Ever wish you could be in two places at one time? We’ve all felt the stress of having too much to do all at once. While we can’t help you clone yourself, we can provide some ideas on how to make the time you do have go further. Give your productivity a boost with these ideas to try when you ask “How can I be more productive in the daily grind?”
Productivity Hack #1: Delegate with Accountability
Putting “your baby” in someone else’s hands can be nerve-wracking. What if the people you bring onto the team don’t do it right? You know empowering them is the right thing to do, but how do you get over the urge to micromanage?
When you delegate, take the time to spell out in advance exactly what your helper will be held accountable for. Hopefully you only have to do this the first or second time, but if you are thorough you can hand it off and forget about it. Be sure to evaluate the work after the first or second time so the employee knows exactly where she stands and how she can do better.
Empower your staff with jobs matched to their skills and a clear set of expectations from you, then let them do what you pay them to do. And don’t forget to focus on what they are doing well! When they are empowered and encouraged, their productivity increases.
Productivity Hack #2: Multiply Your Time with Automation
In 2000, one American farmer produced 12 times more per hour than a farmer in 1950. That’s just one measure of the huge increase in productivity in the agricultural sector in the recent past. Wouldn’t it be great to be more than 10 times as productive as you are now? In part, the agricultural industry did it through technological innovation and automation.
It’s time to become a fan of digital automation. Even the simplest content management, project management or customer relationship management platform can bring surprising superpowers to your workday.
One example we like to suggest is to create a batch of written content, like this blog article, at one time, say once a week or once a month, then schedule it for publishing later on social media, your website, emails, newsletters and so forth. Digital tools can then track and report on responses and gather leads from the channels you use to distribute your content.
Think about all the contact names and email addresses you currently have. Wouldn’t it be nice to send a friendly email once a month to nurture prospects on that list? Block off a few hours to compose a series of six emails, slot them into a workflow and move on to the next task while your digital tools do their work. I love productivity hacks that don’t require me to do more work.
What you can’t automate or delegate, outsource. You may find it more efficient and even less expensive to let an outside expert handle jobs that would take hours of training or practice to master.
Ammie’s Assignment: Make a list of all the tasks you touch every month. Can you think of ways to batch tasks for automation? If you get stumped, I’m just a click away. Let’s start a conversation about how you can boost your productivity more than you thought you could!