You might have been working for a long time for the same company and you have been accustomed to the way you work everyday. But have you thought about checking if its really efficient for you? It’s worth taking the time to reassess your work routine or habits so as to avoid wasting time and to be more efficient in what you’re doing.
Not only it would help you to finish your work faster, you would also feel less stressed because you would have a system that works for you. So without further ado, here are my 5 tips on how you can develop a routine at work that really sticks!
1. List down ALL of your daily tasks – Coming in to work without a plan or a guide on what you have to do is like going to war without a gun and bullets. You need to know what are the things you need to accomplish for the day. List everything down even the smaller action items like reading emails, tidying paperwork, filing accounts etc. The purpose is to know what are the tasks you have to complete within your working hours so you can allocate the proper time for each action item.
2. Process items in your list in batches – Once you have listed all the tasks for the day it’s time to group and identify tasks that can be done together. It is important that you understand how and what work is done for each tasks so you can group them together and work on them together.
3. Timing is everything – You need to know what time of the day you are most productive. This is important because you can schedule the more difficult tasks that needs more attention or concentration on the hours you’re most productive while you can do lighter and ad hoc tasks on the hours you feel low in energy. The objective is to understand the level of energy you have throughout the day so you can function well.
4. Create a schedule based on tips 1 to 3 – So you have identified the tasks you need to do everyday, you already batched tasks together and you know what time you are most productive during the day, so what now? Well it’s time you get your schedule straight. From the tasks you do daily, block time for each. This wouldn’t be much of a problem now because you already know which tasks are easy to do and which requires a lot of time to complete. Understand the timing and respect the schedule that you have, build a routine around it by following your schedule. The key here is to follow through and use your schedule to be responsible for your time.
5. Make time for your personal stuff – Well when you work it’s not all about work. You have your colleagues and you have to take breaks. So to be more productive, schedule your breaks and schedule things that would get you distracted easily like social media, personal email, your phone etc. Making time for personal stuff would help you eliminate further distractions. Plus you need to have breaks every once in a while.
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So what are the other tips you can share to be more productive at work? Can you share with me your work routine? I would love to hear from you on the comments below!
Elaine Fernando is a Professional Organizer, a member of the National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO) and a member of APPO (Association of Personal Photo Organizers). Elaine may be reached at 908-630-8995 or [email protected]
