Work On Your Work: 10 Simple Ideas On How To Work Smarter Not Harder
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Lists with This Book. This book is not yet featured on Listopia. Oct 26, Tanya rated it really liked it Shelves: A nice book with many useful tips to make us more productive. I find some suggestions in this book quite helpful. A practical how-to book for people who want to improve their life quality. Rich rated it really liked it Apr 29, Brian Yarwood rated it it was amazing Sep 25, Trevor rated it really liked it Sep 01, Ruth Lorenzana rated it it was amazing Aug 11, Buyandelger rated it liked it May 05, Pranav Joshi rated it it was amazing Oct 15, Mounifa Odeimeh rated it really liked it Mar 23, Dave in Charlotte rated it liked it Dec 11, How To eBooks rated it it was amazing Jan 13, Gavin rated it it was ok Mar 16, Sergi rated it it was amazing Mar 20, Timothy Ramsey rated it it was amazing Jun 04, This in part comes from psychophysiologist Peretz Lavie who found that our energy during the day follows natural cycles, which he called "ultradian rhythms.
Planning your schedule ahead of time helps you avoid missing deadlines and getting snowed under. When planning ahead, put the bigger, harder, more pressing tasks at the start of the week or day so you can knock them out first and relax more as the week goes on. Batching similar tasks can help you be more efficient because you're not switching back and forth between different types of work.
This is especially useful for small tasks, because you can knock out a bunch at once and get a nice kick of productivity. Dawn Foster , former consultant now director of community at Puppet Labs, writes on Gigaom how she uses this technique to chunk everything from exercise to meetings to email. We tend to ignore our energy levels when planning our work, but it's an important aspect of how productive we can be.
When we have energy isn't the same for everyone either—we each have our own built-in body clock called a circadian rhythm. If you know you're most productive right before lunch, for instance, don't plan meetings or email catch-up time then.
Instead, put your hardest work in the time periods when you've got the most energy, and save easy tasks for when you're dragging. A smaller to-do list is less intimidating and more achievable.
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There's nothing wrong with having a short to-do list if you're getting real work done. Of course," Leo writes. Naps can do wonders for your memory and helping you solidify things you've just learned. Perhaps more importantly, a short nap is the best way to improve your energy levels when they're low. Try drinking a cup of coffee just before a short nap for the biggest energy boost. When I'm writing, I close my email and Twitter clients. I don't have any notifications showing up on my computer at all, so I can focus on the task ahead.
Try turning off all notifications while you're working. If that sounds too extreme, only turn them off during the periods you need to be most focused or sift through your list of notifications to identify the essential ones. Lifehacker's Whitson Gordon offered a guide to this latter practice back in , but it's just as applicable two years and thousands of new notification choices later. For short tasks, or big ones that you want to chip away at in short bursts, try a Pomodoro timer: Set a timer for 25 minutes, and work until it's done.
When the timer goes off, take a 5-minute break and then repeat the process. To ensure this method works for you, Scott Hanselman , a program manager at Microsoft and avid blogger, suggests tracking the technique's effectiveness with an accompanying notebook. Each time you're distracted during the 25 minutes, put a tick on a piece of paper. Over time, the pages of the notebook should contain less and less ticks. I've found that you can also use real-life events as work timers. For instance, work until the end of the album you're listening to, then take a break.
See a Problem?
It's getting easier every day to get caught up in tools, apps, and processes for managing our workload. To help you get your focus back, go back to basics with pen and paper, and make a simple list of what you need to work on. There aren't any settings or tags to play on paper, so once your list is done you'll have to start working. As a project manager, it has always been quite overwhelming for me to delegate countless tasks and handle them.
A project managers’ guide to working smarter and not harder
There is no pause button for us and we have to stay on top each project to make sure things move as they should. Possibly, there are many things we can learn from the things happening around us.
That's why Mark Zuckerberg wore that same outfit for years. In fact, research from the Behance team found "that placing importance on hours and physical presence over action and results leads to a culture of inefficiency and anxiety. Developing new habits does take time, and patience will help you to work through the ups and downs of change more readily. For example, if you're a chef, then you obviously have a love for cooking. Suddenly you realize you actually completed a lot in that timeframe. Push yourself hard to do work when it's time to do work and enjoy these activities once you're done for the day. Even at the office, you need to allow time for your mind to regroup and recharge.
What does it mean to work smart? How do you define working smart?
I have seen people burning midnight oil to reach their goal, working so hard and still not succeeding at the things. The simple secret is: Working hard is just not enough, sometimes we need to find our ways of working smarter to achieve our desired outcome.
16 of the Best Ways to Work Smarter, Not Harder
So where can you start when you want to work smarter? In Eat That Frog! He tells us how to stop procrastinating and get more of the important tasks done today. And this is one of the secrets to working smart.