How To Increase Productivity: A Step-By-Step Guide

By Julia Cavalheiro

If you have ever finished your workday with the feeling that you didn’t accomplish something. Don’t worry, you are not alone. Managing your time with all the things that have to be done by the end of the day can be very challenging. Because of it, we want to help you, with a step-by-step guide on how to increase your productivity. 

The first step consists of:

In other words, stop fighting procrastination and learn how to use it in your favor

Procrastination or mind-wandering is a very normal and legitimate feeling, and this urge to stop your work to do something different is not the real issue. The problem starts when people have harsh and judgemental beliefs about themselves, adding a second layer of negative emotions, for example feeling ashamed, angry, or disappointed, making it even harder to be productive.

Sometimes procrastination can be a way to increase creativity or even stimulate critical thinking by just making you switch environments or try something different to boost your mind. In order to stop the vicious cycle of adding the negative second layer, it’s important to try to respond differently to the feeling and instead of trying to fight it, just seek to validate it without negative self-talk. 

Set small goals

By dividing the bigger tasks, it will become less overwhelming and more achievable. Try to change the word in your planner “finish project” to what steps you need to do in order to be able to finish it by your deadline. When doing this you can feel more in control of your productivity.

Remove temptation

Try to create a work environment that will have fewer distractions. For example, many people lose so much time just by checking unrelated social media, while they have to work; if you are this person, using apps like SelfControl, Freedom, StayFocused, or Anti-Social, that will block your access to social media during your period of work can be a good tool. 

Be accountable

Having someone that will help you keep track of your tasks can also be a good way to manage your accounts. The person of your choice would have the role to receive regular progress reports on your project and should respond to you depending on how your performance was. 

Decide a specific time for your deep work

Define when it’s the best time during your day that you can focus better, and then try to do consistently your hardest work during this frame time.

Track progress and reward yourself

In order to know how well you are with doing your work schedule, creating a tracking system can make it easier to know how well, or not you are with your work progress. Some people like it better with visual systems, others work better with the “to-do list”, regardless of the method, it can help you to have a quantitative perception of your productivity.

It is also important to reward yourself, and it can be made with anything that brings you joy; for example having a nice cup of coffee, watching an episode of your favorite series, having something nice for lunch, etc. 

Conclusion

Productivity is not something linear, and should not be treated as so. Feeling unmotivated, or procrastinating is normal. Nevertheless, there are some tricks that can help you to get back on track, like the ones above.

But everyone should also remember, that we do live in a world of an exacerbated search for productivity and that this frustration of not finding it can also lead to negative feelings, that could harm our mental health.

So, let’s try to be the best version of ourselves but with a critical view of the type of society that we live in.