Four Unexpected Things You Can Do to Instantly Increase Your Productivity

I've got the most distracting co-worker who's always trying to bring me down. His name is Netflix, and he sits right across the hall.

You see, I work from home—from my bedroom, specifically—which not only means that I have distractions galore, but also no one around to witness if I cave. There are no co-workers or supervisors who would notice if I took a three hour lunch break, and there's no one to glare at me if I watch three episodes of Friends at my desk.

Basically, it's up to me to make sure that I have a plan to stay productive, and that I stick to it.

At first, I thought my productivity would be nosediving at home. But since I've left the office for my bedroom, I've actually become the most focused I've ever been. I've learned a lot about productivity since setting my own hours, most of which wasn't obvious to me before I acquired such aggravatingly amusing co-workers.

Below are a few of the things I've learned—unexpected tricks I've accumulated that help me keep Netflix in his place during the day.

1. Don't work Monday morning.

The first thing I do every Monday morning is go through all of the deadlines I have coming up in the next two weeks. For me, this means going through my docket and checking the status of every case with an upcoming due date. As I go through my docket, I put notes on my calendar so that when I'm finished, I can visualize (literally, on my calendar) exactly what I need to get finished that week.

It takes about an hour for me to do this every week, but it's definitely not an hour wasted; once I can see everything that needs to happen, it's a lot easier to prioritize. I can set goals for each day so that I don't have to think about it again during the week, saving me time, headaches, and panic in the long run.

2. Schedule a time to worry.

My boss actually taught me this when I first started working in a law firm, when I was thoroughly overwhelmed with the idea of a docket. He told me what he does to manage the stress of his (even larger) docket: he makes a list of daily tasks (like I mentioned above) and then doesn't think about those tasks until they're scheduled. By scheduling a time to think about each task, he is able to keep today from being overwhelming.

Because today is the day he worries about Tuesday's worries, not the day he looks ahead to the ever-growing mountain of things he has to get finished this week. He's scheduled time to worry about that, so he's able to keep cool now.

3. When you get an email, ignore it.

When I first started working, I treated every email I received like a ticking time bomb—if I didn't stop, read, and reply that second, it would blow me up to unresponsive smithereens. And so every time I received an email, I stopped what I was doing so I could send a reply.

And you know what? I would waste half my day re-starting projects where I had lost my focus. But in reality, instead of losing my steam with whatever I was doing, I could have easily responded to the email after I was finished—turns out, none of them were actually going to explode.

Now, when I get an email, I briefly skim it to see if it's critical. And if it's not, I make a note to myself to reply later, and then I ignore it. It's amazing how much more quickly I can finish something when it's not punctured with less-than-urgent interruptions, and much to my relief, I've yet to encounter an explosive email.

4. Don't work too hard.

Forget everything I just said about interruptions—sort of.

You see, while I've found that a report is ten times harder to write when you're answering Linda from down the hall every ten minutes, it can be just as hard to write if you stare at your screen for hours at a time. After about an hour and a half, my mind starts to wander, and I realize I've been reading the same line three times while thinking about what I'm having for lunch.

One of the biggest things that helps me stay productive is hourly (at least every two hours) breaks to take a walk, get a drink, or sometimes even jump rope in my living room. The breaks aren't long (maybe five or ten minutes), but they're enough to give my brain a second to cool off and start fresh.

Plus, my hourly movement is like quitting smoking—talk about a win-win.

tl;dr - How I Increased My Productivity Every Monday, I put that week's deadlines on a calendar so I can visualize how my week needs to go. I schedule a time to worry about something, and then forget about it. I don't interrupt what I'm doing to respond to non-urgent emails. I take a physical and mental break every hour or two.

What's your biggest weapon for staying productive?

Four Easy Things You Can Do Right Now to Make Your Emails More Effective

About ten months ago, I left office life and started working from home. And since then, I've been living dream: answering work emails without pants.

Since I’ve stared working from home, I've also become a lot more reliant on email. You see, walking over to someone’s desk is no longer an option for me, so about 90% of my daily interactions take place online.

That said, when it comes to the art of email, I've become a Van Gogh of Outlook.

It wasn't always this way though; at one point, I was more at the finger painting level of things. But like all great artists, I learned.

And today, I’m sharing four tips I've learned that have helped me make sure my emails are as effective as possible, and which I hope will help you polish your own online communication.

Use active voice.

Here’s a test: which sentence do you think is easier to understand?

a) The blog post was written by the wordsmith.
b) The wordsmith wrote the blog post.

Or how about here:

a) Eyes were rolled by the unamused blog readers.
b) The unamused blog readers rolled their eyes.

If you’re like me, option b (the active voice) is a lot easier on the brain. My readers' brains are important to me, so whenever possible, I use the active voice. While this tip has helped me in all of my writing, it is especially helpful when emailing, when clarity is key.

Put down the thesaurus.

Working under my general assumption that everyone knows and loves the show Friends, I’m sure you remember the episode when Joey writes Chandler and Monica a reference letter. In that episode, Joey uses a thesaurus to come up with sentences like: “They are humid prepossessing Homo Sapiens with full sized aortic pumps.” (In normal speak: "They're warm, nice people with big hearts.")

When writing an email, clarity is almost always more important than impressive language. In other words, it’s fine to use words like “use” and “said” in your email instead of their fancy cousins, “utilize” and “articulate.” Basically, don’t be a word slob, but also don’t be a Joey.

---

Don’t be a word slob,

but also don’t be a Joey.

---

Two is better than one (sentences, that is).

Once, after a long day, I received an email with a sentence that had many different points, from a person who had many different thoughts and a particular fondness for commas, which he used without hesitation to come up with the longest sentence I ever read, thereby forcing me to reread the email with my very tired eyes at least five times, much to my dismay.

Don’t get me wrong—I love a well-crafted sentence. But like point #2, email is all about clarity. One sentence may be more impressive, but two is a lot easier to read.

Be obvious.

People are busy, and busy people generally don’t like reading a lot of words—which means a lot of times, people are just skimming your email instead of reading the whole thing. So whenever possible, I make my point within the first sentence or two of my email. And if I can’t, or if there are multiple important points, I make sure that each important item jumps out at the reader. (Bolding things is my friend.)

And as an extra special added bonus, here is a fifth point: Stop apologizing. I could write a whole blog post about this one but that, my friends, is for another time.

Do you have any tips to add to this list? Do you like online communication, or do you prefer face-to-face?

My Favorite Time Management Tip (and a Giveaway! Free Stuff!)

Sometimes, it's the simple, seemingly obvious tips that are the game changers. You know, those little guys you blow off because, "That's so easy. No way that works."

Like, when someone told you to put a cup of water in the microwave when you're heating up pizza to keep the crust moist: so simple, it could never work. Right?

But let me tell you, it does. (And I take pizza very seriously, so I know.)

One of my favorite time management tips is one of those. You might read it and think, "This sounds too easy, and easy things don't work."

But it does. I swear. (And I take time management almost as seriously as pizza, so I wouldn't lie.)

First, let me ask you a question: have you ever noticed that when you're working under a tight deadline, you become a focused productivity ninja? Like, the night before you had a paper due in college: your brain was on rapid fire mode, and not once did you check Insta or Twitter.

But when you had attempted that same paper three days earlier, you were averaging about two sentences for every three cat videos.

Don't worry, it's natural. Most of us do it. We procrastinate until we don't have enough time to waste time.

And that's why this trick is one of my favorite time management tips: it takes advantage of something we all already do. Only instead of actually waiting until the last minute, the trick is to make a pseudo-deadline.

For example, I will look at all of my deadlines coming up in the next two weeks, and I will assign two or three tasks to every day. Then, I tell myself that I have to get those two or three tasks done before I can call it a day

It sounds silly, but by setting these self-imposed deadlines, I never fart around in the afternoons thinking, "Oh, I'll just finish this tomorrow." Because in my world, there is no tomorrow. The deadline is today.

Like I said—simple, but it works.

And now the fun stuff...

That being said, I have an announcement that is almost remotely related: I've decided to host a giveaway. It's been about a month since Audaciously So officially launched, so now I'm working on spreading the word and growing this community.

But instead of spamming every social media outlet I'm allowed on, I'm going to make this a little more fun by creating some good old fashioned competition.

So how does the giveaway work? Simple:

All you have to do to enter the giveaway is follow me on Pinterest (here I am!) and pin your favorite career-related pin using the hashtag #AudaciouslySo. I'm not a fan of hoops, so there will be no more for you to jump through.

The giveaway will end on Tuesday, June 21, 2016, at 12AM.

Once the giveaway is over, I will pick my favorite pin. Assuming that the lucky pinner is following me on Pinterest, she will win the prize! Specifically, whoever pins the most interesting pin will win:

This Gold and White Day Designer Weekly/Monthly Planner || to get your time management on

Nice Girls Don't Get the Corner Office: Unconscious Mistakes Women Make That Sabotage Their Careers || to help you stop sabotaging yourself

This Pineapple Pencil Holder || to help you pimp out your desk, blogger style

Sound good? Good. Because I'm so excited to see what you all pin!

What's your favorite time management tip? Did you enter the giveaway? Leave me a comment and let me know!