every time they pop-up.

Make a ‘Not To Do’ list, and put it in a place where you see it more often.

  1. Have some ‘me-time’.

Go for a long walk; listen to soft music; practice yoga; Write, Paint- do something which is of value to you, at least once in a day.

In the ‘me-time’ hours, make sure you switch off your phone and get rid of the bleeping emails, messages, Whatsapp texts and any otherworldly communication. Retrospect, think about life, read a book, watch an old movie, go through your childhood albums, go to a dinner with an old friend, do anything but work.

These hours will energize your soul and your mind, as and when they prepare you to take upon the Himalayan tasks you indulge into, later on!

Mind well, Productivity isn’t yet another ‘Management’ term.

It is a habit, practiced by world-class performers. And, it is the only thing, which inculcated on a continuous basis, can outperform any hurdle or competition.