time-is-money

Probably, you also dreamt about completing twice as many tasks in a day, then you are generally able to. Although it might sound strange at first, it’s possible. The key to achieving this goal is organization.

Be your own assistant!

Like it or not, a day consist of 24 hours. Unfortunately, we can’t change this limitation, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to use our time better. What do I mean by this?

With very strong self-control we are able to create a kind of schizophrenic state. In this, we could be our bosses and assistants at the same time.

A good way to reach this is to picture two hats, that can summon the different characters. One of them is the hat of the boss, who will give us precise tasks with strict deadlines. The other one is worn by the assistant who executes the daily tasks from the to-do list. If we put on the boss hat in the morning, and then change the hats, we can structure our workdays easily.

assistant-tools

 

Why is order the quintessence of productivity?

Most people have mastered the art of procrastination. They don’t even realize how much time they waste on useless stuff during work. They say to themselves things like: “Ok. One more cigarette, and I’ll start it” or “I’ll just listen to a song and begin working immediately afterwards”. By switching between the two roles, we can avoid the delays, and motivate ourselves to create valuable workdays.

The people who wake up early are often more productive and efficient in work than the ones who sleep till late. What is the reason for this?

If you set the alarm to 5 o’clock and use a few hours to do things that make you happy, for example, read a book, have breakfast with your loved ones, or run in the park, you will begin work differently. These events will make you feel like it was worth waking up early, or well, waking up at all. This can be a very strong drive throughout the day, and help you deal with tasks, which otherwise you might try to procrastinate.

One more productivity hack: punish and compensate

This system can only work provided that you are able to take it seriously. Creating a process of punishments and compensations can help you achieve this. It’s a rather difficult task if you’d like to do it properly because let’s be honest, we are much more likely to compensate than punish ourselves.

There is one thing that could be very useful, though. It is to come up with a prize, that you are eager to receive. If you choose a suitable gift and find the right time for the compensation, this will provide a strong motivation to endure suffering. For example, if you decide to apply to a tender, give yourself the present not when you acquire the work, choose the completion of the project instead.

Ask for help   

Delegation could significantly speed up your progress too. Find someone, with whom you can work with, and ask him to do some of your tasks!

If you don’t know people with the proper abilities for a chosen work, you might consider hiring a freelancer. There are plenty of pages like upwork.com where you can find talented professionals from various fields, including programming, designing or accounting. This list can help you locate the most suitable freelance job site for your project.

ask-for-help

If you’re a tech savvy person, project management applications are made for you. With Asana you can easily create the tasks with your boss hat on, and also, delegate them, and set the deadline if needed.

Many people are searching for ways to make life easier. If you found my advice useful, or you are also looking for ways to make your days more productive, I suggest reading the works of  Napoleon Hill, John Maxwell, Robert Kiyosaki or Timothy Ferriss. The latter, for example,  is a very important book on time and mobility centred around working only four hours a week.

There are many tips and guides available online too, that can help you boost your productivity. This post could aid you in creating to-do lists, or making them useful again. If you’re interested in project management applications, I suggest this article, because it lists most of my favourite programs. Finally if you’re looking for more productivity hacks, don’t go anywhere, you can find many posts about them on my blog, for example here you can read about smart habits, and this lengthy post explains the GTD and the Pomodoro method and also describes an experiment with them.

Organizing our life is one of the most difficult tasks. Its hardship comes from the fact, that we have to punish and compensate ourselves at once. But if we put on the right hat at the right time, the complications will seem less unsolvable. And who knows? In the end, when we’re finished with all of our tricks we might find a white rabbit.