Do you have a difficult time getting your tasks done?
The common excuse is “I didn’t have enough time.”
Yet, if you examine your day, you’ll often find that the contrary was true. You had plenty of time, and you still didn’t get that simple todo done.
Could it be that you are giving yourself too much time?
Less Time Can Be More Productive
It happens to all of us.
You get to the end of your day and you still didn’t get to that one task. The important one that you said you would do today.
You had plenty of time. In fact, you had several blocks of unscheduled time. You just couldn’t get yourself to do it.
When you reach the end of your day, that task still isn’t done.
You had plenty of time. And maybe that was the problem.
You had too much time.
“Giving yourself less time for a task is a great motivator to action.”
The next time you find yourself unable to get tasks done, try giving yourself less time to complete them.
Here are some tips to drive your productivity by allowing less time:
- Set a Deadline… even if there isn’t one – Nothing creates action and motivation like a deadline. Even if your task does’t have a deadline, give it one anyway. And set it well in advance of when you want to get the work done.
- Haste Doesn’t Always Equal Waste – Sometime haste doesn’t mean wasted time. Use speed to get your task in motion and build productivity momentum. A first draft or attempt is often better than none, and gets you that much closer to finishing.
- Make an Appointment – Confining a task to a specific time slot on your calendar not only makes sure you will get to it, but also limits the time allowed for that particular item.
- Give Yourself Less Time – Work expands to fill the time allowed. Give yourself even less time that you think the task requires. You might just surprise yourself.
- Focus Your Time on One Task – Multi-tasking leads to many tasks started and not many done. Even worse, the ones that get done while multi-tasking are usually the less important ones.
Give Your Tasks Less Time
When your work seem to be floating through your day and never reaching completion, it may be a result of too much time.
Don’t give your tasks the flexibility to pick their own time frame and duration. Instead, give them less time and drive them to completion.
Many of those tasks won’t take nearly as much time as you were going to give them.
Question: What tasks do you need to give less time to in your day? You can leave a comment by clicking here.