5 Tips to Increase Your Productivity
For most of us, we feel like we need 25 hours in a day instead of 24. It always seems like there’s just not enough time to do everything we need to do in just 24 hours. We love to put emphasis on TIME MANAGEMENT as if it’s the answer to our problems, but what I’ve come to realize is that time is elusive. It slips away from us very easily which is why we go home some days wondering “what the hell did I do all day?” On the other hand, some days we’re “movin’ n grovin’ getting the important things off our checklist, but what if we could have productive days more often and more consistently? I bet that would skyrocket our success!
Instead of time management, it’s action management. You can’t manage time. That would require “control” and I’m pretty sure we know by now that there are many things in our world beyond our control. Here are some tips to help manage your actions more efficiently:
1. Have your goals and plan written down.
“Goals give you more than a reason to get up in the morning; they are an incentive to keep you going all day” – Harvey Mackay
“Austin, if you write one more article that talks about goal planning, I’m going to… {insert expletive}.”
Yes, I know, I know, I reference goal planning a lot, but it’s also crucial to your action/time management. Having your plan written down takes out the guesswork so you can get to work! Make a habit to look at it daily to check to see if you’re on track.
…….A quick interjection……..
I was recently having a convo with one of my guests for my podcast and we were talking about how individuals set awesome goals, but they don’t spend enough time looking up at the scoreboard to see where they are. That’s like if Gregg Popovich or Vivian Stringer gave their players a pregame speech and then didn’t speak with them for the rest of the game. The game is always a tale of two half’s and a lot of coaching in between.
As the players of the awesome game we call life: Goal plan like your pregame warmup, take action in the game, look up at the scoreboard to see if you’re up, and have your coach/mentor/book/podcast/article be your realignment to help you come out with the W.
Write down your goals and plan!
2. Get your major tasks done first and during peak performance
“Peak performance begins with your taking complete responsibility for your life and everything that happens to you” – Brian Tracy
Whether you work a 9-5 or own your own business there are certain parts of the day that you’re on fire with high energy. There are also times that you’re a step behind, like after lunch in my case. Identify when your energy levels are at their highest and use that time to do your most important work. For me, time in the morning is the most important for me. It’s during that time that I’m working on the most important thing: building the business. If I try to do this work in the afternoons, I usually find myself not as focused or efficient. Even though I may be present and working, I’m not 100%. Especially because by the time the afternoon hits, I’m running to appointments, handling administrative tasks, and putting out fires for my clients.
There’s a reason why the mantra is “time is money.” Learn to use your time wisely by acting on your most important, prioritized work during your peak performance hours. You’ll start to notice getting the major things done first will allow for the rest of the day/evening to flow rather smoothly.
3. Get up really early or stay up really late.
“If you want to be more productive, you need to become master of your minutes” – Crystal Paine
This tip piggybacks off of the previous tip of getting the major things done first during your peak performance. You’ll notice that the most successful people either stay up late or get up really early. It doesn’t matter which you choose, just understand that it’s during these two periods that most people are asleep and most distractions are non existent. During the “hot” period of 10am-8pm, a lot of activity is going on and you can get pulled in every direction possible to handle life, career, and anything else on your agenda.
One of hip hop’s greatest artist, Lil Wayne, chooses to be a night owl. “Live for the night, sleep in the day” as I quote one of his lyrics.
He’ll go to the studio around 10pm and work till about the same time most people start to get up for their workday. Don’t be surprised to see him work into the early afternoon with the only reason as to why he doesn’t keep going is due to his lightheadedness from possibly missing a meal. His goal is to knock out three songs a day and with him working the hours in which most people don’t have the opportunity to distract him, he wins.
Nicki Minaj, on the other hand, is the total opposite. She likes to get into the studio first thing in the morning. That’s when she feels like her energy is at its best to allow her creative side to really shine. Again, a period when most people are still sleep or just starting to get into their grove for the day; minimal distractions.
Drake just shuts his phone off and locks himself in the studio. To quote some of his lyrics:
“I’ve been in the crib with the phones off, I’ve been at the house taking no calls..”
“Drapes closed, I don’t know what time it is, I’m still awake I gotta shine this year”
“I could never let the streets down, haven’t left the condo for a week now..”
It doesn’t matter when, just choose to do your most important work at the very beginning of your peak performance period.
Please tell me you like my Young Money reference ?!
4. Get everything out of your head on onto paper
“The key is to not prioritize what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities” – Steven Covey
While your brain can remember a ton of information, it can’t remember everything. It will remember the most important things, but will easily forget millions of information bits that you have received over time.
Do you remember exactly what you were doing on November 15th, 2017 at 2:08pm?
Of course not.
What the brain doesn’t store well are the bits of information you don’t know you’ll need in the future. What may not resonate with you now may surely resonate with you later.
A great book on this topic is “Getting Things Done” by David Allen.
Write down EVERYTHING. Things to do, places to go, projects to start, ideas, thoughts, and even feedback on your life and progress. Two great things happen when you do this. 1) You’ll immediately feel the weight of your priority list become lighter because you know it’s going to get taken care of. 2) You’ll pick up things that didn’t resonate with you in the past, but now it’s the very answer you have been looking for to move your life, business, and career forward. Once you have everything written down, set up a system to review it at least once a week.
Next to each item, project, or idea that you list, you’ll eventually have three options: Do it, delegate it, or delete it! As you go through your list, adopt the Two Minute Rule which simply states that if the task in front of you can be completed in two minutes or less, DO IT NOW!
Think about it. How many times have we let things that can easily get done in 2 minutes or less stick around for more than it was supposed to?
If it will take longer than 2 minutes to complete, set time aside in your calendar and do it then! Even if you were to set aside an hour or two each week just to do the small menial tasks, you would be able to get about 30-60 tasks done. How’s that for productivity?
You can also decide to delegate the task or item for someone else to handle, or delete it if it no longer serves a purpose to you.
From “Set business lunch with______” to “Clean out backyard” and everything in between, get all your projects and to-do list out of your head and on to paper!
5. Establish Accountability
“At the end of the day we are accountable to ourselves – our success is a result of what we do” – Catherine Pulsifer
Accountability is the glue that will bring about all your productivity and success. They say “If you know better, you’ll do better.” While this is true in theory, it forgets the human element of choice.
How many of us know what we should be doing but aren’t? (My hand is raised).
Yes, if we know better, we’ll do better, but only if we actually “do.” This is where accountability comes into play.
We can all use a little more accountability for that extra push towards our goals when we feel tired or unmotivated. It also helps when everything is clicking on all cylinders so you don’t lose momentum.
While I need to begin holding myself more accountable as I have in the past, the easiest way to hold yourself accountable is to bet on yourself!
Don’t gamble at the casino and not bet on your own self! (Although I like the 6’s, 8’s, and hardways at the craps table!)
Try this: Based on your goals and plan for the year, set what you want to accomplish for the week. Find someone you trust and place a wager that states you will accomplish what you have set out to accomplish. If you lose, you will forfeit your wager. If you do accomplish what you set out to do, you win.
Let’s put this into a real world example:
You want to lose 20 pounds in the next few months. On your priority list you have “go to the gym and do cardio for 45 minutes, 5 days a week.” Now it’s time to find a friend you trust and place your bet. Your wager will be a blend of what you feel comfortable risking and the pain that you will feel if you lose. If you only risk $10, you may not have the motivating factor of lost money to keep you accountable, on the other hand, risking your life savings also won’t be beneficial.
For me, that amount was $150-$200.
Give that money, in cash, to your accountability partner and share what you are looking to accomplish for the week. If you succeed, you get your money back, if not, your friend can spend it on whatever they want, and it can’t be for the benefit of both of you. I guarantee your actions will change!
The key to making this successful and not another weekly expense is to make your action tasks manageable and attainable. Don’t try to build Rome in a week. Instead of betting on yourself to lose 20 pounds, bet on yourself to go to the gym instead. Bet on the action, never the outcome. If you take the proper action, you will get the desired outcome as a by-product.
All that to say……
The only difference between where we are and where we want to go is what we say we’ll do and whether or not we actually do it. That’s it.
Most of us are extremely hard workers, but sometimes we’re also hard workers of tasks and projects that don’t bring us much return on our investment of time. Focus more on the things that bring you closer to your goals rather than the things that distract you from them. I’ve disabled all my notifications on my phone so that way any time I’m checking texts, email, group chats, and social media is when I want to, not because my notification went off. 80% of the communications that come through your phone alone are not as important as you think.
A perfect example of this is the episode of Family Guy when Stewie walks into his mom’s room begging for attention and it goes a little something like this:
Stewie: “Mom….. mom…. mom…..mom…..mom…..mama….. mama….mama…..mommy……mommy…..mommy…..mommy…..
Lois: “What?!?!”
Stewie: “………Hi!” (childishly runs away).
Your distractions are basically the same conversation as above. Pointless.
There is no time management, there is only action management. You can’t manage time, but you can control your actions and only set small, meaningful daily goals that eventually lead you down a whole new path of life!