Increasing productivity or even being productive takes planning and time. We often want to find an extra hour or two a day to do certain tasks, but if you put into effect systems and get organized in your daily life you can get a lot more done each day. Parents can easily fit in more fun time with their kids when they organize their day and their home and learn to say “no” more often. If you work from the home, you can be more productive by eliminating distractions from family and friends. Employees in an office setting can be more productive by planning out a project and working on it in chunks. These little changes can make a big difference in how productive you become.
Here are 30 simple strategies you (and your team) can implement to increase productivity:
- Creating a universal system and protocols and making sure your team knows these can help increase productivity.
- If you want to increase productivity in your team, establish a performance goal that inspires people to take action.
- One habit that many highly productive people confess to is getting up earlier than others. How could you use an extra hour or two?
- Find the right tools to help you achieve your daily goals. Finding ways to simplify tasks will boost productivity and increase mindset.
- It’s not enough to plan to reach a goal: For maximum productivity, plan how you can maintain success once you reach it.
- Make a list of the “time waster” habits in your everyday life. How will you take steps to reduce these?
- Important tasks are worth doing well. (“Hurry and impatience are sure marks of the amateur” -Evelyn Underhill)
- It’s important to keep up with business learning. Listen to podcasts while doing other things, if you don’t have time or to read books.
- Combine your personal life action list with your work action list for maximum effectiveness. (Retweet!)
- If you really want to be more productive, learn to say “no”. (What are three things you can start saying “no” to?)
- Identify distractions and replace them with new, productive habits. (What is one distraction you can eliminate right now?)
- Review your “to do” list at the end of the day. If you consistently don’t achieve its goals, reduce the number of tasks.
- “You can prepare all you want, but if you never roll the dice you’ll never be successful” – Shia LaBeouf
- To eliminate time wasted on meetings, plan them, send everyone an agenda, appoint a chairperson and stick to your agenda.
- Respect your team members’ expertise and remember that different viewpoints can lead to innovative solutions.
- To increase productivity, eliminate reactivity. Plan at least a week ahead, using a system that you find easy and pleasant to use.
- If you don’t like videos, and a particular business person’s emails always contains videos you have to watch, clear the clutter. Unsubscribe.
- When it comes to productivity, find out if it works best for you to tackle your hardest task first – or last. (Everyone is different!)
- To increase productivity, set time limits on meetings, phone calls and tasks. Make note of what works and doesn’t and refine these.
- If you want to increase productivity, resist the urge to multi-task. Focus on one task at a time – and get each one done.
- Get rid of clutter to increase productivity – and this includes ruthlessly dumping negative , energy-sapping people.
- Take a leaf from your high school days and work on different tasks in “periods”. This technique can actually increase productivity.
- Recognize that “emails aren’t letters, they’re tasks”. Use tools like Active Inbox to help clean and sort:
- If you want to increase productivity in your team, learn to recognize what each person’s “reward” is – and provide it.
- Which apps do you use to boost your productivity? What’s the common denominator in why you like each one? (E.g. easy to use, visuals, etc.)
- Create an “Action List” – not a “chore” or “to do” list – and learn to think of it that way. The positive wording can work miracles. (Related Article – Start Your Action List!)
- Knowing team member motivations helps productivity, but it’s also important to understand what discourages each one.
- Use a project management system if your team consists of more than just you and your VA.
- If you want to increase team productivity, try “walking a mile” in members’ shoes. Ask about their challenges and goals.
- “Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work in hand. The Sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus” – Alexander Graham Bell