Do you find you are busy rather than productive?
It’s interesting that Albert Einstein is quoted as saying “Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.”
There’s a lot to be said about being busy doing nothing, or nothing of value and feeling you’ve been unproductive at the end of the day!
We know we should do the hard jobs first and the easy ones later but doing what we should and what we want are two different things!
There’s a saying by Franz Kafka that says “Productivity is being able to do things that you were never able to do before.”, and pretty much this is true in that we can become more successful and productive if we keep learning and remaining focused on the task in hand as well as our long-term goals.
We sometimes feel we should or need to do more, when in fact we need to focus on less to be more productive which means being less distracted, plan our calendars so the day isn’t totally full, and have SMART actions or goals to get the traction we need for our businesses or for us personally.
If instead of focusing on a goal of ‘getting more done’, we had a goal which was having less to do, wouldn’t that sound more positive, give us more motivation and attract what we want rather than what we don’t want! Wouldn’t that make more sense?
Here are SIX steps to help you become more productive:
- Identify what is essential and eliminate what isn’t creating a clearer plan
- Ensure goals are SMART goals remembering it’s better not to achieve a goal than not to have one at all!
- Things may not go the best way you want each day, but consider measuring your effort as well as the outcome
- Having something that is ‘good enough’ or being ‘good enough’ is better than always striving for perfection and never getting the job done at all
- Consider trying to manage your time first before trying to manage other tasks or projects
- Be conscious of not having too many plans or writing new plans; instead commit to what you have in place first; this prevents jumping from one plan to the next
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