5 Hacks For A More Productive Workday

One night a few months back I took a personality test.

Because that’s how exciting my life is.

Anyway, the results showed two interesting things…

1. For the most part is what right on the money with my own perceptions. My openness and extraversion scored near the bottom which indicates I prefer routine, lack creativity and am more quiet and reserved. As a proud introvert who hates anything artistic, this is bang on.
2. I scored relatively low (20th percentile) in conscientiousness. This is a trait found in those who are self-disciplined and goal-driven. If you’re high in conscientiousness, you’re likely to be hard-working, organised and dependable — All expected traits in a successful project manager (and anyone, to be honest).

I didn’t like this score.

Like every millennial, naturally the first thing to do was to claim this statement as wrong despite the rest of the outcome confirming my pre-conceived bias.

However, after a few minutes I reflected on the past year or so of different areas of my life, including my job as a Project Manager.

I realised my work days lacked some basic structure.

Any structure I had was forced upon me in the form of meetings.

My time around and between meetings was disorganised.

If I’m being completely honest, I spent more time than I’d like putting off tasks that needed to be done; typically being spent on Reddit & Youtube.

I’d find every excuse to avoid getting started on that bit of work.

I was completely inefficient.

And I wasn’t performing how I liked in my job; this didn’t sit right with me.

So when the personality test told me I was careless and disorganised, I knew I had to change.

I’m a strong believer that people’s personality are either inherent or developed from an early age.

But, I also believe that those things don’t stop a person from taking action to improve areas of their personality.

Not everyone can be Beyonce. But with regular practice and time, even the most tone deaf of us, can become better singers.

The same can apply to an apparently disorganised person wishing to become more orderly in their life.

So I decided to take action.

And for the past month or so I’ve been working a lot more efficiently.

I’m still applying and learning but as a result of being more productive, my day to day performance is higher, my stress is lower and my inbox is cleaner.

So in today’s post, I thought I’d share the 5 tactics I’ve used to become more productive throughout the work day.

1. Have a to-do list and actually use it

Chances are you already have this to-do list somewhere. It’s an easy task to create a list of things you have and keep building on it.

It’s a different thing to use it properly.

It keeps growing and you don’t know where to start whenever you do try to tackle it.

What has worked great for me is spending 5 minutes to choose which tasks you have to today.

And do those only.

This brings me to tactic number 2.

2. Block out time for deep work.

Don’t just assume you’ll make time to tackle those items on your to-do list.

Because guess what?

You’ll spend your day in meetings and then meaninglessly checking the flurry of emails coming into your inbox.

Before you know it, 5pm will be here and no tasks are done.

You have to literally block this time out in your calendar and commit to it.

Again, I do this time blocking at the beginning of each day.

This means saying “no” to new meetings that come in.

When the time comes…
Close down your emails

Get your headphones on

Start your Frozen favourite playlist

And get to work.

When the time’s up, move onto whatever is next.

3. Schedule A Break

The amazing thing about increasing your productivity is that you can get more done without having to grind through at your desk for the entire day.

In fact, this style of working is detrimental.

Honestly, how efficient do you think you’re going to be when you’re 5 hours deep in meetings and work.

Is that next meeting really going to have all your attention?

Will that email really be of a high quality?

…Exactly.

So make sure to schedule a break.

If you’re reading this during lockdowns, this is even more important.

I’ve been on meetings with people often “bragging” about being back to back all day or not seeing outside for the past 3 days.

This is not good.

For me, I try to block out about one hour at some point during the day.

I will use this time to either go for a walk whilst listening to a podcast or to get my daily workout in.

(Another solid case in the favour of flexible working).

This breaks the day up into at least two manageable chunks.

And guess what? I still get everything done that I need to.

4. Create time by saying “No”

We all wish we could have more time in the day.

Or just freeze it for a while to allow us to catch up.

It doesn’t help when your day is gridlocked with meetings.

And yes, it sure does feel productive to be ‘busy’ and to be able to tell everyone how busy you are in meetings today.

But is the outcome what you want?

That list of things you need to do won’t shrink if you barely have an hour in the day to get through them.

The solution? Start saying “no”.

Go through every meeting in your calendar. If you’re in doubt about why your attendance is necessary, then decline the invite.

Trust me, if you’re needed, they’ll soon reach out and tell you why.

But by taking this approach you’ll aggressively start freeing up space in your diary.

Boom. You’ve just created time for yourself.

5. Have one day with zero meetings

For me and my team, this has been a game changer.

Friday’s have become the day we strive for no meetings, unless absolutely critical.

This has made me excited for Fridays.

And not just for the obvious reason.

As an introvert, a day where I don’t have to speak to a lot of people is a good day.

I can really put points #1, 2 & 3 into over drive listed here on this day.

It allows me to finish the week strong and also prepare for the next effectively.

This tends to be the hardest to follow through with because it requires buy-in from you, your direct team and other people you work with.

“Sorry. We can’t talk today, it’s my no-meetings day”

It’s hard to say this when someone wants a quick chat.

But if you and your team can get on board with this then it will truly level up your output for the week.

I’ve found it also makes it easier to accept those busy days of meetings as you balance it out with a day of none.

OK you got me. These aren’t exactly hacks.

If anything, they’re so obvious that we all tend to ignore them.

I find myself struggling more with some of these on certain days.

But that’s the great thing — simply trying to apply this tactics as best you can will elicit at least some positive improvement in your day.

Which of these are you going to implement?

Do you do some of them already?

Let me know.

Thanks for reading!