Adam Fuhrer

Photo courtesy of Stephen

When implementing these 9 tips, a normal day at work, can be handled much more efficiently and productive.

1. Set goals you want to accomplish for the day, the night before. Take 5 minutes the night before and write down on a piece of paper the tasks you want to accomplish for the next day. Then bring that piece of paper wherever you go. Make sure you review it and accomplish those goals.
2. Wake up early. If you have your alarm going off at 7:30, change it to 6:30, it will give you time to prepare for the day. It will also give you time to finish that extra task you couldn’t finish the night before. It is very quiet when you wake up early and personally, I feel I get the most tasks done right when I wake up. Besides, watching the sun rise once in a while is a really awesome thing.
3. Start your day off right. If you have the time, take a warm shower, it really wakes you up in the morning. Also having a small breakfast before you head off to work, can really help jump start your day. Go light. Something like some fresh fruit or oats, are two of my favorites.
4. Clear your desk. Clear your desktop of any clutter, that means pens, pencils, calculators, papers. I love it when all that is on my desk is just my monitor and a couple pens in a cup. It keeps me focused on the task at hand, and I feel I have more room to move around.
5. Close Email and IM. Those little pop-ups that come up when you get a new message only distracts you and moves you away from doing work. Adium, can help you sometimes, but other times it just distracts you. Take some time later to log on to Email and IM afterwards.
6. Take breaks. Take a designated break after you’ve have finished some work. Reward yourself after finishing a task. Go outside, get some fresh air. Or maybe go on your favorite site for 15 minutes.
7. Get rid of outside distractions. That means close your door, let your phone go to the answering machine (answer only if extremely important), close the internet and any other applications you are not using at the moment.
8. Don’t multi-tast. Focus on one task at a time. Don’t multi-task. Take the time to finish one task, properly, and efficiently. Otherwise, your brain could get confused and start mixing stuff up.
9. Listen to some light music. This might just be a personal thing but I tend to listen to some light music, most of the time without words. So I’m not actually concentrating on any of the lyrics. Some really great instrumental music is Nine Inch Nails’ new album, called “Ghosts”.