Do you feel like you’re wasting your valuable time and want to learn how to be more productive? To get started, make this the last article that you read (until you’ve finished your work).
The average worker spends eight hours at the office each day. However, just 2 hours and 53 minutes of that time is spent actually being productive. Without realising it, we spend more of our work day reading the news, scrolling through social media, chatting and making a cuppa.
Of course, it’s not completely on us. There are a number of factors that cause us to work slower, procrastinate and avoid the things that we need to get done. A lack of management, a poor time schedule and personal problems are all causes of low productivity.
However, low productivity can be banished. With a few tweaks to your schedule and the way you work, you can learn how to be more productive and get the most out of your time in the office.
How to be more productive: 5 quick tips
Take regular breaks
If you find your mind wandering away from work, rather than trying to push on, take a short break instead. A brisk walk, quick snack or just five minutes to let your brain recover will allow you to focus on the task at hand. You should always give yourself a 10 minute break after 90 minutes of work.
Don’t multitask
It sounds like the perfect plan. If you’re doing three things at once, you will get everything done in a third of the time, right? However, multitasking causes cluttered thoughts and leads us to prioritise unnecessary tasks. Likewise, if we try to multitask, we waste more time switching between tasks than we would if we took our workload one thing at a time.
Stick to routine
The likes of Bill Gates, Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos all have strict morning routines. They wake up at the same time every morning, exercise at the same time and get to the office at the same time. Judging by their success, it clearly works. Sticking to a routine will program your brain to focus and switch off at the right times.
Review your progress
You won’t reach your peak productivity level overnight. It will be a gradual process and it is therefore important that you track your improvements and slip-ups. If you find that you’ve spent the last 10 minutes thinking about what to get for dinner or where you want to go on holiday, note it down. With time, you will become aware of those thoughts and cut them out quicker, saving yourself lots of time.
Do less
It sounds counterproductive, but doing less work is the most productive thing that you can do. 20% of what we do produces 80% of our results. The other 80% of our time is wasted on trivial tasks that provide little reward. Figure out the tasks that will be most beneficial and focus on doing those as best as you can.
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Work burnout hits successful people too – they just deal with it