by Celes | Read Full Article Online
What
do you define as a "productive" person? Is it the ability to
robotically churn out work, hour after hour? Is it the amount of
discipline one has? Is it the speed at which one works?
Before
we can discuss what makes a productive person, we should first define
what productivity is. The common notion of productivity is the ability
to churn out a lot of work in a short span of time. True, but not
complete. IMO, true productivity is the ability to create a lot of high impact
work in a short span of time. This is the kind of productivity we
should concern ourselves with, not other kinds of productivity which are
more empty / busy work that create no impact in the long term.
For
example, let's say Peter types very fast and can reply 1000 emails a
day. That doesn't make him/her productive, because there's little output
(product) to speak of (unless the emails contribute to tangible, high
impact outcomes). However, if John completes just one task in a day that
has more impact than the 1000 emails put together, then he's more
productive than Peter is.
The
past few months have been my most productive months for the year. I
ran/spoke at a total of 8 workshops/speeches, including one in Hong Kong
last month. My latest workshops have drawn in the highest number of
participants to date. I created and ran 30DLBL, the first ever 30-day
personal development challenge of its kind online, and had the honor of
running it with over 1,200 of you in this special journey. I wrote, did
the design and launched 30DLBL Program (both guidebook and workbook), which has sold over 200
700 copies (as of Aug '12)! Personal Excellence grew almost double in
subscribers from Sep through Dec (just 3 months), from 9k to over 18k,
making it one of the biggest personal development blogs online today.
At
the same time, I've also been managing other work, such as 1-1 coaching
with clients (I'm handling about 5-6 clients on average at each time),
administrative aspects of the business, writing Personal Excellence
articles/guest posts, maintaining the site, etc.
A
few days ago I finished designing my lineup of workshops next year, and
earlier this week I conceptualized the idea for a new book. That's all
while maximizing other aspects of my life, such as keeping to my
exercise regime (I exercise daily now), having a positive social life,
keeping in touch with old friends, all at the same time.
I think productivity is really how you manage yourself, and the habits
you practice. By selectively practicing certain habits over others, you
can get a lot more output for your time. Here, I'll share with you my 8
top habits in productivity. Practice them and watch as your
productivity sky rockets thereafter. :D
Habit 1: Ruthlessly cut away the unimportant (and Focus on the important)
The first habit of productive people is to slice and dice everything that's unimportant.
Whenever
I go to my work desk, I write down a list of things to do for the day. I
then evaluate which are the most important things out of the list,
first circling them, then ranking the items. After which I'll challenge
these items to see if they're the best use of my time. What impact does
doing these make? Can I be doing more high value tasks? Doing so helps
me ensure I'm working on the absolute most important things for the day.
Then, for the non-important ones, I either push them to a later date or find a way to take them off the list. (Learning how to say no to others is very important here.) Those who have the 30DLBL Program might recognize this as the 20/80 List in Day 8. It's my favorite daily self-management tool.
For everything you're doing now, ask yourself how important this is. Does this bring you dramatically closer to your dreams? Does this create any real impact in your life in the long term? Is it the absolute best way to spend your time or can you be doing more high value tasks?
If
the answer is 'yes' to all the questions, keep this task. If not,
perhaps it’s time to ditch it. No point doing something unimportant! Say
you’re handling a project that makes no difference to your business
after it’s completed. It wouldn't matter whether you take an hour, three
hours, or one week to do it—it’d still make no difference at the end of
the day!
It's part of knowing what your end objective is and doing things that serve this objective. Read: Keep Your End Objective In Mind.
Many people tend to wrongly classify regular tasks as high value tasks. A good tool to set them apart is the Time Management Matrix
that classifies our daily activities into 4 different quadrants. Your
most important tasks fall under Quadrant 2. I've written about it
extensively complete with diagrams and recommendations on how to deal
with tasks in each quadrant, so read them here: Put First Things First.
Going
by the questions I raised above, my most important tasks are the ones
that bring me closest to my dreams when I do them. For example, working
on my blog allows me to reach out to more people out there, which lets
me achieve my end vision of enabling others to achieve their highest
potential and live their best life. For you reading this now, I'd like
to think that you found this blog partially through my efforts in
reaching out to people out there, and partially thanks to the universe.
:hug: Thank you for being here at the blog. This is why I prioritize
Personal Excellence blog development over all other tasks, such as
writing guest articles, getting new speaking engagements, etc. While
other tasks help me progress in my goals too, they're not as effectively
as working on my blog.
It
doesn't end with correctly identifying the high value tasks. Often
times, we'll be imbued with a stream of random, miscellaneous requests
throughout the day. I used to give immediate attention to these things.
Say random request # 1 comes in and I’ll do it immediately since it
takes just 5-10 minutes, max. This is the same for random request # 2,
#3…. all the way to #20. After a while, I realized these things take a
lot of my time and I don’t even get any meaningful result out of them.
Not only that, I never finish my high value tasks. I may think I’m being
very productive when I finish the random things, but truth is it’s just
fake productivity.
So nowadays, I use a separate "do later" list for these urgent tasks. I dump all the incoming tasks here and work on my 20% high value tasks
(that lead to 80% of the value I get in the day). At the end of the
day, I allocate a time slot to clear these tasks. I batch the similar
urgent tasks, then clear them at one go. Turns out I’m always able to
get them cleared in an hour or less, compared to the few hours I’d have
taken if I attended to them in the day.
Habit 2: Allocate breaks strategically
The second habit of productive people is to allocate breaks strategically.
I
don't think being productive requires you to work non-stop like a
robot. On the contrary, it's by doing that that you become less
productive. While the number of hours spent on work increases and the
amount of work accomplished seems marginally higher, the work done per
unit time is lower than your average. Not only that, your work done per
extra unit time actually decreases.
If
you think the above sounds confusing, not to worry! Here's a simple
example to illustrate my point. Say you want to write a book. You can
usually type 1,000 words in an hour working on your book. This goes well
for the first 2 hours, and you clock 1,000 words per hour. However, at
the third hour, you feel tired, and you type 500 words in the third hour
instead. That's -500 words less than your usual output! In Economics,
this is known as the Law of Diminishing Returns.
Rest
is important. No matter how much you want to work, there are areas of
your life that work can't fulfill, such as love, family, health. That's
why our life wheel
is made up of different segments, vs. just 1 big segment. Each segment
is distinct and unreplaceable by others. By "rest", I'm referring to any
segment of your life that's outside of Business/Career/Studies. Taking
time off charges your batteries so you can sprint forward when you
return to work.
Earlier
this year, I did an experiment. I went for a period where I
continuously worked without stopping (save for necessary breaks like
sleeping, eating, etc). I also went for a separate period where I would
work, then space in break times in between work, such as catching up on
emails, exercising, walking around the house, reading books, going for a
walk, catching up with friends, a short nap, and so on. What I found
was this:
Output decreases over time when there are no breaks (despite reaching the point of diminishing returns)
With breaks, the output can be maintained at a consistent high
*Drawings are very empirical, but you get the idea!
What
this means is when I work non-stop without any breaks, my productivity
keeps slipping until it's near 0. However, when I take breaks, they help
me start on a high note when I get back. Even though there are
"down-times" away during the breaks, the high output more than makes up
for that. Hence, by strategically placing my break times, I'm able to
maximize my output. Rest, hence, does not prevent me from getting more
done - it enables me to get more done.
More time spent on work does not necessarily lead to more work done,
but applying the above strategy AND combining it with increased time
spent on work will maximize your output.
If
you're self-employed or on a flexible work schedule, you can put this
into practice easily. Even if you're in a 9-5 job, you can still do it
all the time. Whenever you feel unproductive, throw in a quick break.
Walk away from the desk, get a drink from the pantry, go for a toilet
break, talk to a colleague about work. You'll be more perked up when you
return.
Habit 3: Remove productivity pitstops (i.e. distractions)
The third habit of productive people is to remove productivity pitstops.
Productivity
pitstops are things that limit your productivity. They can be the music
you listen to when you work, your slow computer, unwanted phone calls,
alerts from your inbox on incoming mail, the internet, You Tube,
Facebook, Twitter, etc. These things trap you and prevent you from
getting things done.
What
should you do then? Well, remove these pitstops! Or go to a place where
they're no longer an issue. For example, a big productivity pitstop for
me is the internet. When I write my articles while online, I have the
tendency to click to other sites. I'd check my mail, after which I
become distracted by the new mail. The mail would lead to follow-up work
and replies, which take time. By the time I'm done, a good 15-20
minutes has passed. Then within minutes of working, the same cycle
repeats. So instead, when I'm writing, I unplug the LAN cable from my
laptop and move my laptop to my bed (which is what I'm doing now as I'm
writing this article). It's a lot faster!
Go
about your daily routine and observe when your output slows down.
What's distracting you? How can you remove it? Experiment and try
working in different places. Adjust your environment. Make tweaks here and there. The more productivity pitstops you find and remove, the more productive you'll be.
Habit 4: Tap into your inspiration
The fourth habit of productive people is to tap into inspiration.
I
can't stress how important this is to maximizing your output. No matter
what field you're in, your inspiration is the key to your output. For
example, an inspired programmer creates programs that changes people's
lives for the better. An inspired structural engineer designs effective
building structures. An inspired marketer creates breakthrough marketing
plans that touches people's hearts. An inspired writer writes
continuously. A highly inspired musician writes one song after another
I
fully grasped the impact of inspiration when I started my business and
was in charge of my full schedule. I realized during the times when I'm
inspired, work is simply effortless. Taking writing as an example. The
words will flow and I don't even need to process them. They get
transferred as thoughts in my mind straight to the keyboard. My last
article How To Finish What You Start
was completed in one night, which is much faster than my normal
articles which can take as long as a week (for series posts). That's
because I was very inspired when I was writing it. On the other hand,
when I'm uninspired, nothing comes out. It's like when opening a tap and
there's no water, save for one to two drops.
What
do you tap into your inspiration then? Do you just idle, waiting for
inspiration to strike before you do any work? That's allocating your
control to your external world, which really isn't what this blog is
about. I often hear people say they're not planning to write because
they're not inspired. I think it's not about waiting for inspiration to
strike but about learning to channel into your inspiration.
How
do you do that? It's simple - think about what inspires you in life. Is
it helping others grow? Connecting with people? Being recognized for
your work? Working with the poverty? Helping the unfortunate? Being #1
in your field? How can you achieve them? Find out your motivators, then
use them to drive you.
My
biggest inspiration is to see others achieving their highest potential
and living their best lives. I love seeing everyone living to their
highest being, and if there are ever anything blocking them I'll feel
all ready to rip it away, so I use this to drive me in everything I
create. When I'm writing a blog entry, I'll start by thinking what is an
area people are facing blockages in, then I channel into that energy.
30DLBL
was created because I noticed while many people pursue self-help, not
many know how to translate what they read into practice. I got inspired
to create a personal development program which would encapsulate my best
strategies and lessons on how to live our best life. This program would
consist of a series of tasks, at a manageable pace of one task a day,
which would both trigger immediate action and create tangible results.
And hence, 30DLBL was born.
Habit 5: Create barriers to entry
The fifth habit of productive people is to create barriers to entry.
A
great thing about our world today is that it's easier than ever to
reach out to someone. Everyone is just a sms/phone call/email/Facebook
message away. At the same time it has become a highly distracting place
to live in. Every few minutes, there's a new request coming in. Your
phone rings and it's a telemarketer; You get an sms from a friend who's
bored at work; You get a new email and it's some unrelated, unimportant
mail; You get a Facebook mass events invite from someone you don't know;
Your calendar sends an alert about an appointment you already know...
the list goes on.
There
are constantly messages coming from all different directions, shouting
for your attention. Each one of them serves an agenda that's not yours.
And every time you pay attention to them, you're distracted from doing
what matters... to you.
What
do you do then? To get real work done, I recommend you put up barriers,
so it's hard(er) to reach you. Unplug your phone, switch off your
phone, close off your inbox, set a personal rule where you only reply to
emails after X days. I'm not saying disappear from the face of the
earth, but do that during your work hours at least, especially when
you're working on an intense project. After a while, people will get
used to it and adhere to the rule in order to reach you.
For example when I was working on the 30DLBL Program
last month, I blocked out my calendar from other appointments. When my
friends wanted to meet-up, I explained I was working on an important
project and I wouldn't be free for a few weeks.
On
a daily basis, sometimes I'd switch off my phone and only check it at
the end of the day to return the messages and calls (my telecom
automatically sends a message if there are missed calls while I'm
unavailable). I set up my blog contact form as my official contact
channel, and funnel the requests through FAQs page which filter out
majority of potential requests before they are sent. I still continue to
get regular mail, and people who send them know there's a minimum 5 day
lead time (if responses are needed).
(Update Sep '11: I've since shut off my contact form and now encourage all readers to connect with me via my Facebook page instead.)
By
making it harder for others to reach you, you filter out a lot of
unimportant "noise" from outside, and that lets you work on your Q2
goals (see Habit 1). It's not about being difficult or putting yourself
above others (nothing of this sort) - it's about focusing on what
matters to you and creating real value you want in your life so you can
then do the same for others.
Habit 6: Optimize time pockets
The sixth habit of productive people is to optimize time pockets.
Time
pockets refer to pockets of time you have in between events. You
usually get time pockets when waiting for people, commuting, walking
from one place to another, etc.
Look
at your schedule. What are the time pockets that can be better
utilized? How can you maximize them? Have some ready activities to do
during these pockets, such as listening to podcasts, reading books,
planning, etc. You will be amazed at how much can be done in just a
short amount of time!
For
example, I spend a lot of time commuting. Even though I largely work
from my home office now, I still commute a fair bit, say when heading
out to meet friends, networking, business/lunch/personal appointments,
giving workshops, and so on. While I try to schedule them at convenient
places, there's still downtime from walking from one location to the
next, waiting for transport, traveling, etc.
So rather than let the time go to waste, I use it to do some work. I bought a smart phone last year (with a QWERTY
keypad) so I can type articles on the go. I also acquired a dataplan so
I can check my emails wherever I am. Last but not least, I make it a
habit to bring a notebook when I go out to jot down ideas.
Amazingly,
I'm highly productive during these time pockets. Because there's
nothing else I can do in this 15, 30, 45 minutes, I concentrate fully on
what I'm doing. Right now, I'm actually typing this article on my bus
ride home. Just a few days ago, I finished creating my 3-months plan
from Dec '10 to Feb '11, as well as created the idea and book outline
for my next book for next year, all while having lunch. That's a lot of
progress compared to if I had just spaced out, slept or idled away the
time pockets.
Habit 7: Set timelines
The seventh habit of productive people is to set timelines.
This is a fundamental productivity habit. By Parkinson’s Law,
work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion. This
means if you don’t set a timeline, you can take forever to complete what
you’re doing. If you set a timeline of two weeks, you’ll take two
weeks. If you set one week, you’ll take one week. And interestingly
enough, if you set one hour, you actually can complete it by one hour
too, if you truly want to.
So,
set timelines. When you set timelines, you set the intention to
complete the work by this time, hence paving the way for the reality to
manifest.
I
do regular goal setting to maximize my output. The 30DLBL Program was
out last month as I had set the timeline for it to be released then. If I
hadn't done so, it would still be in the works, possibly for release
this month, next month, or perhaps even never. This month, I've
timelines for other projects, such as for an upcoming workshop, to start
writing my next book, write new articles, have a second anniversary
celebration at Personal Excellence (more on that next week!), release Personal Excellence Book version 2,
and hit new readership targets at PE. By virtue of just setting these
targets and striving for them, I'm already increasing my productivity
compared to if I didn't set any goals.
Be
clear on what you want to achieve (Habit 1), then set your timelines
for them. What do you want to finish this month? What will make you look
back and think that this is the best way you've spent today, and
there's no better way you could have spent it? Set that as your targets.
From there, set your weekly goals. Finally, you can set your daily
goals which become your day-to-day targets.
Habit 8: Automate everything possible
The eighth and last habit of productive people is to automate everything possible.
Technology
today has made automation possible for a lot of things we do. Even when
it's impossible to fully automate the task, we can still use the
systems to get a lot of the work done for us.
Keep
a record of the things you do today, and see how you can automate them.
Some of the not-so-productive tasks that we do on a regular basis are:
1. Delete, archive, sort our mail2. Delete spam mail
3. Paying our bills
4. Appointment scheduling
5. Planning our days/weeks/months (unproductive because it's still planning vs. acting)
Here is a partial list of things I automate:
I'm
continuously looking for ways to automate my process, so I can spend
more time on creating value for others rather than being stuck in busy
work. By automating your to-do list as much as possible, you reserve
your time for the absolute important things. If you get a deja vu
feeling when doing something on your task list, that's a cue to automate
that item.
Apply the 8 Habits of Productive People
Which
of these eight productivity habits can you apply in your work/life now?
Practice the 8 habits of productive people and boost up your
productivity immediately.
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