12 tips on how to increase your productivity
How to increase productivity at work and in your personal life?
This is the question I will answer in this article.
Find out my tips now.
1 – Start with your motivation
If you want to increase your productivity, the first step is to understand your motivation to become productive.
What will be the benefits to you and others if you can improve your productivity?
Answering this question is essential to fully engage in this process of personal and professional development.
Try to think holistically by identifying all the advantages of improved productivity.
If you don’t take the time to understand what motivates you to make progress, you won’t be able to take full advantage of all the other tips I offer in this article and the other productivity articles and videos you’ll find on the website.
However, if you understand how improved productivity will facilitate your success, you will stay motivated even when you encounter difficulties and uncertainties.
To learn more about motivation, I encourage you to read my article on how to stay motivated.
Practical tip
Write a list of your motivations to increase your productivity.
Then prioritize this list from the most important motivation to the least important.
Circle the three most important motivations.
Then, write them down on a separate sheet of paper and keep it in front of you every day.
Doing this will allow you to better manage your dips in motivation.
2 – Measure how you use your time
You cannot change what you are not aware of.
To increase your productivity, you need to understand how much time you spend on different activities throughout your day.
Over the course of the week, write down how much time you assign to all of your activities, including time spent sleeping.
Then average the time used for each task and identify the time spent on important, less important, and unimportant activities.
Now that you have a clear picture of your situation, plan in your agenda, and a to-do list, the first change you would like to make to your usual schedule.
This pretty simple exercise is actually very effective in making you aware of your choices and the impact they have on your life.
For example, you may realize that you are not getting enough sleep, and as you probably already know, sleep has a significant impact on productivity and well-being.
You may also notice that you tend to procrastinate, i.e., put off a series of actions, perhaps because of excessive perfectionism or fear of the reaction of others.
There is no need to change everything right away.
The important thing is to begin the process of change.
You will see that with time, you will be able to become more effective.
To learn more about time management, I recommend you read my article on time management obstacles.
Practical tip
Start by measuring how you allocate your time in the morning for a week.
Then eliminate, move or delegate less useful activities.
Doing this will allow you to start improving your effectiveness at work and in your personal life.
3 – Model your most productive days
A very effective way to increase your productivity is to learn from yourself, and more specifically to draw inspiration from your best days.
To do this, think about a specific day and write down all the aspects that helped you perform at your highest level.
Then, set the stage for repeating the same or even a better day.
There are many factors that can create the foundation for a super productive day.
Here are a few.
The productivity of your days prepares in advance because, as I wrote in a previous article, the habit of planning your day in advance is important to foster your productivity.
The quality and quantity of your sleep are equally important to maintaining a good level of alertness, productivity, and well-being.
The food you choose to eat on a daily basis has an important impact on your health and also on your productivity. Therefore, it is recommended that you choose easy food to digest throughout the day.
Your ability to deal with stress effectively is also important. Therefore, it is essential to plan some time each day to relax, play sports, meditate, meet friends, and focus on enjoyable activities.
Practical tip
Identify at least one action that would help you improve your productivity and do it whenever you feel it is relevant to your work or personal life.
Keep doing it until it becomes a habit.
4 – Learn to say no
To be more productive in your work and personal life, you must learn to assert yourself by saying no to activities that are not important to you.
Work tasks include meetings to which you are invited, even if your presence is not necessary.
If you do hold meetings, you should make sure that you only invite people who can contribute, and let your employees focus on their priority activities.
I recommend you read my article in which I explain in detail how to hold a productive meeting.
The same principle of learning how to decline a meeting applies to your personal life.
If, for example, you don’t get along with certain family members and every time you meet them you feel a drop in energy, you should limit or eliminate these relationships from your life.
The same goes for friends or acquaintances that you feel exhausted or angry with each time you spend time with them.
Think of all the energy you would have to spare if you were able to say no, and how you could use your time to increase your productivity and achieve your goals faster.
Changing your behavior isn’t easy, but it can be done by strengthening your confidence and self-esteem.
To explore this topic further, I recommend that you read my article on how to learn to say no at work.
Practical Tip
Start by saying no to minor requests.
Every time you manage to say no, congratulate yourself or give yourself a small reward.
When you can’t say no to a request, be tolerant with yourself and try to do better next time.
Then, as you progress, give yourself a bigger reward.
5 – Design your workspace more efficiently
Improving productivity also requires creating a more functional and pleasant work environment.
If you’re unhappy with your office, do your best to improve your workspace.
In a previous article, I talked about the importance of choosing the right monitor to improve your productivity.
More generally, focus on improvements you can quickly make to your workspace to make it more harmonious and suitable for your needs.
Whenever possible, create a work environment that increases your concentration, reduces distractions, and improves your well-being.
Practical tip
Identify a small improvement that you can implement immediately or within the next 24 hours at the latest.
Be aware of the effect this small change has on your well-being and productivity.
Then plan and implement the next change.
Continue until you create a more pleasant and functional workspace.
6 – Don’t take phone calls
Have you ever decided to take a call while in the middle of an important task?
If the answer is yes, you know that it has wasted your time and concentration.
Most of the calls you receive are not urgent or important.
But you are used to answering them all the time.
The more you answer, the more you reinforce this behavior.
Next time you decide to answer an unplanned call, look at how many minutes you have wasted and how you feel about your choice.
I’m not suggesting that you don’t answer important calls.
What I am suggesting is that you answer only the truly essential calls, such as those from your spouse or your children’s school.
All other people will leave you a message if the reason for their call is really important.
But in the latter case, finish your important business first and determine in advance how much time you plan to spend with this person.
Practical tip
Decide on the phone numbers of the people you need to answer.
Record a message explaining that you do not answer phone calls and that if it is really urgent they can leave a message on your voicemail and that you will call them back as soon as possible.
7 – Plan your time on social and work networks
If you need to use social and professional networks for your work, I recommend that you plan :
time slots for this activity
specific actions you want to take to achieve a specific goal
If you don’t plan these times well, your attention will be pulled away from the content offered by other people and you will waste time unnecessarily.
Remember that the goal of these networks is to get you to spend as much time as possible on their websites.
Therefore, they will do anything to distract you.
If you want to use these networks to your advantage, follow the instructions above.
I recommend setting a time limit for your personal use of social networks as well.
To make it easier to post your content on social and professional networks, I recommend using Postcron.
Practical tip
Use the countdown timer on your phone whenever you use the internet for personal or professional use.
As soon as the alarm sounds, disconnect without making excuses.
8 – Make time for yourself
Your productivity depends on you and your mental and physical state.
The decision to give time to activities you enjoy is vital to your well-being and health.
Your life should not become a race to achieve goals at the cost of your health.
When organizing your days, schedule time for yourself each day and give yourself the time you deserve.
Doing this will allow you to draw energy from activities that make you feel good, but also enable you to better manage the stress in your day.
If you are feeling a little stressed, I recommend reading my article on how to relax quickly.
Practical tip
Plan at least one enjoyable activity at night before you go to sleep and accomplish it!
If you can, get up an hour earlier every day and turn this appointment with yourself into a ritual, a habit you will keep over time.
9 – Learn from your mistakes
An extremely effective way to increase your productivity is to identify your mistakes and create procedures that will allow you to avoid them in the future.
When you make a mistake, don’t criticize yourself because it has a negative impact on your self-esteem and confidence.
Instead, you need to be empathetic with yourself and focus on how to best handle the same situation in the future.
If you don’t, you will continue to waste a lot of time and energy.
As a result, your productivity, motivation, and confidence will also decline.
But if you make the choice to face problems when they arise and find a way to solve them, you will feel much better and your actions will become much more effective.
Practical Tip
Identify a mistake that is causing you to waste time and that you keep making over and over again.
Think of two solutions to solve it once and for all.
Test your solutions and adjust them if necessary.
Continue until the problem is completely solved.
10 – Use time management tools
You can make your life easier by using tools that help you better manage your time.
First of all, use a planner in which you plan both your work assignments and your personal life activities.
Also, keep a notebook next to you to take notes.
That way, whenever you have new ideas or simply need to remember important information, you will be sure to jot it down.
I also recommend that you have a personal journal where you can write down the important lessons you have learned in your life so that you are aware of all your progress.
Then create a daily or weekly to-do list, but try not to overload it with too many tasks.
Finally, choose a time management tool such as the Eisenhower matrix or the ABCDE method.
Practical tip
Choose a time management method and get all the tools I just described.
11 – Write down your did list
Everyone knows about the to-do list.
But few people know the did list.
This is a list of the actions you have accomplished during the course of the day.
What are the advantages of this list?
It allows you to :
- make you aware of your progress
- increase your motivation
- improve the flexibility of your strategy
- get out of your comfort zone
When should you write this list?
Preferably, write your list at the end of the day or at night before you go to sleep just before you write your to-do list.
Practical tip
Create a two-column table where you write the actions you took in the first column and the effect each action had on your goals in the second column.
12 – Think outside the box
To finish this article, I encourage you to try new ways of working.
Over time, you have developed habits that reassure you but that can also limit your effectiveness.
I suggest you spend an hour a day researching and testing new approaches to work faster while maintaining the same quality of work.
Be patient because at first, your results will probably not be satisfactory.
But if you persevere, you will begin to optimize your time and this will increase both your productivity and your well-being.
Practical tip
Pick a recurring activity that costs you a lot of your time and try doing it in a different way.
Conclusion on how to increase your productivity
In this article, I have provided you with 12 tips on how to increase your productivity.
If you are interested in the topic of productivity, I invite you to discover all my articles on productivity.
If you are looking for tools to improve your time management skills, I recommend you read my article on the best time management apps.
If you want to learn how to manage your time, I invite you to find out more about our online time management course.
To take advantage of the expertise of a time management coach, write to us now through our contact form, call us at +33 6 69 46 03 79 or contact us on WhatsApp at +33 6 69 46 03 79.
If you are ready to take action, check out our life coaching packages:
- one month life coaching package
- 3-month life coaching package
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Read this article in other languages
Français : Booster sa productivité : le guide ultime
Italiano: Aumentare la produttività: la guida definitiva