20 Productivity Hacks To Make Your Day Easier

All of us are looking for the one piece of wisdom that will make our lives easier and more enjoyable. Between navigating through all of our various roles in life working and as daughters, mothers, friends, partners—and just our own individual contributions—there is always a long list of things to do. Although there is no single way to be productive, there are many productivity hacks that we can implement into our lives to help us get there.

 

1. Use your commuting to achieve productivity

As we move between in-office and remote work, commutes can still be unpredictable. But for most of us, there are still a few minutes in many days where we’re in that “in between” space of not at home but not quite settled into the days’ business. How can this time work in your favor? Is it a quick phone call to check in with a parent? Or five minutes of deep breathing and listening to a podcast? Even though this time is very short, it can be a rewarding way to begin and end your day.

 

2. Get rid of your email

Yes, clean it up. It’s all there! Get rid of half-done replies, drafts that won’t go anywhere, and holiday sales notifications you didn’t happen to shop your way through. You will feel refreshed if you spend 30 minutes filing, unsubscribing, or getting responses in your personal and professional emails.

 

3. Prioritize Your Tasks

Prioritization sounds easy, but it isn’t always simple. To really prioritize, don’t just make a list of tasks that need to be done and pluck off the “biggest,” “hardest,” or even “easiest.” Instead, think of your day as a set of building blocks that all need to fit together. Where’s the causality? What must be done first in order to make the week or day go better? This more connected method helps us overcome some resistance when it comes to difficult tasks.

 

4. Use the Pomodoro Method

These little tomato timers and their “work then break” method are a fan favorite for a reason! It’s proven that our brain feels more refreshed and focused when we can work in bursts. Set a timer, choose a small task or project, then give yourself the breaks to recharge.

 

5. Ignore Your Email in Morning

If you find this one uncomfortable, give it a go for a week and see how it affects your productivity. It’s a natural inclination to want to respond and jump on tasks when we see an email. Starting your day diving right into the piles of emails you have means that your inbox becomes your prioritization list—in control of you instead of the other way around. You might consider setting aside an hour for email checking in the afternoon so that you can focus on your priorities.

 

 

6. Know Your Work Zones

It is a great productivity hack to match the work you do with the place you do it. Are you more productive at a kitchen table or a desk? Or maybe your best creative ideas come to you when you’re on a walk and can let your mind reset. It doesn’t matter what your situation is, knowing where and when you are at your best can help you be more productive and improve your work-life balance.

 

7. Strategically Leverage Your “OOO” Message

Who says Out Of Office emails are only for vacation? Use this autoresponder to get creative and target specific projects. “I’m on a special project right now, and my mornings this week (9-12) will be dedicated to that effort. Please contact me outside of those hours for the most timely response.” Push the boundaries by setting some of your own.

 

8. Get Your Day Started the Night Before

“Scoping” your day is different from planning. When you’re scoping your day, you’re mentally preparing yourself for the various waves of energy and effort you’ll need throughout the day. Can you shift an important call to the morning when you’re feeling a little more fresh? You might consider asking a friend to pick up after-school pickup if your meeting is delayed. You will have more options for managing the day and rearrange your schedule if you can do this assessment on the night before a full-day.

 

9. Reduce small distractions

Every little ping and buzz takes us out of our mental focus. Tune in to the nudges that push you out of your zone every day. Is it a flashing message? Do Not Disturb the office for a few hours. Do you hear the buzz from the office floor? Headphones, please! A dimmed room and some blue light glasses may be all you need. It helps you focus on a single task or project without distractions.

 

10. Install a social media blocker

There are many apps and sites that can help you control your social media use. It is almost as important as helping to control its use to identify when and why you are turning to it throughout the day. Do you find yourself reaching for a “scroll” when you’ve hit a tough part of a task? When you’re lacking some motivation? Or when you’re burned out and need a break? Understanding your “why” will do an even bigger job of helping you reorient to productive mode.

 

 

11. Book Time for Your Self-Care

A daily massage is a great way to self-care, but there are other ways to do it in a shorter time frame. You could have a full-blown tea ritual in the breakroom, complete with a fancy pot you keep at work, or walk the block doing a walking meditation. The point is to identify new hobbies or the thing for you that yields maximum good feelings for the highest value cost and effort to help ensure you keep it up.

 

12. Find Ways to Set Up “Habit Stacking”

The book made habit stacking very popular. Atomic HabitsThis allows you to link new goals to existing habits, increasing your chances of achieving them. You’ll start to view your new habit goals in a whole new way when you think about the small ways you can link them together to be more productive.

 

 

13. Know Your Personal Bandwidth Triggers

We all know what our personal “running on empty” looks like. It is important to be able to recognize it before it takes over and you can rewire. Do you start to squint your eyes more? Do you get distracted and look through your old photo collection? Whatever your personal trigger is, that means you’ve hit top capacity on your bandwidth—become friends with her, and watch out for her more regularly.

 

14. Make “No” Your First Response

This may be another counterintuitive approach to productivity, but starting with “no” means that you get to say “yes” to a whole host of other things that are your personal priorities. If someone approaches you with a new project, or a need, try to see it through the lens of putting the burden on them to show why it is worth your effort.

 

15. Trust Your Natural Rhythms

Some of us can be called morning people. Some of us may not be. We may never be our best selves, no matter how many mini videos we watch of a young woman getting out of bed to get her green juice and going to yoga. Find your own rhythm and hack it to find the best times for you to accomplish your tasks.

 

16. Find a planning system that works for you

Without a system, productivity is impossible. That doesn’t mean that you have to string together some ultra high-tech collection of apps, trackers, and planners. It’s possible. DoesYou need a consistent way of organizing your life tasks to reach the goals you care about. Whether that’s through a gorgeous paper planner that feels more like a journal or a minimal but comprehensive app to tackle your to-do list, find your sport.

 

 

17. Attach your Long-Term Goals to Everyday Activities

Goals aren’t happening unless they’re broken down into mini-objectives and addressed in small pieces. You can think about how you can make your long-term dreams come true and move forward every day in small ways. What about running a marathon to celebrate your next birthday? Great. Even a 10-minute jog today can get you on the right track to achieving your goal.

 

18. Communicate Your Productivity Goals

We all do better achieving our productivity goals when we’ve shared them with someone else. This can be formal, as in telling your boss or colleagues what you’re up to this week, or it can just be chatting with a loved one about what’s on your plate lately. Externalizing what we’re doing and what we need to get a job done is a huge part of productively working through our task list.

 

19. Slow down

Quality almost always wins out over quantity. If you find yourself hurrying through a task and then moving on to the next, this is your trigger to slow down. Not only are we likely to make mistakes that will just take more time to correct in the long run, but we’re also training ourselves to overpack our days and often times not communicating that timelines may be unreasonable or that we need more resources. What are the essential elements to do a great job, not just one that is quick?

 

20. Define Your Personal Productivity Metrics

On that note, productivity isn’t about doing more, faster. We could define productivity with a little more nuance and say that it’s about doing the best job, at the right time, with the right resources, and for the right objectives to get to the best outcome. When that’s the case, “how much” we checked off our list doesn’t matter as much as how productively we used our energy in a day, matching it with the things that matter the most.