10 productivity rules that will help you achieve what you set out to do

10 productivity rules that will help you achieve what you set out to do. Leading, maintaining, motivating, and promoting optimal functioning, labor productivity and a high level of competitiveness in the market is the challenge that all organizations must assume day after day. Nevertheless, this is not an easy mission. The success of it depends on the management and leadership’s capacity to handle complexity. Also, on several aspects that must be constantly monitored and controlled within the company.

The world of work is increasingly demanding. Whether you work for large companies or smaller companies, being productive is essential. Besides, optimizing efforts and resources is a good way to be more efficient. So, want to improve your personal productivity?

What is productivity?

Productivity is the relationship between the total productive activity and the means or resources invested to achieve such activity in a given period. This takes into account the resulting quality of the product.

Now, these resources may be of different nature and may be measured based on different factors, such as time spent. For instance: personal productivity in the business field, natural resources, infrastructure, and capital required to achieve a given productive activity.

Therefore, productivity is a necessary indicator to know whether the viability of productive activity is higher or lower. Productivity rules. The more resources used to make a certain quantity of a product in a period of time, the lower the productivity, and vice versa.

Productivity advantages

Sometimes the workload is excessive. Besides, being aware of many things at once does not help us focus on a specific goal. It’s customary to start many tasks and not finish them or not finish them as we expected. However, that goes against personal productivity, also affecting the performance of the company.

It’s necessary to find a way to focus on what is important. Also, to prioritize and be effective. On the one hand, being productive helps you order your work and do it more slowly and better. On the other hand, it’s a good method to optimize your time and energize efforts.

Covering too many tasks at once can be counterproductive, but from today you will know how to boost your personal productivity. Besides, these rules will help you become a highly productive person without sacrificing more than you should.

One of the notions of productivity indicates that you should do as much as you can in the shortest possible time. However, in the long run, this can actually be very unproductive as you will end up exhausting yourself and start to hate your obligations. So, the secret is actually to set priorities and focus on what’s important. Because of this, when there is something you really want to achieve, you will achieve it no matter how long it takes.

Firstly, a golden rule of productivity is to focus on your goals and priorities

If you are not clear about what your goals are, you will not have any chance of achieving them. In other words, if you don’t know where you’re going, you may never get there.

Goals are the great things you want to achieve in your life. So, focus on priorities, which are the things you have to do to help achieve your goals. For example, pay the bills, or support your family.

You need to focus on your goals and priorities. 

In a company, a multitude of tasks that accumulate over the days can arise. Perhaps the most logical thing would be to make a plan and follow it strictly. This becomes a failed task in most cases.

Surely, among all your tasks, there are some more important than others. A key way to increase your personal productivity is to prioritize. Do the ones that are most urgent or important first. Give them the time they need.

It’s important to always remember that a well-done task is better than a thousand poorly completed.

Second productivity rule, always do your job

You need to have a powerful work ethic that guides your decisions, about what is and isn’t right to do. Besides, you should not commit to anything beyond your ability; this is why it is important to plan your agenda very well. Remember that your word is worth gold, and you must keep it as well as you can.

Third productivity rule, love your work

If you like your work, long hours do not become an ordeal. You can work tirelessly for long periods of time when long-term projects are presented, and you should not feel bad. Besides, there is nothing wrong with having fun at work. You can achieve multimillion-dollar projects by being happy and smiling.

There will be days when you will not have such a strong load. On that day you have the right to take the day or afternoon off. Work should not be painful. In fact, it should be a pleasure and as easy as possible for you.

It sounds like a cliché, but if you don’t like what you do, you’ll never be happy. And as we have said, without happiness you can’t reach the desired level of personal productivity. It satisfies you, excites you and makes you want to continue learning. Productivity rules. That’s necessary to face the challenges of each day.

If you do not find sense in what you are doing, it’s not worth it to keep going. If you want to contribute to boost the personal productivity of the professionals in the workforce, strive to keep them motivated. For example, build a pleasant work climate and recognize their talent.

Fourth productivity rule, be flexible, adaptable and creative.

One of the big misconceptions about entrepreneurship is that you are your own boss. This isn’t correct. Don’t forget that you owe it to your customers, your investors and, in a way, to your employees. They are the stakeholders.

Fifth productivity rule, take care of yourself

You should be able to eat well, sleep well, exercise, and take good care of yourself without stressing about how much you got done before breakfast. Stress monsters are not healthy. Besides, it’s doubtful that they can be productive.

Sixth productivity rule, avoid distractions

It’s the hardest rule to comply with. The amount of stimuli we currently have makes it take much longer to finish a task. For instance, constantly looking at WhatsApp, Facebook or Twitter causes us to be distracted and stop focusing on our work. This leads to loss of concentration and therefore ends up costing us more time to complete tasks.

Keeping your phone far away is a good tip not to fall into temptation. Productivity rules. Remember, if you care about personal productivity, social media isn’t paramount, it can wait.

Seventh productivity rule, be positive

Normally, overwork generates stress. The accumulation of tasks makes us feel burdened. We don’t get to do everything we want. Because of this, we get angry with the world. A good attitude will help us to be more resolute and to have more ideas. If we are angry or in a bad mood, then it’s likely that we won’t do good work.

Eight productivity rule, enjoy your free time

Sometimes, we think we’re not important. We prioritize our work over our life. Our free time is used to finish tasks or advance work. This isn’t right. Productivity rules. Understanding that each of us, our family, or our friends are paramount is also relevant to working well. So, if we spend time with the people we care about most, we’ll get to work happier. That will help us to cope with our duties better. Work is important, but you are essential.

Ninth productivity rule, the Pareto principle

The Pareto principle was created by the Italian economist and philosopher Vilfredo Pareto in 1907. It proposes that greater results can be obtained by investing little time and few resources. This implies, among other things, that putting more money and resources into an activity does not necessarily translate into significant improvement. In other words, it is often relatively easy to get much better results without spending more resources.

This advice can be very useful for workers who want to improve their productivity in a crisis context where budget cuts are needed. Productivity rules. The Pareto principle emphasizes that better planning during the day and detection of efficiency errors is key. Although paradoxical, continuing to spend is the easy solution. Besides, we have already been working like this and at the present moment, we are imbued in the inertia of habits.

Tenth productivity rule, the Parkinson’s law

“The work is expanding to take up all the time available.” This law was enunciated in 1957 by the British historian Cyril Northcote Parkinson and states that work is usually carried out according to the time that one has.

That means that if we have little time to perform a task, we will finish it in less time; and if we have more time, we will finish that work in more time. Productivity rules. 

Our way of working adapts to our perception of the working day. Keeping this in mind can help us improve time management and better organize the calendar. For example, one of the implications of this law of productivity is that it is almost always better to have many simple short-term goals than a general medium-term or long-term goal. In the first case, we will be creating a context that predisposes us to make good use of all the time available for the final goal.