How To Get More Done In Less Time: [16 Powerful Tricks]

Want to understand how to get more done in less time? Then you’re in the right place.

Have you been spending all of your time, energy, effort and money to attain your goals? Have you sacrificed hanging out with your friends, going out shopping and your sleep? You sincerely want to succeed, but do your results seem insignificant? Frustrating, is it not?

Like many, you may feel like your workspace has become a jail cell that keeps you away from civilization.

How To Get More Done In Less Time:

This article helps you to get enormous amounts of shit done. Say goodbye to excessively hard work with little results and hello to productivity.

• Reduce stress and feel more snug when getting your tasks done.
• Boost your productivity with the best apps and stay on top of your work.
• Learn how to monitor your progress so that your productivity keeps improving.

The word productivity is used a lot, but most people only use it in sentences asking someone else to hunker down and get to it. Few people really give tips on how to attain that excellence of having the ability to produce good results consistently.

Productivity isn’t just the measure of how much work you can accomplish at work; it stretches way further and encompasses every aspect of your life. Effective productivity is about getting more things done in the same amount of time.

This post will provide you with invaluable information about productivity and how you can really get things done. Feel less stress and more snug when you’re focusing on the tasks at hand.

Use it as guidance and be sure that you actively seek what will truly benefit you on your journey towards a tenfold in productivity.

Preparing your workspace for ultimate productivity

Let’s start by kicking in an open door! Having all the required tools and supplies close by makes it easy to complete tasks. While they say creative minds can make sense of their own chaos, it can even add to stress and hamper your productivity.

Research shows there’s a direct correlation between productivity and clutter. Did you know the average American spends about 38 hours a year attempting to find lost and misplaced materials? In other words, spending 5 minutes a day clearing up your workspace is worth the investment.

Tidying up your workspace includes putting away your tools and equipment. While doing so, allow yourself to identify potential problems before they arise by performing basics checks on an everyday basis. You might be using them again soon, but that it no reason to leave them lying around.

Ensure that they’re secure so that you don’t lose productivity by trying to search for something that’s no longer there. There are all the time people with sticky fingers around.

Do not expect to come up with revolutionary discoveries in uncomfortable situations. Think how you can really be snug while working. Do you have a nice ergonomic chair? Is the temperature right? How about the light entering the room?

Depending on the task, studies show that sunlight can improve your productivity by twenty to thirty percent. Psychologist Chris Knight and colleagues found that houseplants have an identical effect. Adding them to your workspace can increase your productivity with fifteen percent.

How to reduce stress and feel more snug

1. Night-night

Most people can relate to time pressure because of waking up to late. Rushing in the morning easily makes you forget things needed to get your tasks done. What if you’re about to present the sales contract to a prospect, only to find out you left it at home? Just prepare everything you need before you go to bed.

If necessary, make a list and check it twice. Sometimes the right mindset is all it takes to get things done. You will most probably not finish that report when your mind is all over the place.

Take some time before you fall asleep and consider the things that you’ll get done tomorrow. This empties your mind and lowers your stress level, leading to a better sleep as well.

Being awake all night is hardly ever a good idea. Sleep deprivation will most certainly reduce your attention span and your ability to concentrate. After twenty-four hours of sleep deprivation, there’s an overall reduction of six percent in glucose (brain-fuel) reaching the brain.

This is why you start craving sugary junk. It sounds childish, but set a fixed bedtime and stop being a slave of the coffee machine. You will see a significant increase in your productivity.

2. Eat like your productivity depends on it

Productivity is also closely connected to your diet. Research shows that eating unhealthily is linked with a sixty-six percent increased risk of productivity-loss.

Constantly skipping breakfast and eating greasy, salty and sugary foods throughout the day is a bad idea. The very first thing is to make your eating decisions before you get hungry.

If you don’t have time to make breakfast in the morning, simply make it the night before and store it in the fridge. For lunch, unhealthy options tend to be cheaper and faster than healthy alternatives, making all of them the more alluring in the middle of a busy workday.

You might save 10 minutes at lunch, but will pay for it with weaker performance the rest of the day.

Do not let your glucose bottom out. You will perform better by grazing throughout the day, as glucose is fuel for your brain. Spikes and drops are both bad for productivity and bad for the brain.

Make healthy snacking easier to attain than unhealthy snacking. For example, place a container of nuts and a selection of dried fruit by your computer.

3. Meditate and move

Stressed? Back away from the task at hand and get up. Do not tell yourself that you’ll never get the job done and that you’ll most probably fail at your task. Instead, take a few deep breaths to lower your blood pressure and clear your mind of chaos.

Stretch your back, your arms, your legs and everything else that’s stretchable. After stretching, your brain becomes more efficient than it could have if you just slogged through the pains. Studies show that too little body movement can reduce your productivity by fifty percent.

The trick is to pause your work in a way that enables you to easily get back at it. For example, if you’re working on a set of math problems, then pause after completing a problem, not while you’re still busy solving one.

Closing your eyes for a couple of minutes every hour reduces the anxiety caused by staring at your computer. This helps you to stay sharp and active.

4. Break it down

Most big tasks have deadlines weeks from the current date. Therefore, it’s best to know what you’ll be doing within the next weeks. Manage your time and resources accordingly and try to attain something worthwhile every day.

Productivity methodologies like Pomodoro suggest that you break down tasks into small, manageable subtasks. The technique uses a timer to break down work into intervals traditionally twenty-five minutes in length, separated by short breaks (either five or ten minutes).

This technique can easily increase your productivity with twenty percent. Clear and short tasks provide you with more motivation not to slack off or procrastinate.

5. Be nice to yourself

Others normally tend to encourage us when we have gotten things done. So who says we cannot encourage ourselves? Give yourself a compliment after a long day of work! This kind of encouragement boosts your confidence and is great for your overall wellbeing.

When the weekend kicks in, be sure you get some well-deserved rest and recreation. Watch a baseball game, organize a family barbecue, go for a nice swimming, climb a mountain. Do whatever floats your boat.

This helps clear your mind for the upcoming week by lowering the I-hate-my-job feelings. End your day the same way you started it… feeling happy.

Working with checklists, notes and mono-tasks

6. Prioritize by using checklists

Checklists with reminders let you organize your workload and checking items of that list continuously gives you encouragement boosts. They also minimize mistakes and can easily provide you with an hour of additional productivity per day.

Write down your tasks and be sure you estimate the amount of time each task should take before you start your workday. Try planning out your day ahead and anticipate the possible roadblocks.

Tackle the tougher and the time-consuming tasks first. You still have full energy and it makes your other tasks seem easier.

Sometimes tasks keep popping up at a faster rate then you can get them done. You see the stacks of paperwork piling up on your desk. Prioritizing is the way to solve this.

Quickly review the tasks that pop up and use your foresight to assign priorities based on time to deadline, required resources and difficulty.

Eradicate the tasks that are unnecessary and tidy up your checklists. Again, tasks with a high precedence should be worked on first, unless they depend on a resource that’s still unavailable.

Getting different workloads throughout the week makes it barely tougher to plan ahead. However, a tentative schedule is better then no schedule at all. It gives you an idea of the things that you want to get done during the day and it helps you accomplish the most vital tasks right away.

This makes procrastination and confusion less likely. You can even use it as a plan of action, which you can consult as soon as you appear to be lost.

7. Keep it easy

Cognitive processing works best if we focus on one thing at a time. Our brains aren’t as efficient when we try to handle several tasks at the same time.

A study by the Institute of Psychiatry at the University of London found that multitasking causes a greater decrease in IQ then smoking pot or losing one night worth of sleep.

You need to stop overloading your brain with simultaneous inputs and revert to focusing on one thing at a time. This will make you less prone to making mistakes. Check your work regularly to spot mistakes early on.

Solely checking everything at the end, only to found out you entirely messed up, is not productive. Ensuring that the quality of your output is just as important as getting output.

Make sure you make notes if you come across some awesome information that might help you in the final stages of your task. Add the location and content as well. This lets you keep it out of your mind until the time is ripe.

8. Productivity apps

App scan help you prepare your schedule for the day and even for the upcoming weeks. Setting up reminders will reduce the risk that you’ll run late or miss appointments.

Also, having your smartphone memorize your deadlines lets you focus on the task at hand. Keep in mind to update your reminders when changes occur that will have effects on your schedule. Do this as soon as the need arises because you don’t want to forget it.

Updating your reminders in time helps you to avoid uncomfortable situations. Undoubtedly, this also reduces stress and makes you more snug in performing your tasks.

With app called Evernote (1), you can take notes, save content from multiple sources, search through your saved notes and share your work with others.

After you have logged in on all of your devices, using the same username and password, you can create and view notes from any device or web browser.

Boost your productivity and stay in control

9. Emailing kills your productivity

You can spend your whole day checking your incoming emails, responding to them for eight to ten hours straight, and it feels like actual work.

Avoid this and try tackling your emails twice a day: fifteen minutes in the morning to filter out the most vital ones and one hour in the afternoon to clean up your inbox.

Know that the average person spends about sixteen minutes refocusing after handling incoming emails. This means that checking your emails ten times a day will cost you nearly three hours of refocusing.

At the same time, keep your outgoing emails short and to the point and state that you expect an identical type of e-mail in return.

Try to avoid receiving unnecessary emails by sending selectively and by unsubscribing from newsletters that you trash anyway.

10. Avoid procrastination like the plague

Focus all of your energy on completing whatever task can be completed at this moment, unless something urgent comes up that demands immediate attention. Procrastination is the most costly invisible cost in business today and costs as much as 5000 dollar per employee per year.

It doesn’t only lower your productivity, it also sets you up for risky crunches that could have been much easier if you completed your tasks as they came up. Procrastination is fed by distractions, so try to remove them from your workspace as much as possible.

The extreme end of procrastination is working too hard. Just because a day has 24 hours doesn’t mean you must invest all of them in work. Although it’s tempting, try to avoid finishing tomorrow’s work today. Working too many hours is terrible for your productivity.

Do yourself a favor and work within your capabilities. Productive people are the ones that put don’t have trouble being decisive. Simply learn to say no if their requests don’t slot in your schedule. This will save you from lots of stress.

11. Surround yourself with like-minded people

Some people don’t have enough self-discipline to keep themselves working. Are you like that? What really helps is to find a buddy that checks on you every now and then.

Choose someone who tracks your progress and offers suggestions. Basically, you are asking your buddy to act like your boss. Keep in mind that your buddy should really understand what you are doing.

In order to boost your productivity, try to surround yourself with like-minded people who are really into what they’re doing. Working with people who have similar habits and styles is uplifting.

If you are someone that’s rather serious then laid back, find people who share this ideal. This helps you synchronize your work habits and creates a pleasing relationship with your peers.

12. Keep your heart pumping

Regularly exercising keeps your body in good shape and your mind sharp. Most people spend around eight hours a day sitting on a chair. Try to break this routine by physical exercise.

When you exercise, you are increasing blood flow to the brain, which helps sharpen your awareness and makes you more ready to tackle your next big project. Exercising on the weekends helps you break the monotone routine of work and helps get rid of the Monday blues when work starts again.

Getting enormous amounts of shit done

13. Nail it in your prime time

There is a timeframe where you perform at your best. During these hours your concentration is flawless, your tasks get finished on a fast pace, your efficiency is like never before and your results are peaking. You can calculate prime time by charting your energy levels and finding a pattern.

Let’s speak about calculating your prime time. To chart your energy levels, I suggest a few things. The first is to cut out caffeine, alcohol and other mood enhances or depressants to get an accurate reading. This is completely essential in getting reliable data.

Secondly, wake up and fall asleep naturally, without setting an alarm (if you’re able to). My third advice is to record your energy, motivation and focus every hour, on the hour. Do this on a ten-point scale. Finally, collect at least three weeks of data.

Collecting it is going to be a pain, but the more data, the better your results will be. Three weeks of data will provide you with twenty-one data points for each hour of the day, which is a decent number to draw conclusions from.

Based on your conclusions, schedule your most vital activities when you have the most energy, motivation and focus.

14. Learn how to deal with distractions from family and friends

Doing something out of the ordinary, like working early mornings or late in the evenings, is a comparatively new phenomenon that some people still fail to grasp. Distractions from family and friends are terrible (2) when you are attempting to catch up on a deadline.

Do not allow their trivial concerns to distract you from your purpose. Make them aware of the proven fact that you are working and that you appreciate it if they don’t disturb you. This doesn’t necessarily mean you need to be impolite and offensive.

Instead, learn to be firm and prioritize important things instead of continually ending up accommodating the concerns of your family and friends. Simply explain them that you’re not free simply because you are at home or because it isn’t someplace in between nine and five.

15. Check your progress and eliminate inefficient habits

Make sure you check the concrete work you have done within a selected timeframe. Are you pleased with the result? Did it take longer then you wanted it to? This gives you insight in your actual productivity.

Track your progress manually or use software, which tells you how you spend your time on the computer. Take time to analyse your work at the end of the day. Is there a more efficient way of getting your tasks done?

Eliminate your old habits as soon as you find a better way of doing things. This will unlock a robust solution to getting things done faster and with a higher quality. You will thank yourself for it.

16. Reduce your workload through outsourcing and automation

If you find it a challenge to fit everything into an already hectic schedule, then instantly try to outsource some of your tasks. Have a look at fiverr, which is a global online marketplace offering tasks and services, beginning at a cost of five dollar per job performed.

Fiverr lets you outsource anything for just a couple of dollars, from research to slick designs.

Have you read the 4-hour workweek by Timothy Ferriss? In his book, Timothy tells you how he used YourManInIndia to hire an Indian virtual assistant for a few dollars per hour through.

He outsourced all of his repetitive tasks this way. Keep this in mind if for when you’re ready to cut down on tasks.

Noteworthy, virtual assistants must be managed correctly. Define your expectations exactly and don’t hesitate to fire your virtual assistant when she or he is not up for the task. Start outsourcing the less critical tasks today, as it takes time learning how to multiply yourself by using a virtual assistant.

Finally, try to determine how you can automate your processes. Make use of free apps, which can significantly cut down the amount of time to complete a certain task.

This is where Zapier comes in handy, which connects the web apps you use to easily move your data and automate tedious tasks. For example, you can let Zapier save new Gmail attachments to a selected Google Drive folder.

Automation simply lets you free your mind from unexciting tasks, allowing you to have more brilliant ideas.

Get started now and tenfold your productivity!

Thank you for reading this article about get more done in less time and I actually hope that you take action my advice.

Being more productive doesn’t all the time require huge changes. Everything you learned here requires small changes that can easily be obtained. However, all the topics in this text have one thing in common, particularly that they require action on your end.

You will simply not become more productive if you aren’t actively changing your workflow. Try to adapt practical habits and include them one by one. Once you do, you’ll find the rewards are truly promising. So what are you waiting for?