Our productivity ninja, Hayley Watts, is running a ‘Stress Less Achieve More’ public workshop in London tomorrow, which our digital ninja Pippa will be attending, armed with her social media weapons to give you all a taster of the day. Before the mad rush, we asked Hayley to share her five top productivity tips.
1. Do the jobs that you have been putting off or don’t enjoy doing first thing.
You’ll feel like you’ve achieved loads and moved mountains. Sets you up for a productive day.
2. Lunch time? Get away from your desk.
End your lunch break with a brisk walk, giving you time to change your view, get the blood flowing and returning back to your desk ready to roll.
3. CC emails
If you really must CC people include a note in the mail explaining why eg Sarah: paragraph 2 might be useful info for project x etc. Most of the time you’ll realise you don’t need to send it to them. Ask people to do the same when CC ing you into emails.
4. Arrange a daily time with colleagues for you to catch up with each other
This saves email chains that can be replaced with a conversation and means that you don’t interrupt each other when you’re in the flow. Some good old fashioned talking with one another!
5. Go Dark
Disconnect and don’t be available for a period of time. This allows you to get your stuff done, without interruption from others.
Do you apply these tips to your work practices? What’s your top productivity tip?
I agree with point 5, but it is not always easy to do.
Most of us work in an environment where we are constantly in contact with others, especially in confined offices spaces. Perhaps for these case we can attach a “Please Do Not Disturb” on our backs, just like we do on the doors of our hotel rooms.
The biggest mistake people make while trying to buckle down and get some serious work done, is leaving their Facebook open in the background, or Skype. Then they get constant message alerts that they feel obliged to answer.
It is understandably difficult, especially when you want to ALWAYS be there for clients. There just has to be a degree to how “available” we are, because it is equally important to allow for alone times too.