Wouldn’t it be helpful if you could get eight hours’ work done in six hours? There will have been days when you’ve done exactly that. Perhaps a deadline was looming, or you needed to get something important done.
Similarly, there will have been days when the opposite was true and it took you eight hours to do just six hours’ work.
The following tips will help you improve your focus, work smarter, and increase your productivity every day.
Master Your Mental Energy
It’s not how long you sit at a desk that determines the value you generate. It’s the energy you bring to those hours that is important.
Use Your Morning for High-Value Tasks
Most people feel their mental energy is highest in the morning, between 9 a.m. and 12 p.m. Do your most important work during your best hours. Start each day knowing your three most valuable tasks, and if your best hours are in the morning, tackle your single most important task first.
Stop replying to emails first thing! As soon as you start replying, you’re using up your best few hours and risk spending your highest energy on low-value tasks.
Work in 60-Minute Sprints with Breaks
Just as your mental energy fluctuates predictably throughout the day (‘circadian rhythms’), your energy also oscillates in 90-minute cycles (‘ultradian rhythms’). To stay at your best, it’s important to have a break at least every 90 minutes.
Master Your Attention
Have you ever noticed that you turn down the car radio when you’re lost? Or maybe you’ve seen people stop walking in the middle of the street because their phone call suddenly required their attention? Multitasking is a myth. Your brain can’t multitask, it attention shifts.
It’s been estimated that multitasking causes your productivity to drop by 40% and that you make up to 50% more mistakes. A study by the University of London found multitasking caused people’s IQs to drop by up to 15 points – similar to what you’d expect from a night without sleep – or the average IQ range of an eight-year-old child. To maintain your productivity, reduce or eliminate distractions:
Turn Your Alerts Off
Any external distractions can get in the way of your focus and productivity. These include multiple tabs open on your browser, a noisy environment, clutter on your desk, and interruptions from others. The biggest culprit is likely email and text alerts. Turn them all off.
Check Your Email Only 3-5 Times per Day
Batch process emails a few times a day (aim for three), and turn off your email application when you’re not using it. Some roles demand immediate email responses – but most don’t. Speedy responses can create, and then reinforce, unrealistic expectations. If something is urgent, people can always call you.
Challenge Your Tech Habits
Do you ever find yourself watching television while simultaneously flicking through your smartphone? If you were reading a book, would you also be flicking through a magazine? Do you check your phone in the few minutes after waking up or the last half hour before you sleep?
If so, is this behaviour you would recommend to someone else? Behaviours like these create a state of ‘continuous partial attention,’ constantly switching focus and making it harder to concentrate. Become more aware and deliberate with your tech usage.
Do a Brain Sweep Once per Week
Carrying things around in your head is another form of multitasking and a waste of mental energy. As David Allen, the author of Getting Things Done, notes: “Your mind is for having ideas, not holding them.” To enable your mind to focus, you need to empty it regularly.
The best way to do this is with a weekly ‘brain dump.’ It’s a simple exercise that helps you release all the unattended clutter and miscellaneous ‘to-dos’ that are in your head. Use pen and paper (or a task-based app) to empty your mind. A list of prompts you might find useful:
- Personal – home, friends, family, admin, insurance, bank, holidays, events, birthdays, books, leisure, creative projects, learning, errands, things to fix, buy, clear, sort…
- Professional – email replies, phone calls, meetings, things to follow up on, projects to begin, business development, ideas to capture…
Final Thoughts
The trick to becoming more productive is not to work harder or longer but to work smarter. I hope these ideas will help.
Best of luck!
3-Point Review
- Manage your most valuable work in the morning and take regular breaks.
- Turn off all alerts and eliminate external distractions.
- Empty your brain once a week with a brain sweep.
