Posted by Claire White ¦ Business Skills
- Are you constantly interrupted to deal with 'just a quick question'?
- Are you working at home and surrounded by distractions?
- Have you figured out what time of day you do your best work - and do you make the most of it?
Check out these 5 tips to get you started.
- Work out who your interrupters are and devise a plan to block these out in future.
- Work out your most productive period - There's no point trying to do an important piece of work when your concentration is flagging or your creativity is at its lowest ebb. Most people have a good idea what time of day they work best but it wouldn't be hard to work out when yours is. If it's first thing in the morning, make sure that your most important work is done before anything else has the chance to distract you.
- Create business disciplines - Many successful entrepreneurs have built their businesses via consistent chunks of dedicated concentration time. UK entrepreneur, Nigel Botterill, with eight £million businesses to his name, advocates spending 90 minutes every working day on the most important development projects. Studies having shown that 90 minutes is the average length of time most people can concentrate before they become ineffective.
- Make sure everyone knows the rules - impress on everyone how important it is that during your dedicated 90 minutes you must not be interrupted. A useful mantra - Do Not Disturb Unless the Building is On Fire! - Make it apply to everyone, including staff, family and friends, and don't waiver. It may seem a little anal at first but once you've established the rule it will be accepted as the norm. You may well be surprised by just how much you get done, and experience shows that other people will quickly begin to appreciate the benefits of it too.
- Pick the right environment for you - it's crucially important that you have somewhere you can concentrate and won't be interrupted - research shows that for every interruption we lose 15 minutes effective work time, 4 interruptions a day and you've lost an hour! - But that doesn't necessarily mean you need complete peace and quiet or to have a dedicated office where you can close the door. I know one very successful entrepreneur who built her million pound cleaning business by driving to her local motorway service station every morning, turning off her phone and spending 90 minutes concentrating on business development.
So what tips do you have for better productivity? Have you noticed what effect 'where you do your business' has on you? I'd love to get your feedback below.
Share This Post
comments powered by Disqus