Top 10 Productivity tips
Focus on Result-Oriented Activities
Pareto’s law (also known as the 80 20 rule) states that 80% of the outputs result from 20% of the inputs. This means that 20% of our actions result in 80% of the results. We must find the 20% that is creating the 80% of our desired outcomes and focus solely on those activities.
Launch the Administration Quick Search (for admins only)
This trick is meant for Application admins. If you’re an application admin you can quickly open the administration search box by typing “gg” on any Jira page. Type the first few letters of your search to show suggestions. Example: Typing “ban” will suggest the “Announcement Banner” page. Click the page name to go directly to the admin page. In the Jira Administration Console, launch this search box by clicking “Search Jira admin” in the area above the admin navigation.
Use Focus Tools
Make good use of apps and technology to help you remove distractions. Here’re 18 Best Time Management Apps and Tools to help you stay focused. This way, you’re not distracted by the web, e-mail, or IM.
Don't make a new year's resolution - they're too easy to break. Make a new year's theme, so even if you screw up, you're obligated to get back on the horse.
Automatically file an email
To apply the “Work Less” theory, have Outlook automatically file an email. Then you can read them all at one time without distraction.
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Create a Folder: Ctrl + Shift + E
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Automate Filing into the folder
Right-click the Email, click “Rules”, Choose “Always move messages from” -
And select your new folder
Find the original Control Panel
The new Settings option is easy and makes a lot more sense than the stuffy old one, but if you were accustomed to the old one, you might need that one to have access to some more advanced options. It is easy to look for it even though it’s smartly hidden. All you need to do is click on the Start button on the screen and go to Control Panel from there. When you right-click the Start Button, you’ll be able to see options there, such as Computer Management and Disk Management.
Just Start
Often times, starting is the hardest part. People tend to wait for the perfect time with perfect condition to start. But there’s no perfect condition. Once you get going, you will quickly get into a rhythm that could last for hours.
Monitor, measure, tweak, repeat.
Last, but not least, you need to monitor & measure your activities to see the profitability and efficiency in everything you do. By analyzing your activities continuously, you can identify when one task is starting to take longer than usual, or when one task that was once profitable no longer is. Here are some examples.
- By setting up Google Analytics, you can find out which online marketing activities are driving traffic to your website. If you see that Facebook generates more traffic than Twitter, for example, you’ll know that you need to focus more of your efforts towards Facebook.
- By using unique coupon codes in your email marketing campaigns, you can find out whether your emails are generating more revenue than your paid marketing.
- By calculating how much an hour of your time is worth and using a timer to monitor how long it takes to do a specific task, you can find out whether something is taking long enough to justify delegating the task to an employee, hiring an employee to handle that task, or outsourcing it.
Find out Your Productive Hours
Everyone has a certain time of the day in which they are more productive than others. For me, it’s the morning. Find out when your prime time is for productivity and optimize your work schedule accordingly.
Set a Timer
Estimate the time you need to tackle different tasks and set a timer for each of your tasks. How you go about this is up to you as there are many different ways. There is the Pomodoro technique where you focus on a task for 25 minutes followed by a five minute break afterwards. In the event that you have a task that will take much longer than that, you can consider one of the many timer-based apps. One that comes to mind is Clockify. It’s used for freelancers and entrepreneurs alike, however it’s a good way to be setting yourself a timer. It provides reports and you can serve as a project manager of sorts too. Best of all, it’s free.