Tag Archives: Productivity

Diminishing Returns in Productivity

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toomuchinfo

I work in IT and spend a lot of my time on the Internet. I love gadgets. I love new technology. The question is, does all this technology help us or is it really holding us back? Spending a lot of time messing about with technology and not really achieving anything – sound familiar? I do often have to take a step back and wonder if what I am doing is a productive use of my time. By productive use of my time I mean that I am questioning whether I am using my precious time in the best way to reach my ultimate goals (the end game)?

Whilst obviously it is essential to spend time on your interests (what’s the point of living if you aren’t doing what you want to do), it is important to review and make sure that we aren’t doing things just for the sake of doing them, and more to the point not kidding ourselves that messing around with our ‘systems’ ‘workflows’ and ‘lists’ is actually productive use of time. I have found that the more technology and systems available to me, the more information overload I have. I can’t get enough information sometimes and I often find that I don’t want to discard a piece of information until I have got the most out of it. This could be reading it, committing it to memory, filing it for possible later use or sharing it with other people who might find the information useful.

For example, at the moment I am spending quite a lot of time redeveloping my system for holding, organising, using and storing the mountain of information I come across on any given day. I’d say that over 90% of this information comes from being connected. It could be a new blog, a search that I have done on a particular topic and found 10 links I want to follow up on or something that a fellow twitterer has suggested. Whilst systems (such as GTD) are great for organising and storing information, without a execution plan (the actual doing rather than just collecting) your pile (albeit digital) of information to digest just continues to grow. 18 months ago I don’t think that I had this mountain of information to deal with. I wasn’t aware of as much about social media, blogs and productivity. I probably did have a similar amount of information to deal with but just didn’t realise that I did or wasn’t so worried about it as I wasn’t clued up on ‘being productive’.

Tim Ferriss suggests going on a low information diet. This is a brilliant Idea and I have applied that principle (at least in part) by cutting down my RSS feeds, and only going on the internet to look for information when I need it. The problem I have is that I am interested in a lot of things, as always Google and the answer to my endless questions is only a click away.

I do enjoy learning something new every day and being knowledgeable on a given topic, but sometimes I need to take a step back, not gather any new information and process the information I have.

At the moment I am trying to simplify my system to serve two main purposes therefore:

  1. Efficient capture, storage and relevance of information.
  2. Efficient execution of action with the information relevant to my goals and progression.

So my system is a work in progress. I don’t think I’ll ever stop tweaking it, but for now it’s back to organising the wealth of information I have whilst being ruthless with the deletes and taking action against those things that are going to make a difference.

Is productivity making you unproductive? Have you any tips to share? Let me know in the comments below!

Image by Will Lion on Flickr via Creative Commons

10 Ways to Maximise YOUR Time

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“Time is free, but it’s priceless. You can’t own it, but you can use it. You can’t keep it, but you can spend it. Once you’ve lost it you can never get it back.” Harvey MacKay

*Please note that I use the British English spelling of Maximise as I am in the UK!

Time is a finite resource. Like all resources in this world we really need to accept that they are finite, seek to make the best use of them and not waste them.

I have long argued that time is your most precious resource. Time is what enables you to follow your dreams. Sure you might need money, luck or skills along the way but all of these factors rely ultimately on time.

What is time?

Time is a concept. Einstein once said that if he was to travel on the tram in his local town at the speed-of-light whilst looking at the town clock then time would stand still. This illustrated that time is only a concept. Have you ever noticed that sometimes time drags whilst other times it flys by? I honestly can’t remember the last time that time went slowly for me. I always have more that enough to do, and not enough time to do it.

Use your time wisely:

1. Work effectively.
I won’t repeat my own productivity tips here, but to maximise your time your really need to work effectively. If you can complete a job is less time, it gives you more of your time currency back.

2. Use your time in the right context.
You know your routine, your plans and your motivations. You should be able to understand how to use your time wisely. For example whilst waiting for a train or plane you can catch up on reading, but whilst driving it might be a good time to make calls or catch an audio-book. Also you might be more effective at writing in the morning, or going running in the afternoon. You know yourself better than anyone, use this to be the best manager of your own time you can be.

3. Don’t let other people steal your time.
If you take away only one thing from this post let it be this. Guard your time as if it was money.

4. Don’t steal time from yourself.
Do procrastinate, waste time or kid yourself that watching daytime TV is a productive use of your time.

5. Understand what value time has to yourself and other people.
The saying goes that time is money. Understand that time is just as valuable to other people as it is to yourself. Don’t waste people’s time, and they won’t waste yours.

6. Use your time wisely.
Eliminate the meaningless, focus on the rewarding. Make sure that your actions are the right ones to take you to where you want to be.

7. Learn how to estimate your time correctly.
Most people are very poor time estimators. Don’t be one of these people. You are less likely to let yourself down if you understand how much you can realistically do in a certain time period rather than overestimating the amount of tasks you can do and being constantly disappointed, or feeling unproductive.

8. Know your own biological clock.
Some times are better than other to work on certain tasks as your body rhythms change throughout the day. For example I find it easier to write in the morning but work out in the late afternoon. By knowing when you work best on what types of tasks you can be the most productive with your time at all times.

9. Time to relax.
Understand that you need time to relax. Schedule it in if you need to, but sometimes the best thing that you can do with your time is nothing…it’s your time – make conscious decisions to use it how you want to.

10. Time to think.
The more free time you are able to provide yourself with, the more time you will have to think. Thinking time is important, it allows you to process information correctly to make the most productive use of it in the future.

Time Saving Summary:
I’ll reiterate these two main points: Guard your time, remember it is your most pressure asset. You are the manager of your time. Manage it wisely and manage it to you own personal greatest benefit.

How do you maximise your time? And what tips to you have for managing time and guarding your time?

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Bits & Bobs:

Image Credit: by laffy4k on Flickr via Creative Commons

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Time for Three:
Reading around the web:

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Is the Productivity Movement Dying?

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“We shall never have more time. We have, and always had, all the time there is. No object is served in waiting until next week or even until tomorrow. Keep going… Concentrate on something useful.” Arnold Bennett

There has been a trend recently of understanding what Productivity is and isn’t, and the realisation by many (myself included) that tweaking your productivity system doesn’t necessarily make you a better worker, person or anything else.

In the last week I have seen two posts that show this trend:

1. Jonathan Mead, regular contributor at Zen Habits helping us in a tongue in cheek way to understand that we make be productivity junkies.

2. The excellent Lateral Action highlights a post by Merlin Mann on the changing route of his 43folders blog (perhaps a blog that can be ‘blamed’ in part for the productivity movement’s overkill).

I  have been there, done that and got the moleskine notebooks with the over-the-top productivity systems. I proposed a 12 Step Programme for overcoming your Productivity Addiction several weeks ago. The thing is this, productivity is not about how your work out what you have to do and organise it, productivity is about using your time in the most efficient way to create more time for yourself. I have always been more of a fan of the world efficiency over productivity. Efficiency conjures up images of doing something well and doing something in a way that doesn’t waste time or resources. Productivity makes me think of car production where you want to increase your productivity which essentially means making more units per hour. In this way productivity is about creating more things in the time you have, efficiency (the true core of productivity) is creating more time to do more things (that you want to).

This is key to the principle of my blog. Just check out my about me page (which I will be massively updating soon as it hasn’t changed since I started blogging back in April). Essentially I want to create more time to do to do the things that I want to do, and pursue my Lifestyle Projects.

What are you thoughts on the productivity movement? Do you have any examples of productivity overkill? Let me know in the comments below!

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Bits & Bobs:

  • Don’t forget you can follow me in real-time on Twitter.
  • I’m planning a series of competitions on my blog starting very soon. Make sure you are subscribed for more updates.
  • I’ve also been reading about keeping things simple and concise so I thought I’d try a shorter post. Got another post coming your way this week.

Image Credit: by Spankmeeehard on Flickr via Creative Commons

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Time for Three:
Reading around the web:

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The Importance of Being Idle

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Image by *Micky on Flickr via Creative Commons

I’ve been ill with a stomach bug for the last few days and this has reminded me of the importance of rest and slowing down. When you are interested in productivity and achieving your goals it is easy to become too focused on always doing something, and neglect the fact that sometimes doing nothing is equally as important. Allowing your body and mind to rest and recuperate is an important part of healthy living.

It is no lie that in order to achieve your goals you need to make productive use of your time and really make sure that you are taking the right actions to get you to where you want to be; let’s not forget that it is all very well complaining that we don’t like our current job, situation etc. but if you don’t take action and you just lie on the sofa watching TV night after night then you are in a position of your own making. Like many things in life, rest and work are areas where you need to strike the right balance to enable you to be efficient in what you do, and get where you want to, without burning out.

Here are some tips on slowing down, but still remaining productive towards your long term aspirations.

1. Recognise the signs
You need to learn to recognise when you are working too hard or approaching burn out. By learning the symptoms and causes you can take the necessary actions to make sure that you avoid getting into a fatigue situation early.

2. Allow yourself to stop
So you recognise the signs that you are doing too much, but heres the hard part; persuading yourself to stop and rest for a while. I often find that I feel the need to always be productive and if I am not doing something constructive then I feel like I am selling myself short. There is always a time for hard work, but there is also a need for rest.

3. Plan your rest
I always make sure that I have something to look forward too such as a holiday, weekend away or something new and exciting to do. This is a great technique because then, when you are facing a difficult challenge or a situation that requires extra focus, you can always look forward to something that you have planned coming up soon.

4. Have a day off
Another great tip is to have a day off, at least one per week. You need a day to rest and do nothing. This allows you mind to recoup and process the copious amount of information you have to deal with on a daily basis.

5. Use your time wisely (be productive)
You are less likely to feel guilty about resting or taking time off if you are productive when you are working towards your goals. Make sure that you use your time in the most productive way you can and don’t procrastinate. If you strive to get the action habit then you will achieve what you want whilst still having the time to relax.

I know that many people are working hard in their Lifestyle Project to have more time off! Work hard, but don’t deny yourself the rest that your body and mind deserves along the way to achieving your goals.

How do you relax? Do you feel that you can’t relax because you always need to be ‘productive’? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments.

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Bits & Bobs:

So the new site design is up, what do you think? I’ve still got a few tweaks I would like to do but I like the design very much. I’m planning to do a post on moving from wordpress.com to your own hosted blog soon – if you have any questions regarding this please do let me know lifestyle [dot] project [at] yahoo [dot] com.

Image Credit: by *Micky on Flickr via Creative Commons

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Reading around the web (some actually relevant to this post!):

http://lateralaction.com/articles/getting-nothing-done/

http://www.escapefromcubiclenation.com/get_a_life_blog/2008/11/who-says-follow.html

http://zenhabits.net/2008/11/the-lazy-mans-guide-to-getting-things-done/

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12 Step Programme to Turn Your Productivity Addiction in to Actually Getting Things Done

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Image by Chim Chim on Flickr via Creative Commons

Image by Chim Chim on Flickr via Creative Commons

The more I read about productivity, the less productive I become.

It seems that no matter how much I try to simplify my productivity system, I am constantly revisiting it. I do know that in the grand scheme of things it is not going to help me, but I enjoy it. I am a productivity hobbyist. And it’s killing my productivity.

Here are just some of the signs that you might be a productivity addict

  1. You spend copious amounts of time reading blogs about GTD implementations.
  2. You search for Microsoft Outlook GTD hacks.
  3. You get excited when someone mentions GTD in a blog post title.
  4. You own a moleskine notebook (and probably several for different lists).
  5. You spent money on a posh inbox.
  6. You miss your weekly review because you are still processing your inbox in to a million sub-folders.
  7. You think about your GTD implementation on a daily basis.

I know these signs, because I have done all of the above and more. Now I am trying to just take action. If you want to achieve you goals, you need to stop thinking and start doing.

What it means to be a Productivity Addict

Being a productivity addict means that you know when you are wasting time therefore you worry about it more. Before you discovered the productivity sub-culture you used to waste less time surfing the internet, and when you did you didn’t worry about it. Now you worry about it. You try and work out more ways to be more productive to overcome this and the cycle continues. The time to stop is now.

12 Steps to Overcome Productivity Addiction

  1. Admit you have a problem (leave a comment to share this).
  2. Do not talk about productivity (just be productive).
  3. Realised that there is only so much that you can tweak your system before you just go back to using pen and paper anyway.
  4. Next time you hear about a new productivity programme, DO NOT sign up to the beta.
  5. Admit the nature of your wrong doing (tell us about your addiction in the comments).
  6. Make a list of 3 things you must do today. Do not do anything else until you have done these.
  7. DO NOT talk about productivity club.
  8. Do absolutely nothing related to productivity at least one day per week, just go with the flow.
  9. Those things you keep moving from one context, list or file to another. Just do them now, or eliminate them. Stop organising them, and start doing them.
  10. Realise that being productive means doing the things that you need to do in a timely fashion. It does not mean doing more things.
  11. Consume only the information you need to do the single task you are concentrating on now. No more.
  12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, try to carry this message to productivity addicts and to practice these principles in all your affairs (modified from AA step 12)

Are you a Productivity Addict?

Anti-Procrastination

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Image by γαλώ /* [offline] on Flickr via Creative Commons

Image by γαλώ on Flickr via Creative Commons

Today I’ve got a guest post over on the Saavy Entrepreneur Blog. Please do check it out. Cristina runs an Anti-Procrastination month each October to get back on track with work and stop putting things off. It’s a great idea.

How do you procrastinate?
Think about it, what do you do to procrastinate? I spend loads of time researching various topics on the internet, finding lots information which leads to more information. Then more and more. I’ll make a long list of things to do related to this, more websites to look at, and the spiral continues. This gives me a list of things to do, which is just another way to procrastinate actually doing the important things that I was looking at information about in the first place. Nuts I know.

Celebrating the new Poll feature in WordPress, I’ve set up a quick poll below. Please vote now!

[polldaddy poll=1030712]

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Also be sure to check out my other blog Lists for Life.

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Thanks for taking the time to visit! Chris

Skills for Productivity

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This your kind of thing? Please think about subscribing via RSS or eMail (it’s free). Thanks for taking the time to visit! Chris

Image by bourgeoisbee on Flickr via Creative Commons

Image by bourgeoisbee on Flickr via Creative Commons

“A winner is someone who recognizes his God-given talents, works his tail off to develop them into skills, and uses these skills to accomplish his goals.” Larry Bird

In the 3 Ts (and an S) of Productivity Series, I am looking at the Tools, Techniques, Tips and Skills for being Productive.

I always want to be able to achieve the most possible, whilst doing the least possible (or spending the least time doing it). Therefore I’ve always tried to find systems or procedures to help me with my pursuit of this goal. I do however have to balance this with my, not perfectionist side, but my quality control which requires me to accept when ‘good is good enough’ and to be of a reasonable standard. These topics will be explored in later posts.

So here are the skills that I think you need to master in order to be productive. How are you getting on with these?

Objectives / Planning / End In Mind
I guess that this is a good place to start! Unless you have objectives for the task you are going to undertake and know what you want to achieve and how you plan to get there, then how can you be effective? If you are not clear on what you want or need to end up with then how can you find the best route to get there?

Know your own SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats)
SWOT is a simple way of illustrating that unless you know (or at least admit) your SWOT in achievements how can you carry out tasks effectively? Know what you are good at and focus on that, delegate other stuff you are not good at. You can change or influence your SWOT but it takes work and planning. Maybe these could be linked to your goals. See my post on SWOT analysis here.

Keep it Simple Stupid KISS.
This is an area that I am both good and bad at. I do enjoy keeping things simple, but I also am always seeking more knowledge on the subject at hand. Whilst a thirst for knowledge is by no means a bad thing, it is only seeking and acquiring the relevant knowledge to achieve a specific ends that is the skill of being effective. Constantly seeking new systems is actually not effective, you’ll probably revert to what you already know anyway.

Know when it is ‘good enough’ is Good Enough
I’m not saying that you should compromise quality to finish a job. Knowing what level of quality is required and when ‘good enough’ is Good Enough is a skill for productivity and knowing the correct level of standards for what you want to achieve.

Single Tasking (Multi-tasking is for whimps)
In modern workplaces many people think it is good to multi-task. This is the whimps way. Single tasking is the key. Remember the times when you were allowed to concentrate on just one thing? Without the constant distractions of the phone email, IM etc. chances are that you probably achieve more in less actual and elapsed time and it was probably better output. You probably created your own distractions and procrastination activities. Focus – find your zone.

Eliminate
There are several things you need to eliminate in order to use these principles.

  • Distractions
  • Unnecessary work
  • Unneeded work
  • Manufactured Emergencies

Become a master eliminator and learn to say NO!

Simplify
Is everything you are doing necessary? Are you taking the simplest route from A to B using the simplest method? The less complex you make things for yourself the more likely you are to achieve your objectives.

Quality over Quantity
This really applies to the amount and quality of work that you do rather than the individual tasks so it is the quality (using above points) of work that you do over the quantity (less hours) that is most important. Measure your results not the time you have spent on a particular activity. Eliminate to find that correct quality. Also know what is good enough.

This post is very much about what I have understood as skills for productivity so far. There is a lot of interrelation between the points and more detail behind all of them. There may also be other ones but these are what I came up with so far in a bid to keep it simple.

My idea for this post came from trying to design (based on research) my own principles for how to be productive. These are more habits/skills for to consciously work on, whilst Covey’s 7 habits are more characteristics. i.e. you either are or aren’t proactive.

What skills do you think are needed to be productive?

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Tools for Productivity

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This your kind of thing? Please think about subscribing via RSS or eMail (it’s free). Thanks for taking the time to visit! Chris

Image By Teo at Flickr via Creative Commons

Image By Teo at Flickr via Creative Commons

“What you have to do and the way you have to do it is incredibly simple. Whether you are willing to do it, that’s another matter.” Peter F. Drucker

There are various types of tools that can help you in your quest to be a super productive being. They enable you to be put into practice the skills and techniques of a productivity. Tools to fulfill these requirements are increasingly being developed and refined with more and more becoming available everyday. If you are anything like me, you’ll probably enjoy discovering and trying these tools. But beware – this is essentially procrastination and you’ll probably try and justify ‘sharpening your system’ as productive work, when in fact getting stuff done is far more effective.

In this post I’m going to look at the key ‘Tools of Productivity’ that I have thus far identified. I have identified more that this, but in the interest of elimination and simplification seek to present the essentials.

Planning Tools
Remember to begin with the end in mind. In others posts I have either or will describe how planning is a great skill of a productive and effective person. I’m not using this to tell you why you should be planning (I’ll do that in another post). Just be sure that you have the right tools available.

My preferred planning tool is mind maps on paper. Paper is not constrained and this property along with mind mapping allows free flow thinking and amendments. Remember though that papers tools are not automatically backup up like online tools. If you want to try mind mapping online there are loads of free sites. I’ve tried MindMeister and is seems good.

Other planning tools: Lists, Planning software (for example MS project) I find many tools to complex for most purposes except where I am forced to use it in a professional context.

Lists
I’m a big fan of lists. I keep lists for everything. Things to do, music to buy, dreams (places to go), checklists for planning etc. I find that simple is best so I keep lists in a fairly linear fashion. However, as my lists are important to backup my brain. It’s best not to store information in your brain for a number of reasons!

I was using Gubb for my lists, but I have recently switched to Zenbe on the iPhone, and it is great that it is synced to a website for backup piece of mind.

At work I still haven’t found the right list management system for me. I’m currently using excel for it’s sorting facilities as I manage a team of people and deliverables it is quite useful for this.

Another thing to note is that I do not use Outlook at work for my to-do list management. This is for a very important reason. To keep me out of my email!

Calendar / Reminder System
You should try and schedule as much of your activity in a calendar system to enforce deadlines and make sure you do it. Notice how if something non-important is in your calendar like a staff meeting then you still give time to attend? Make the same commitment to personal high importance tasks.

For work I use Outlook , as it is the standard at my place of work. You can do fancy stuff like colour code etc. but I’ve been there done that and spend the wasted hours maintaining it with the false belief it will make things easier. For me simple is best.

For personal calendar and remind I use iwantsandy.com. I love the interaction element of this tool and I have written a review of iwantSandy here. I think that it is important to enjoy using your system and that is what Sandy gives to me. I am looking to move more of my system to Sandy as more features come available, as having everything in one place is food for the interests of keeping stuff simple.

Outsourcing / Delegation
These are great tools for getting stuff done but do require time and patience and learning for using as an effective tool. You should think of delegation at work (and personal outsourcing as appropriate) as you first option for every task. This way you can eliminate as much as you can. “Can’t someone else do it?” – make this your Mantra. See my other post on delegation.

Against the recommendations of GTD I do keep separate work and personal systems. Both of my systems are accessible from both places. I don’t want them to overlaps to that I can concentrate on the different contexts of work and home in isolation when I need to.

Email
I will write an separate post about this, but seen as email and internet are the biggest distractions in the modern workplace it is worth using the tools available to maximum benefit. Make email your slave not your master.

1) Auto-Responder – Set an out-of-office so that you can dictate when you check emails.
2) Filters – I have a CC folder for mails I am copied on which means that when I look at this folder I approach with the different mind set. I also use a waiting for filter, so that when I send an email I have @wf in the email so my filter puts a copy in my waiting for list.
3) Delete Key – Use it
4) One inbox – Email is great for capture. If someone asks you to do something say ‘can you send me an email so I don’t forget’
5) Turn off notification popups – if you don’t see the popups you’ll be less inclined to dip in to your inbox as often.
6) Turn off Auto Send/Receive – you choose when you want to get emails.

So these are the key tools in my current Productivity arsenal. I’m sure that I’ll review this post and refine it and it is something that I could go in to a lot of depth about. I wrote this post in draft a few months ago, and in that type my system has evolved and changed – I am coming to accept that this is a side effect of the productivity culture.

This post will eventually form part of a series on Productivity: Tools, Skills & Techniques.

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My leaving work routine

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This your kind of thing? Please think about subscribing via RSS or eMail (it’s free). Thanks for taking the time to visit! Chris

Here’s a post about productivity.

By Mrs. Maze, Flickr via Creative Commons

By Mrs. Maze, Flickr via Creative Commons

Empty your mind, be formless. Shapeless, like water. Bruce Lee

I try to have leaving work routine so that I can go home and have a clear mind and switch off from work. I think that this is a very important part of productivity. By having a leaving work routine, in conjunction with your GTD and other systems, you shouldn’t find yourself waking up in the middle of the night and wondering if you send that email or phoned that person back.

I have a calendar entry called Daily Review and it appears at 4pm daily (unsurprisingly). This is serves two pruposes 1) to remind me to do my leaving work routine and 2) remind me it’s time to go.

Here’s what I try to do as part of my daily review:

1) Review what I have done today – just a couple of minutes look at the items ticked off on my list also shows you what you haven’t done and is high priority. This then enables you to…

2) Get my Inbox to Zero (or as close as I can – I try not to make my self a slave to this). This means that everything that I need to do should be captured on my to-do list.

3) Set my MITs (Most Important Things) to do the next day. For more about this I’ll let Leo over at ZenHabits explain here.

4) Tidy my desk. When I am not working from home I have a minimal ‘mobile office’ consisting of a meeting book, notebook, pad (for capture of tasks and putting my MITs for the day on), scrap paper, USB stick and Pens. At the end of the day I put it all in a plastic pouch and slip it into my laptop bag. Keeps everything together and not loose in my bag.

5) Get out of there and do something good!