How to be Productive at Work: 6 Easy Tips to Manage Time Effectively

Meet Neil. He had no clue what was happening to him, was working very hard at the office to execute his tasks in time but nothing worked out. He remembers how he felt during that challenging time and says "It was incredibly discouraging and stressful. It made the job a lot more frustrating than it already was". After almost a year of feeling discouraged and confused  --- trying everything he could have --- he decided to take matters into his own hands.

"That night I had a very healthy and productive discussion of an hour with 'myself'. And the most important thing that came out of the talk was to 'don't panic at all'. Whenever you switch on your panic button, every little error seems a big blunder to you and that makes you loose focus from all the important stuff. Once the focus is lost you mix up all the tasks and most of them get delayed leading to unproductivity" said Neil.

Neil discovered many moves to reduce the pressure and tried very hard initially to make them his habit, now he works smartly and delivers great results in time and live a healthy & peaceful life. We have jotted down those simple tips to be productive at work for you so that you can learn them and try to achieve productivity and peace at your workplace. Here we go ---

1. Make priorities in the first 15 minutes.

Prioritizing the tasks helps you in reducing your workload almost by 50%, you would know what needs to be done earlier and later or can be shifted to the other day.

Always reserve the first 15 minutes of the work hours for prioritizing the tasks. create an excel sheet or Google spreadsheet (if needs to be shared with the team) for maintaining a timeline. This sheet could have columns for tasks, execution team, delivery date, points to be considered and feedback. This will help you in maintaining focus and not missing any important task.

P.S. - Always keep buffer time for all the tasks and assume that some new tasks would come in between in an emergency category.

2. Always eat the biggest frog first.

The task(s) which has become a worst nightmare for you needs to be finished first. It is a human tendency that whenever something keeps on poking you from inside, will reduce your focus on other things, getting rid of it as soon as possible would be better in any case. This task will be the first in the priority list you have prepared in the first 15 minutes.

Cheers! You have reduced 70% of your workload by successfully implementing these 2 steps by now.

3. Do not ever gossip with your dear colleagues in the first half.

The first half i.e., generally 9 am - 12 noon is the most productive period of the day, you need to streamline your overall schedules, prioritize the tasks, make official calls and send e-mails to clients or internal teams at this period of the day.

Also, gossiping may demotivate you or fill you up with negative vibes which would further lead to unproductive day and bad results in the execution of the tasks.

There may come one time when you would not want to work, which will make you hang out with colleagues and pass time. But you should try not to do that, instead of that you can have a cup of coffee and take a 'me time' in the first half and post that start with an interesting task which will motivate you to work hard for the day.

P.S. --- Always remember "you are the only creator of your destiny".

4. Always carry a notepad at the workplace.

A simple notebook can reduce your workload by being your non-living 'executive assistant' (or EA).

Make a rough hourly or daily checklist in your notepad, so that you can keep a track of all your priorities, pending work, calls to make, reminders and meetings etc. Keep checking the list continuously, add to it,  carry the pad along with you wherever you go in the office or out of the office (in work hours obviously!) and never mind if anyone calls you a 'waiter', it's for you not for them.

5. Never hesitate to tell your boss about the tight schedule.

It can only create trouble if you can not speak for yourself. Your boss is not going to kill you if you tell him that you can not do the new work assigned today and ask him/her to shift it for the other day or replace it with some existing work.

This will help you in being organized and find serenity amidst chaos.

6. Always love your job not your company.

Once a great scientist, philanthropist and one of the best presidents of India Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam stated that "Love your job but don't love your company, because you may not know when your company stops loving you".

You need to understand that all you need to be focused on is your work, KRAs or daily tasks and everything else come later. You should always maintain a work-life balance which will help you in never missing even a single drop of joyful life.

Looking to include the above productivity tips in your new year's resolution? Check out my post Need a New Year's Resolution? 5 Ideas to Make 2017 a Productive Year.

Question - Is there anything else we can add up here to our effective time management skills and always be productive at the work?

Image Source - Freepik