When you’re worried about getting it all done, or you want to work fewer hours and have a fuller life, it might be time to consider new ways to juggle your workload. No matter how organized you are, you might boost your productivity and create some free time by taking a fresh look at the way you approach your tasks.
If you want to accomplish more, and spend less time doing it, consider these strategies:
- Focus on your goals and priorities. Whether you’re thinking about the rest of your life or the balance of the afternoon, it is important to have a clear idea about what you want to accomplish. Develop the habit of frequently asking yourself: “What is most important here? What matters most?” In any situation, define your purpose and concentrate on your highest priorities.
- Take back your prime real estate. For each of us, there is a time of day when we do our best work. For example, you might be most productive first thing in the morning. Notice your most productive hours and consider that time zone to be prime real estate on your calendar. Schedule that time period very carefully, devoting as much of it as possible to your most important projects. Avoid frittering that particularly valuable time away on routine email or other peoples’ priorities.
- Make a big list. A useful exercise when you’re feeling out of control is to make a complete list of all your tasks and projects. As a starting point, don’t worry about organizing the items. Rather, just capture all your concerns on paper – it can clear your mind and feel liberating. Once you have built a complete list, you can reorganize it into projects and categories. At that point it will be time to set priorities and put time-sensitive items on your calendar.
- Take a step. Sometimes the most important items on your list seem too massive to approach. Don’t give in to the temptation to put off the big ticket items until you have plenty of time. Identify just one or two small steps that will allow you to move a key project forward in the amount of time that you actually have available.
- Decide what not to do. It can be difficult to face the fact that there isn’t enough time to finish everything, and it can be hard to say “no” to requests made by others. Sometimes, however, there really isn’t enough time to go around. Don’t allow yourself to be distracted from your highest priorities by activities that aren’t all that important to you. You should be the one to decide which tasks you will have to let go. When your list gets too long, make a conscious decision about which things to delay, delegate or strike.
- Do one thing at a time. Multi-tasking is fashionable and people seem to enjoy bragging about how many things they can do at once. Time management experts agree, however, that juggling among tasks wastes effort, and that the most productive people concentrate on one thing at a time.
- Master short meetings. In some office cultures, it seems like every meeting has to last an hour or two, even if there is just a few minutes worth of work to do. Many meetings can and should be reduced to 10 or 15 minutes. If you don’t want to offend other participants, it might help to explain that you only have a short time block available, but don’t want to delay until there is more time because the topic is so important. And, regardless of their length, meetings tend to be more productive if participants work from an agenda.
- Know when to take a break. When we work on one thing for a prolonged time, the creative part of our brains may shut down. If you’re feeling blocked or stale or bored, get up and move around. Research suggests that if you leave your desk and get a little exercise you’ll probably be more productive in the long run.