There are many reasons why you could find yourself struggling to be productive at work, including stress, time pressure, distractions, poor attitude, changing workplaces and policies, etc. Regardless, increasing productivity in the workplace is paramount in today’s competitive, time-crunched world.
Productivity is simply defined by how much you can produce in a certain amount of time. In order to increase productivity, you need to either increase the amount you can do, decrease the amount of time it takes you to do something or a combination of the two.
The importance of increasing productivity in the workplace is multipurpose. I call it a Win3.
Win3 – It helps:
1. You – it helps you reach your goals faster and with less stress.
2. Your Team – Your team or organization and customers or clients will benefit because you are accomplishing their goals faster.
3. Your People – Your newfound increase in productivity will provide a more efficient, more positive and less stressful asset to their challenges and issues (namely, you).
Even though we know something is good for us, that doesn’t guarantee we will do it. Have you ever asked yourself, “Why don’t I do what I know I should?” We all have. Improving productivity in the workplace is what I call a “Know Brainer.” We know we should, but sometimes consistently implementing our new ideas is not easy to maintain.
To be consistently productive and have sustained motivation you need four things: meaning, energy, triggers and ability. Having meaning in the things you do, energy to get through the day at your best, a daily schedule that triggers efficiency and confidence in your ability to do your work are all evidence-based ways to increase your productivity. When these elements are combined, you will have a consistent wind at your back pushing you toward optimal productivity and a faster path to successfully achieving your goals.
Three Steps to Being Significantly More Productive at Work:
1. Define what you need to improve to be more productive.
2. Run yourself through the P=META formula to help you determine what will help you improve. Specifically, find out if you are lacking on meaning, energy, triggers and/or your ability behind that certain task.
3. Focus on improving in that ONE area. Focus is the key word. Pick one area to improve, then chase it down and tackle it to the ground before you attempt to improve another area.
For instance, many sales trainers or productivity motivational speakers will suggest that you outline your top 3 most productive activities for each day the day before. Doing this has been suggested to increase your productivity at work by as much as 25%.
Let’s run this through my three steps:
1. Define –You know you can improve your productivity by being more organized and outlining tomorrow’s most productive work today.
2. META: Let’s run this through the META formula
a. MEANING: This strategy is meaningful and will enable you to produce more in the same time.
b. ENERGY: This task should take little time and energy, so it will not significantly reduce your personal energy levels. Plus, it will increase your sense of control of your daily objectives, which produces massive positive energy and motivation.
c. TRIGGERS: As the end of the day approaches it will trigger you to outline your key tasks for tomorrow.
d. ABILTY: After giving it a little thought, most people can identify their key tasks.
If you ran into difficulty with any of the four META elements, then you can use that information is both a way to greater understanding of why you may procrastinating and a trigger to improve.
Doing these three things will give you clarity as to why you are procrastinating and provide you with a clear path to finding a solution. Now you can go from just wanting to improve productivity in the workplace to actually doing it!
This is taken from my speeches to many organizations’ top sales people and organizations that want more top performers.
It is in my book Change Your Day, Not Your Life http://andycore.com/cyd/
And this video is now part of a four-part series.