Today begins week 9 working from home…… 9 weeks!!!!! I honestly never thought I would get as much accomplished as I have in this “work from home” environment – but here I am, working harder and more productively than I ever have! Not busy – just productive!
I’ve always been one to keep a TO DO LIST – but I have learned to make it more reasonable and not try to shoot for the stars in accomplishing EVERYTHING every day! I realized that by trying to complete my full TO DO List everyday – I was making it into more of a procrastination list, rather than a guide. When I did the easy stuff, I became distracted on the hard stuff…….. and put it off until another time. My biggest bit of advice today is to focus on ONE TASK AT A TIME – ONE DAY AT A TIME! How do you do this – break down your overall marketing projects and client needs into smaller goals. What are the individual pieces for each project? Who do you need to talk to first for this project? Break up these pieces before setting timelines – write each task down for each project you need to complete – then estimate how long each task will take you to accomplish. Putting these steps in writing and then estimating the time needed will help you get a grasp of what’s being asked and overall what is needed. Sometimes what seems like a big project won’t take much time at all, or vice versa.
Working from home has taught me to keep better track of my time – even when no one was asking me for it, it helps me understand my work habits and the time of day when I finish work most successfully. Tracking my time has helped me understand my habits – from when I check my email to how often I surf my favorite websites and social media – I didn’t realize how much this affected my workday each day….. By re-arranging some of these things – prioritizing – and taking breaks for personal web surfing – I am now able to get more done.
And…. I have always taken pride in myself on being the ultimate multi-tasker! BUT I had no idea how exhausting this really is….. and it’s not really multi-tasking – I’m not really doing two things at once – I’m just rapidly switching my focus between two things. Every time I switch, I then have to re-focus on the new task. Because it takes a few minutes to get up to speed on a task, these “switching costs” make multitasking extremely inefficient. It takes up so much energy to switch and change all the time. I’m not being more productive, I’m just keeping myself busy… ultimately just skimming over the surface of things and not doing my absolute best on each task! Who knew? By focusing on one thing at a time – this increases productivity… I am a morning person, I’ve discovered that I can accomplish so much more in the mornings. I’ve begun doing my hardest task first in the morning, rather than working on it in stages throughout the day. With concentration and focus, mornings have become my most productive time of the day. When I was just a “busy person” – I was a multi-tasker. Now that I have become a “productive person” – I am focused!
While working from home, I have also now learned the difference between URGENT and IMPORTANT…. yes there is a difference – which relates also to BUSY vs PRODUCTIVE! Urgent means that something needs immediate attention (an ASAP moment). These are on my TO DO that shout “Now! Now!” Urgent tasks put me in a reactive mode…. emails, text messages, social media that constantly bombard me with information has only increased this mind-set. Important tasks are things that aid in my long-term mission, values, and goals. Sometimes important tasks can also be urgent, but typically they’re not. When I focus on important activities, I operate in a more responsive mode, which helps me remain calm, rational, focused and open to new opportunities. Urgent tasks are mostly tasks that have an immediate deadline or a deadline that has passed – and more often that not, things become urgent or an urgent situation is created when a person always knows that something had to be accomplished but kept deferring it and then comes running to me “with their hair on fire”…….
“Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.”
Whether he actually said this or not is debated, but the lesson behind it is important: If you want to be productive, you need to make sure you stay sharp!
Let’s be honest – nobody can focus for eight hours straight! It simply isn’t possible. No matter how many efficient habits you have, you can’t maintain distraction-free focus for that long – I can’t, you can’t! That’s why taking breaks is so important! Even if your break is for a few minutes – a walk outside, a walk upstairs, into the kitchen for watcher or a drink – helps me recharge and come up with new, fresh ideas.
Time management is a huge part of productivity! They go hand-in-hand. If I’m exhausted, it doesn’t matter how many hours are left in my day – I can’t use them productively. This is the logic that I use for tackling difficult tasks early in the day — by using my peak hours efficiently, I get more done in less time before I get tired.
That is one of my favorite quotes about tasks – what this basically means to me is that I should get my biggest, most urgent task out of the way first. We all have that big, important task that we don’t want to do but know we have to do because it holds the biggest consequence if we don’t complete it! Completing this particular task before anything else always gives me a huge sense of accomplishment. It sets the tone for my day and motivates me to complete my other tasks. It becomes a habit!