How many hours in a day you actually do something useful or meaningful? How many tasks you can complete within a day? Do you normally work overtime?
I have to admit, most of my time last time was spent doing something not meaningful nor useful, and I was slow doing most of my tasks and in the end in order to catch up with the deadline, I did normally work overtime.
Well, luckily those things I just mentioned were my past. But does the same thing happen to you?
In case you do feel the same or similar thing happen to you, then I have 7 proven good ways where you can avoid (or at least minimize) distractions that keeps you unproductive so that you can be a productive person.
Here are 7 ways you can minimize distraction
1. Silent your phone. Turn off your phone if required.
Inform your spouse, kids, Boss, peers, clients and whoever important, tell them that you are going offline for this many period of time. Give them emergency contact number just in case.
2. Close email, close browser, make priority.
Keep checking and replying email also kill your productivity. Schedule a time when to check email and stock to it.
Browsing something unrelated to work is also number #1 productivity killer.
Make a priority. Know when to check email, know when to browse things unrelated to work.
How many in one day do you check your email? Check here for tips and tricks the best time to check email within a day.
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3. Use earphone but listen to nothing.
Most of the time when people see you without earphone/headphone, they will start talking to you – work related or non-work related. However the moment you put that earphone on your pair of ears, these people will think a few times before calling you for something, especially if that something is not so important. Even if in the end they will call you while you are using earphone, try to pretend that you don’t hear him/her for the first few calls. If the topic is really important or urgent, they will keep calling you or poke you directly until they get your attention, otherwise if it’s not that important nor urgent nor life-threatening issues, they stop calling you and going to talk to you some time later or next time.
4. Find quieter place – distance yourself from others.
Set time when you can be disturbed. Use that alone time to focus on doing your tasks and to complete them within the timeline.
5. Avoid lengthy meetings.
If you are the meeting leader, invite those who are really related and put the agenda clearly. Avoid inviting the whole team who most of them are not really related to the topic you are about to discuss. At the same time, avoid discussing things that is only related to certain people (1 to 2 people but the meeting was sent to 10 people) and avoid at all costs unrelated things during the meeting. Make it short but meaningful and fruitful. Whenever possible, apart from agenda, put the materials as well on the email invitation so better chances for the meeting attendants to see them and understand them before meeting begins.
If you are the meeting attendant, if you know that it’s going to be a lengthy meeting and no real outcome (certain people like to do this – since it’s probably their job description – to arrange meeting and talk the whole day), try to get excuse and exit from the meeting room once your session/topics are finished/covered.
6. Learn to say No.
Another biggest distraction is that people keep looking for you to help them do their favor. Well, there are times where you should say No to them to help yourself stay focus and productive doing your task. Only then after you finished doing your tasks then offer your help to them.
7. Avoid gossipers and storytellers.
They like to talk. A lot. While gossipers can gossiping person A to Z that they can gossiping about, storytellers can tell you any story from topic A to Z.
If you have one full free day, I still suggest you to do something much better such as listening to meaningful podcasts or audio books rather than sitting with these 2 kind of persons. While gossiping is totally useless (at least for me), hearing the storyteller telling story actually can be good at some point- you may learn something new – however since this type of person will never stop talking, so still better to avoid this type of person as well.
Bring It All Together.
Try those tips above and see how much your productivity improve in a day. Do not abuse them (the tips), try to balance them so people around you won’t get annoyed you kept telling them No for everything and kept avoiding them for whatever reasons.
Do comments on comment section below if you feel your productivity improve after doing the tips above. Or if you have additional tips to share with the rest which works great for you and I have mentioned it, do share them on comment section below. Cheers!
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