Work load is increasing while hours in a day remain unchanged. Employees are struggling trying to complete more work in short amount of time and still exceed the expectations. The question that every person has, regardless of their job description, is how to increase work productivity.
1. Plan and Encourage Ideas
Your first step forward should be planning. There are some people who don’t require this step, but planning is generally the time where you consider ideas, conduct research, work on details and have enough time to process your results. This can apply to managing, writing, designing, marketing, coding, etc.
Planning requires detailed task description and steps to reach your final goal. Instead of using lists, it might be helpful to switch to mind mapping. Maps seem to be a more interactive organization tool. They are great for brainstorming and visually presenting steps of the process needed to reach your goals.
Brainstorming is important in any business since it encourages creativity and increases chances of pursuing great ideas. From this flow of ideas, pick the ones worth implementing into your workflow.
2. Use Your Past Work
To complete your tasks faster you can always use your past experiences and work accomplishments. If you know you’ve made a similar template before and you’re working on a task right now that could use the same template, there is no reason to waste your time and re-create your own work. You should build on your past successes to become more efficient and productive.
With this in mind, work on current tasks knowing that you might use this sometimes in the future. Save your tasks in related work folders where you can easily access them when needed. Recognize the patterns in your work and see if you can speed up your work process by using your pervious work. This includes templates, research on related topics, repeated or similar codes, etc.
3. Have a Designated Work Area
Working at home has its perks especially if it saves hours of your daily commute. However, working at home can also be distracting if you don’t have an appropriate work setting. You might take much more time to complete work simply because you are more relaxed and “at home”.
This issue can be tackled by having a designated work area. Also, you should do your regular work preparation, except the unpleasant commute part and maybe without your work suite and uncomfortable work shoes. The rest should be your “going to work” routine. If you cannot work without getting your hair done, this might just be a winning point to make your day more productive.
Also, setting deadlines throughout your day will help you focus on task completion. You can use mind mapping for this. In case if you have to complete a personal task, you can work your way around it and even use it as your check point for completing steps towards your end goal.
These three tips address some common issues with work productivity. You can apply some of these to get you started on being more productive, but as you see progress, you can add personalized productive tips. For example, some people find music to help them focus better and be more productive while others need complete silence for best productivity. Find your own productive headspace and be more efficient by implementing these steps into your daily work schedule.
Amira Chugunova is a business and technology blogger with an interest in Lean BPM pioneer, JobTraQ.
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