Explore all the solutions you can create with Paperform: surveys, quizzes, tests, payment forms, scheduling forms, and a whole lot more.
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See all integrationsExplore all the solutions you can create with Paperform: surveys, quizzes, tests, payment forms, scheduling forms, and a whole lot more.
See all solutionsConnect with over 2,000 popular apps and software to improve productivity and automate workflows
See all integrationsIt seems like we’re all on an endless quest to get more done. And as long as you maintain realistic expectations and don’t tiptoe into toxic productivity territory, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to stretch your time for maximum impact.
Particularly as we all grapple with ever-changing work environments, increasingly strapped resources, and seemingly never-ending demands on our time, identifying and implementing some productive work habits can help us feel a little more in control of our otherwise unwieldy to-do lists.
Not sure where to begin amidst the avalanche of hacks, systems, routines, and “make your bed” platitudes? We’ve pulled together five tried and true productivity strategies, along with actionable tips to help you get started—today.
Whether you realize it or not, you likely already have times of day when you naturally feel energized and focused. You also have times when you feel like a human slug (sigh, it’s that classic afternoon slump).
You can thank your body’s ultradian rhythms for that. These are natural cycles that occur frequently within a 24-hour period and explain those periodic (and oftentimes predictable) dips in your energy.
Are your eyes glazing over? Don’t worry—you don’t really need to understand the science here. The most important thing to do is pinpoint the times when you’re hyper-attentive, as well as the times when you’re drained and dragging. That helps you be more strategic with how you plan your work by assigning your more creative and demanding tasks to your super-focused times and saving menial tasks for times when you’re dragging.
For too many people, finding the information they need is a task more fitting for Sherlock Holmes. They scroll through old email threads, dig through file folders, and follow a winding, convoluted path just to get a single note or resource.
While estimates vary, recent research says that the average employee spends over three-and-a-half hours every single day searching for the information they need to do their jobs. Regardless of the specific digit, having to repeatedly hunt down information is pretty inefficient.
Setting up systems to ensure you have easy and straightforward access to the information you frequently rely on is a productivity tip that requires a bit of an upfront investment in time and energy, but pays dividends in the long run.
You might think that you’re a whiz at monitoring your inbox while working on a slide deck while immediately responding to instant messages. You feel like you’re getting a lot done all at once—look at you go!
The bad news is that you aren’t actually multitasking the way you think you are. You’re context switching, which is a fancy term that means you’re rapidly jumping between tasks. And that relentless switching of gears comes at a cost in terms of your productivity.
Every time you rip your focus away for a distraction, it takes you a little over 23 minutes to fully refocus on the original task. Plus, all of those disruptions are exhausting. The same study found that, after only 20 minutes of interrupted performance, people reported significantly higher stress, frustration, workload, effort, and pressure.
If you really want to get meaningful work accomplished, you need to eliminate (or at least minimize) your major distractions.
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Wellness tips probably aren’t what you expect to see when looking for ways to get more done at work, but how you feel physically has a huge impact on your energy, focus, and productivity.
This isn’t novel information—we all know we should drink more water or that we should reach for a handful of nuts when we need a mid-morning snack rather than a pastry. But admittedly these healthy routines are easy to say and way harder to implement.
Don’t overwhelm yourself by overhauling your diet or committing to a rigorous training program. Even seemingly simple and small changes to prioritize your physical health during your workday can make a surprisingly big difference.
Starting something from scratch—whether it’s a slide deck, a survey, a workflow, or something else—takes a lot of extra time. It also leaves way more room for inconsistency and error, particularly if somebody needs to take over that task for you at some point.
That’s the beauty of templates. They give you a helpful and customizable structure and starting point so you don’t need to invest hours and elbow grease into those early stages.
You can create templates for yourself or see if some of the tools you’re already using offer ready-made templates that you can tweak.
We all want to make more efficient use of our time, and there’s nothing wrong with that—in fact, it’s a smart thing to do.
But remember to give yourself some grace too. While the above tips will help you work more effectively (and hopefully feel better about the work you’re doing too) you’re still a human and not a machine.
You aren’t meant to be productive every single moment of every single day, and no amount of clever productivity strategies will change that. And honestly, trying to do so is a one-way ticket straight to burnout.
If you want to make some strategic changes to better manage your work and your own wellbeing? Give the above tips a try. And if all else fails, a quick nap never hurt anyone.
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