WORK LESS GET MORE!
Today,
I’d like to take a few minutes of your time to show you how working less can
often lead to achieving more.
Sound
too good to be true? I used to think so.
Back
in the days when I was a fledgling entrepreneur I worked all the hours under
the sun - and often many hours under the moon, too!
I
bought into the often-preached theory that success only comes from hard,
relentless work. And as a result, I put virtually all of my time, energy and
efforts into my work.
However,
it wasn’t long before I discovered a major problem…
Despite
being young and healthy, I began to feel the effects of burnout. To be honest,
I didn’t notice this at first, as it crept up on me like a wild cat stalking
its prey.
However,
years of working hard - eventually hit me hard!
My
strength, my positivity, and even my creative juices were depleted.
It
was during this period of time that I reassessed how I was working and why it
was proving to be unsustainable. I spent weeks researching the issue, and what
I discovered was startling to me.
Namely,
working too much kills productivity and often leads to less getting done!
This
information was like dynamite to me. I instantly realized that I had been
trying too hard to reach my goals and achieve success, when I should have been
taking a more balanced and smarter approach.
If
you suffer from similar problems as I once did, then here are two things I
recommend you adopt immediately to begin moving to the ‘work less get more
done’ model:
1.
Set time limits on your tasks
Have
you heard of Parkinson’s Law? You may not recognize the name, but I’m sure
you’ll recognize its description: ‘Work expands so as to fill the time
available for its completion’.
Strangely
enough, most people have heard about this, but seldom act upon the information!
Trust
me, if you want to get work done quicker - make sure you always set deadlines for your tasks.
Without deadlines, it’s just too easy to lose your focus and drift into
procrastination.
Let’s
take a look at a quick example:
Your
boss has asked you to create three PowerPoint presentations that they’ll use in
upcoming sales events. However, they haven’t told you when they need the
presentations to be completed.
Without
a deadline, you immediately file the work away as non-urgent. But worse than
that - you actually forget about doing it!
A
week later, your boss asks you if the presentations are ready. Your face gives
you away!
Clearly,
if your boss (or even yourself) had originally set a deadline for the
presentations, you would have found the necessary time and effort to get the
work done.
2.
Prioritize tasks in order of importance
Another
technique I strongly recommend to you is sorting your tasks into order of
priority before working on them.
Adopting
this method will see your productivity levels skyrocket!
Here’s
how it works…
Imagine
you’ve just arrived at the office on Monday morning. You switch on your
computer, start going through your emails, and then begin working on tasks from
last week that you had failed to complete.
After
spending most of the morning on the above, you eventually start to work your
way through your daily and ad-hoc tasks, choosing to pick out the easy ones
first - as you’re still suffering from ‘Monday blues’!
Now,
do you think that working in the above way is what super-efficient workers do?
Of
course not!
Super-efficient
workers have learned a little-known fact, namely, it pays to work on essential tasks
first.
For
instance, in the example above, they’d have taken 10 minutes or so in the
morning to look at the tasks they needed to complete. And by just spending a
few minutes in this way, they’d be able to quickly sort the tasks into
essential and non-essential categories.
Finally,
they would begin to work through the tasks, starting with the high-priority
items first. By doing this, they’d have direction and focus, and would be able
to complete the essential tasks on (or ahead of) time.
Try
this technique, and I guarantee that you’ll get more done. Colleagues will
wonder how you are achieving so much - and in so little time!
Lifehack <hello@lifehack.org>
No comments:
Post a Comment