How to turn around an unproductive morning into a successful day
Hello my friends,
Sorry for not writing for such a long time. My life was just so busy. I don´t want to bore you with details. However, I had to finish the practical part of my internship, present the results, continue writing my report, move two times, a lot of administrational stuff and many smaller things.
All of this reminded me of the subject of this post: How to get the right things done faster.
Aren´t we all tired of running after endless to-do lists without the feeling of ever getting it done?
If you now expect the one pill from me to solve this problem forever, then better stop reading this. However, if you want the two most important tools, in my opinion, to become better at getting the right things done faster, then continue reading.
So, without further ado the two tools are:
- The 80/20 rule.
The 80/20 rule is known under a lot of different names. The second most known name is the Pareto principle. Named after the first economist noticing the rule. If you want the full history google it. For me, the most important part about it is that in most things in the world 20 % of the effort is resulting in 80 % of the outcome.
They first discovered this in the distribution of land. It was in Italy that 80 % of the land was owned by 20 % of the people. However, later they found that this rule applies to most things in life. For example:
- 20 % of the clients often make 80 % of the sales
- 20 % of exercises and habits have 80 % of the impact on the trainee
- 20 % of plants often account for 80 % of the harvest
There are countless more examples, but you get the idea, don´t you?
2. Parkinson’s law
Parkinson´s law says that a task becomes bigger and more important in relation to the time given for that task. Some examples are:
- Cleaning
something that would take minutes takes hours
- Instead of writing something fast taking a long time writing it
This is mostly because we forget to focus on the important parts because we have no or a very long deadline. We dwell on preparing, thinking, having breaks and a lot of unimportant mini tasks. Instead, we should focus on the really important parts and set ourselves a short deadline.
This is where the magic of those two tools comes in. They work together hand in hand. First, we define the important task, then we appoint a short and clear deadline.
I think that this is so important that we should read it again and think about it. I certainly should do that daily:
The goal is to detect the most essential tasks and schedule them with very short and clear deadlines. This will enable us to get more critical things done faster while ignoring minor stuff.
Here are two bonus tools that help me a lot:
- Pomodoro technique
This simply says that you should work 25 minutes. Then, take a 5-minute break and repeat this cycle 3-4 times. Afterward, finish the cycle with a 15-minute break and start again at the beginning.
This really helps me. I often combine it with some calming sounds in the background. Although I must admit that it´s with changing results.
2. Waking yourself up
I mean anything that gets you out of your procrastinating cycle of doom. Some examples are:
- Take a shower (ice cold in the end?!)
- Get moving
- Clean your workspace up (careful that it doesn´t become a procrastinating task. Timer helps)
- Sport
- Going for a short walk
I think today we both know what we have to do now, no? Prioritizing the next most important task and scheduling it with a clear deadline!
I wish you a wonderful day and a lot of success with all of your goals!
Greetings,
Alexander
P.s.: This post happened after an extremely unproductive morning. One could say a procrastination morning^^ However, finishing this Post re-started my productivity. Now on to tackle the next most important task!