Being productive can make a huge difference in your life. However, it can be easy to mistake being busy with being productive. And all it takes is something small to derail your productivity. So if you are currently derailed, or maybe you just want to push through the "busy" and be more productive, check out …
You may be reading this title and scratching your head wondering what the heck an OOT is? Don't worry, it's not some strange new dance or the latest social media platform full of people doing that new strange dance! OOT refers to "One Off Tasks!"
Do you ever find yourself bouncing between tasks? Then by the end of the day, you have several things started but very little finished? It can be a form of procrastination and definitely one of unfocused working. We jump from task to task, not finishing the first before bounding onto the next.
Do you love every book you've ever read? My guess is, not. You may, like me, not even love every book by your favourite author! And that's okay (no matter how guilty I sometimes feel about that). It's important to remember that you don't love every book, that not every story you read will draw you in, not every main character's journey will affect you deeply. And the same can be said for your story
Do you consider yourself a perfectionist? Do you constantly strive to do better, be better? Perfection is as elusive as quicksilver. It is the unicorn people desperately search for, claiming to see glimpses of it. Just need that little more time, more patience and finally, we'll see it, we'll reach it.
Have you ever struggled to deal with the Paper Mountain? Paper is one of life’s curious things. It’s completely inanimate and yet with a propensity to breed until you’re suddenly drowning in the stuff!
Being organised isn’t something you are automatically born with. Sure, some people seem to have a propensity for it but mostly, it’s a learned skill. That means you can get better at being organised. It involves putting systems in place and the discipline to actually USE them. That second part is where a lot of people fall down.
Last year, I wrote a post that discussed the merits of picking your Top 5 Tasks/Projects to focus on. We are easily distracted by Shiny Object Syndrome that has us flitting from one thing to another and actually gaining enough focus to truly commit to a project or task can be hard. The premise of the 5 Focus Tasks is that these are the ones you truly commit to and you DO NOT take on any other tasks until these are completed.
Planning out a whole year? Am I crazy? Well, perhaps. But I like to take stock of my methods and change them if they stop working for me. Now, while monthly goals and daily tasks do work, they weren't having the effect I needed for long-term goal planning. I decided I required something more drastic. *Insert dramatic music* I needed to do "Yearly Planning".
Emails have always been a bane in my life. Yes they have their uses and it makes things so much faster and efficient, but we are drowning in emails and many of us find our inboxes are just becoming a digital hoard of messages we can't organise or clear. Here is how I organise my email systems to make things easier.
