Have you ever wondered how other people seem to get it all done while you are struggling to cross out a couple of things on your to-do list? What is their secret? The truth is, we all have 1,440 minutes in a day, but many of us don’t make the best use of those minutes.
We need to shift our mindset towards valuing every minute we have. Most people plan in hours and half-hour chunks on their calendar, but highly productive people plan by the minute. How we choose to spend our minutes will determine how productive we are. The 21 tips below are actionable things you can implement today to be more productive.
What do highly productive people do?
Table of Contents
1. They Work Smarter, Not Harder
When managing how we spend our time, we should stop thinking about how much more we can squeeze into our day. Instead, think about how to simplify the way you spend your time; work more effectively and efficiently so you can clear up space for your loved ones, your hobbies, and time for rest and relaxation. In other words, work smarter, not harder! Here’s one of my favorite time management quotes.
It’s not the hours you put in your work that counts, it’s the work you put in the hours.
Sam Ewing
2. They Wake Up Earlier for Some Focused Alone Time
Wake up earlier in the morning so that you have time to take care of yourself. Avoid using your phone during this time as it can easily be a distraction. It may help to not leave your phone by your bed, so you are not tempted to lay in bed and scroll through emails, social media, and YouTube videos when you first wake up. Leaving your alarm in another room is also a good idea because it will make it much harder to hit the snooze button.
Productive people value the early morning alone time. This is the time before the rest of the world wakes up, before the emails fill their inbox, and their phone starts ringing. This is the time when their mind is clear and they can begin tackling their most important tasks for the day.
I started waking up an hour earlier every morning (and going to bed an hour earlier at night), and I couldn’t believe the difference it made. Now I enjoy this time so much that I even wake up earlier on the weekends. I get so much accomplished during this time.
3. They Get Ready Immediately
Shower and get ready immediately. When you take your personal appearance seriously, you will feel more confident, and will have a more productive day. This habit will make a difference to your productivity even if you are working from home and no one is going to see you.
4. They Take Care of Their Body
It’s also important to take care of your body by getting a good night’s sleep, drinking lots of water, eating a healthy diet, and exercising. When you do these things, you will be healthier and will have more energy to accomplish tasks.
5. They Take Breaks
You cannot reach an optimal level of productivity if you do not take breaks. This seems counterintuitive because when you take breaks, you are not being productive, but productivity is about energy and focus, not how much time you spend working.
When you don’t take breaks, you become more distracted, stressed, and unmotivated. This will result in you having less energy and wasting more time. You can go for a walk, get a drink, take a nap, or read a book. Breaks will keep your mind focused, and help you avoid burn out.
6. They Follow the Rule of 3
The fewer things we try to do in a day, the more focused and productive we will become. Instead of spreading our attention in many different directions, we can have a laser-like focus on the most important tasks. Before you go to bed at night, choose 3 main tasks to accomplish the next day.
If you have larger projects that will require more time, you can use your top 3 tasks as goals all week and break them down into smaller actionable steps each day.
Pareto’s Principle, also known as the 80/20 rule, states that 80% of the results come from 20% of the effort. Find the tasks you do that make the biggest impact and then work to eliminate the rest.
7. They Do the Most Important Task First: “Eat the Frog”
Once you have your top 3 list, do the most important task first thing in the morning because that is when you are at your best. Before you do anything else work on this task. Schedule tasks that don’t require as much focus in the afternoon when you start to run out of energy.
If it’s your job to eat a frog, it’s best to do it first thing in the morning. And if it’s your job to eat two frogs, it’s best to eat the biggest one first.
Mark Twain
In other words, when you have a difficult task to accomplish, it’s easy to procrastinate and put it off, but productive people know that its best to get the most important task done first thing in the morning when your mind is clear. When you do this, it sets the tone for the whole day and gets your momentum going in the right direction. When you eat the frog first thing in the morning, you don’t have to think about it and dread it for the rest of the day. Imagine how productive you will be if you do this every day!
8. They Plan the Night Before
Have you ever gone to bed at night fully intending on accomplishing several goals the next morning, only to wake up feeling unmotivated and waste your time snoozing or scrolling through your phone?
Productive people start each morning with a written plan. The night before, choose your “frog” and get all the materials ready so that you are less likely to come up with excuses to procrastinate.
Anticipate what you will do to sabotage your goal the next morning. For example, if your goal is to go for a run, then go to sleep in your running clothes and put your shoes next to your bed.
9. They Use a Calendar, Not a To-do List
Speaking of to-do lists, highly productive people don’t use them! Instead of writing a long list of things that you want to do, use the rule of 3 method described above. Most importantly, schedule these tasks on your calendar.
If you really want to get things done, pick a day, a time, and an estimate of how long it will take you to finish the task. When you schedule your entire day like this and include estimates of the duration of each task, it is called time blocking. Many of the most productive people use the time blocking method.
Research shows that when we use to-do lists, 41% of the things on our list never get done. Often, we do the easiest, less important tasks, and procrastinate on the things that are actually important. All these uncompleted tasks on the to-do list lead to stress because our brain continues to think about them until they are finished.
When you schedule your list on your calendar, you know exactly what to do and when to do it and you will be successful at getting your to-do list done.
10. They Don’t Overschedule
When you begin using your calendar instead of your to-do list, avoid overscheduling your day. The more you try to do, the less you accomplish. Stay focused on your most important tasks and you will get so much more done.
11. They Say No
The other benefit of scheduling all your tasks on your calendar is you will have a more realistic view of how much time you have available each day. Your priorities will be clear. Every time someone asks you do something, take time to look at your calendar and think about it. If you are used to saying “yes” every time someone asks you to do something, you should think twice.
Author David Allen says, “You can do anything, but not everything.” If you have trouble saying no, an important mindset shift is that every time you say yes to something, you are actually saying no to something else. When your priorities are in order, saying no gets much easier, and when you do say yes, you will know exactly what that entails.
You can do anything, but not everything.
David Allen
12. They Set Strict Time Limits
Parkinson’s law states, “Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.” If you give yourself 20 minutes to do a task, it will probably take you about 20 minutes, but if you give yourself 1 hour, the same task will probably take you about 1 hour.
Try to find a sweet spot for assigning time limits. It’s important to not give yourself too much time or too little time. Set realistic time limits and try to stick to them. This will create a sense of urgency and you are likely to get the task done much quicker.
Think about how long it normally takes you to clean your house on a weekend. You could easily spend the majority of the day cleaning. Now think about a time that an unexpected guest was coming to your house in 1 hour. How long will it take you to clean your house? Probably around 1 hour.
Setting time limits gives yourself that same sense of urgency.
13. They Stick to Time Limits
It’s also important to be OK with not being done with your work. This is hard for me. I often want to keep working until I’m done with a project, but it is usually at the expense of my sleep or time with family. There is always more that needs to be done.
Stick to your time limits. For example, if you want to declutter your house for 20 minutes, it is important to stop when the timer beeps. If you disregard your time limits, there will no longer be a sense of urgency and you will continue to be less productive.
If you plan a 6-hour workday, be intentional about it and actually stop working at the 6-hour mark. Make time for yourself and your family.
14. They Remove Distractions
We are all faced with distractions throughout the day. Some of them cannot be controlled. But many of them can be controlled.
One easy change to make is to turn the notifications off on your phone. You can also turn the “Do not disturb” setting on your phone. Every time our phone dings, our focus is shifted from the task we are working on.
Create a work environment that is conducive to productivity. Try to isolate yourself in a room that is clutter-free. Keep your phone and the tv off and shut the door if you can. The more focused we are with our work, the less time we will spend on it. Research shows that we spend 2.1 hours a day being distracted, and it takes 23 minutes to get completely refocused after being distracted.
Your own brain can potentially be your biggest distractor! Keep a notebook next to you as you are working. When a distracting thought pops up, write it in your notebook right away so your brain can continue focusing on the current task. If this continues to be a problem, do a brain dump to clear your mind.
15. They Manage Their Inbox
Check your email at dedicated times instead of every time you get a notification on your phone. Process your email 2-3 times a day and try to get your inbox as close to zero as possible. Use the one-touch rule when going through your emails- if you can do a task in less than 5 minutes, then do it immediately. When you open your emails, process them immediately, so you won’t have to reread and reprocess the email again later.
When processing your email, immediately write important tasks and reminders in your calendar. Respond to emails that require a quick response, and if it will require more attention, then you can schedule a time to deal with that email in your calendar. If you don’t deal with the emails, they just become another form of a to-do list.
16. They Break Tasks into Smaller Steps
Sometimes the big goals on your to-do list never get done because the task is so big you don’t know where to start. That’s why it’s so easy to procrastinate on those big projects.
Highly productive people break large projects into smaller milestones with specific action steps. When you do this, the larger project/goal seems less daunting because all you have to do is tackle the smaller steps and before you know it, your larger task will be done.
If I decide that one of my most important tasks for the week is to write a new blog post, I could break that task into smaller steps. I would write that I want to research on Monday, write my outline on Tuesday, write the post on Wednesday, gather photos and edit it on Thursday, and post it on Friday. When I plan this way, I have actionable steps that will help me accomplish my goal.
17. They Make Fewer Decisions
Highly productive people don’t waste mental space for unimportant decisions. Try using a method called If This Then That, to cut back on decisions. To use this method, think of everyday decisions that you have to make or problems that you have to solve. Think of specific solutions that you will do every time that problem comes up or the decision needs to be made.
For example, if I get the mail, then I will throw away junk mail immediately and put the rest in a basket on the counter to deal with on Saturday. If my daughter brings home school work in her folder, then I will look through it and have her throw away the ones she doesn’t like and put the ones she does want in a basket in her room.
You can also use this method to set up canned responses for email.
Make sure everyone in your household knows these if this, then that rules. Eventually, all of these tasks will be done on autopilot without the need for decisions.
18. They Don’t Multitask
More and more studies are showing that multitasking is not effective. When you multitask, you will have the feeling of being busy, but you won’t be getting as much done as if you focused on one task at a time.
A busy person can take an hour do get something done that an effective person can do in 15 minutes. If you really want to accomplish something, dedicate 100% of your time and focus on that one task until its done, and then you can move on to the next task.
19. They Maximize Time While Doing Mundane Tasks
I know that I just said productive people do not multitask, but there is one form of multitasking that could help your productivity during tasks that don’t require much focus.
My favorite thing to do while making supper, washing dishes, doing laundry, commuting, or getting ready in the morning is to listen to audiobooks or podcasts. This makes the time doing daily tasks more enjoyable. I find it actually helps me to get things done quicker, and the best part is I’m learning so many new things each day!
20. They Make the Most of Idle Time
Plan small tasks for when you are waiting in the carpool line, at the doctor’s office, or waiting for your child at their sports practice. You could make use of that time to clear emails, listen to audiobooks, or order your groceries for the pick-up service, etc.
21. They Keep Working Towards Their Goals
Being successful in accomplishing goals often requires failure. Productive people keep going. They learn from their mistakes. Instead of getting overwhelmed, they attack their goal one step at a time. Becoming a more productive person doesn’t happen overnight. Productivity is not a trait you are born with; you learn it from trial and error and lots of practice. It requires forming new habits and changing mindsets. Focus on mastering one habit at a time and soon enough you will be a highly productive person. Which habit will you focus on first?
Reflect
So what do highly productive people do that you don’t do? Choose a few of these habits to incorporate in your life. Even the smallest of changes can add up to big results. I think you will be amazed by what you can accomplish each day.
If you want to learn more about being productive, I recommend listening to this podcast. It discusses 15 habits of productive people. You can also check out this blog post about the 23 mindset shifts of productive people.
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