productivity improvement

3 Productivity improvement rules to properly plan your day

Are you ready to have an insanely productive day tomorrow?
You might have said the same thing yesterday or even the day before but let’s be honest productivity improvement requires some work because all it takes is a sign of a text message or a listicle to get you off track.

In order to get everything done that you want to get done, you have to set yourself up for minimal distractions optimal focus and a day that you can feel proud of.

Set up your space, this step is crucial for productivity improvement

productivity improvement

So rule number one to planning a productive day is to set up your space.

The environment where you do your work contributes to your mental focus, possibly more than any other Factor.

Your environment is a big factor because of this it’s important to choose or create a space that gives you the right Vibes for productivity.

I know it sounds a little weird but if you work from home designate an area solely for working and if you’re limited to just your bedroom make sure to create a separate space or a corner that keeps you out of your bed and awake.

If you want to head out of the house, consider a co-working space or a cafe and maybe you want a free place to work outside of the house well check out my favorite place to get Wi-Fi and find peace and quiet for free, the library, libraries nowadays are wildly underrated and make for great spaces to have a cup of coffee and check off a couple items off your to-do list.

If you want more specifics on setting up your environment to help boost your own productivity Patricia has a great course on skillshare titled how to boost your productivity in 10 steps and one of them is about specifically engineering the perfect workspace.

I highly recommend taking it.

Set up your to-do list

productivity improvement

Rule number two for productivity improvement is to set up your to-do list.

Are you ready to enjoy the sweet feeling of crossing items off your to-do list?

It’s one of my favorite things to do. First, you have to grab a notebook or open a file that allows you to physically see and organize the tasks that you have for the next day.

This is because you should set up your to-do list the night before.

Write down all of the things that you want to do, us as humans we are goal-oriented machines. We get feelings of gratification not when we actually accomplish something but in the process of pursuing that accomplishment.

So once you’ve made a full list re-evaluate each individual task, is it important? is it urgent? does it contribute to your overall goals and vision for the week or the month or even the year?

Also, don’t be afraid to narrow down your to-do list, a lot of people put like 50 things down when really they could put just five things down, focus on those five and like at least 30 of the others would come super easy.

If it helps you to schedule a week at a time you can go ahead for it. I recommend putting a handful of tasks on different days of the calendar and just rearranging them as necessary.

Actually, this is why a lot of people prefer to use a computer to initially figure out there to do list because on a computer you can rearrange your tasks each day each week by just dragging and dropping them instead of pressing them out or even erasing them.

Set up a schedule

productivity improvement

Rule number three for productivity improvement is to set up a schedule.

So now you have a plan to do tomorrow, the question is when do you want to accomplish each task?

Create a schedule for yourself that will help you move your day along and give each task the attention that it needs so here are some little tips to setting up your schedule:

Wake up before everybody else

really consider when you’re hitting the hey tonight and plan to wake up after a full night’s rest a full 8 hours of sleep will truly allow you to stay alert and focused right when you wake up.

A lot of people ask when is the best time to get up? give yourself a time when you’d like to start your morning and then get up an hour or two beforehand.

If you have distracting roommates or you know that you’ll hit rush-hour traffic at a certain point in the morning choose a time that works around these factors.

You should be mindful of them if your roommate’s get up at 9 and they like to have a chat when they make breakfast maybe consider starting work at 7 and then catch up to them when you’re ready for your first break.

Schedule with rhythm

One thing you need to know about productivity improvement is that breaks are not bad in fact scheduling them right can help you prevent from burning out too quickly.

When you create your schedule consider scheduling quick 15-minute or even 30-minute breaks to refocus.

These short little breaks can also be the time that you give yourself to set up a new space for a new task or even get from A to B.

Also, something else you should know is that everyone operates on a 24-hour cycle with times of high-energy and Times of low energy and we call this a circadian rhythm.

Consider when you feel most tired and reserve that time for low energy tasks like things that are monotonous or tedious or even taking a nap.

Once you have the entire day figured out in your schedule you won’t feel so guilty about taking a snooze.

Find the right balance between a tight deadline and setting yourself up for Success

So there’s an old adage that says work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.

Most people probably know this as Parkinson’s Law and basically mean if you give yourself an hour for a task you will get that task done in an hour even if that task could be completed in a half an hour.

On the other hand, if you give yourself an hour for a task that would originally take an hour and a half to complete you might be setting yourself up to fail.

This might require some trial and error and you’ve really got to be self-aware about how much work you can actually do but when you create a schedule give yourself a time where you can comfortably complete a task and give yourself a few minutes to refocus and reset.

For me, I like to dedicate an hour or a half hour block to specific tasks if a task could take me 45 minutes I like to round that up and give myself an hour for it and then it also gives me an opportunity for a short break.

This type of attitude allows you to take breaks, emergencies or even take small distractions into account while still moving your day along and getting stuff done.

Conclusion

So if your goal is productivity improvement there are three things to do:
Designate a place where you work. For me, it’s the library for you it can be a coffee shop or just a corner in your bedroom.
Set up your to-do list and figure out your goals and what you want to achieve.
organize your goals and put them on a calendar.

Advice

Don’t get discouraged if your schedule fails the first time. You’re just a human, it happens to all of us just stay focused and motivated.

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