Not everyone is at their most productive first thing in the morning, or they slump in the afternoon (and need a coffee or two to pick themselves up). So before you can start scheduling your tasks around the notion of ‘deep work’ (essentially avoiding the pitfalls of multitasking), you need to listen to your own body!
Spend a week noting what kind of tasks you do, when you do them, and when you feel most “comfortable” (and alternatively, when you can barely keep your mind focused…). By the end of a week, you should be able to pinpoint exactly when you work best. You can then schedule your tasks exactly to your liking, and use the times of day when you’re at your peak for the most mentally demanding and challenging tasks.
Whatever your area of work, you'll likely need to communicate with your coworkers on projects and expect their feedback or input. Even if you're a fully freelance freelancer, you'll likely rely on some form of communication with your clients.
Despite this, an absurdly large majority of workers are wasting their time and risking their productivity with inefficient modes of communication. The biggest culprit? The famous and well-known email. Even though hospitals email list we have made leaps and bounds in personal communication, many of us still use this sadly outdated mode of business communication.
Instead, get your coworkers, and even your clients, to adopt a business chat platform. There are plenty of great options on the market that allow you to chat quickly and efficiently with your coworkers, in rooms by project or department.
But for many teams, just chatting isn’t enough – you actually want to see what’s being done! So, that’s why we created and use Hibox in our office. It’s the only platform that features an internal company chat, file sharing, task organizer, and even video conferencing. It’s not just a way to streamline projects and communication – it actually makes brainstorming more efficient. Research has shown that employees are much more likely to share their ideas in a chat message than in an in-person meeting, as the informal platform dispels many biases (from hierarchy, gender, etc.)
Most platforms are intuitive to use, and after a short initial introductory period, you'll wonder how you haven't used it before.
4. Walk
As much as we all need our laptops and a steady stream of caffeine to get things done, sometimes the most productive thing you can do is take a break from your desk.
Simply going for a 10-minute walk outside can dramatically impact your productivity when you return to work. What's more, Stanford researchers have shown that by going for a walk, you can increase your creativity by 60% when you return to work.
But it's not just beneficial for writers and marketers: even the world's top tech gurus, like Zuckerberg, have been known to hold walking meetings.